Lightborn

by L J Andrews

  Finding solid ground took longer with Angelet in tow. Once safely down, Isa ducked behind a box of spicy shrubs and urged Angelet close to her side. The gardens of Kawal’s manse were quiet, but beyond the gates the streets were alive with mischief and danger.

  “We will leave Sortis through the back alleys,” Isa instructed. “Stay close to me, and remember you are no noblewoman.”

  With a fearful breath, Angelet gripped the emerald cloak around Isa’s shoulders and they slipped into the city. A wooden crate fell from a ledge where two men scuffled over one of the stone walls in the city. Angelet cried out as Isa pulled her out of harm’s way and dragged her toward the shadows of an alley.

  “A noble witch,” a desperate voice grumbled as Isa rushed around the bend.

  Isa cursed herself for not noticing the man in the dark. The sword in his hand was already coated in blood and he caught the chance to grab her arm. Angelet seemed ready to faint in terror, but Isa had little patience for any distractions tonight. Rolling her arm so his grip slackened, and wrist bent, she slid her free hand across his neck and struck the tender part of his throat. Gasping, the man released her and dipped forward so Isa could pound her elbow against his spine. Sputtering, he stumbled giving the women time enough to flee.

  Angelet clutched her chest when Isa tossed her into an alley. It led straight through to another road that would eventually weave into Merchant Square or take them to the outer gate. Angelet startled when glass shattered, and laughter broke out further down the alleyway. Isa gripped Angelet’s arm and tossed her behind stacked piles of compost from the apartments above.

  “Keep quiet,” Isa snapped and pressed a hand against Angelet’s mouth. With a curt nod, Isa directed Angelet’s eyes toward the end of the alleyway at the same moment the clang of metal and boots broke the solace.

  A small unit of soldiers kept close to Kawal as the general stormed the shadows with a fierce look of madness in his expression. “They couldn’t have gone far,” Kawal bellowed. “Spread out and find her.”

  With wide eyes, Angelet hunched behind a burlap sack filled with rotting vegetable peelings. “You saw him.”

  “I have keen sense,” Isa whispered without moving her lips.

  Three soldiers took the left, three others took the right. One man remained close to his general, sword drawn, and eyes darting about the darkness when animal-like shrieks bounced down the walls from above. People leapt across the rooftops with drunken invincibility, one man nearly slipped and fell to his death, but nothing above distracted Kawal’s focus.

  “You said you saw them,” Kawal said without looking at the soldier.

  “I thought I did, My lord.”

  With a firm grip on his blade, Kawal drew his sword and fingered the amulet around his neck. Isa was drawn to the piece and had half a mind to ambush the general. She could likely stand as an equal with steel, but there was the matter of Angelet. Her fear seemed to paralyze her, and movement in the dark stilted any plans of ambush.

  “Halt,” Kawal shouted. “In the name of Emperor Baz, I order you to reveal yourself.”

  Angelet’s rapid breaths were hot on Isa’s neck as they peered through the piles of filth to where Kawal and his soldier had stopped in the alley. A sinister chuckle sent chills down Isa’s spine, but the familiarity of it twisted her insides like knots in a rope.

  “I’ve always found such demands entertaining, as if in the name of some weak, emperor would give me reason to pause.”

  Isa’s blood chilled when Kish stepped from the shadows, but he wasn’t alone. Two Ladroa men, and three more shadowed figures, stood at his shoulder though Isa had never seen such men. Armor like the darkest shade of black coated their strong bodies, and each held a blade of emerald that seemed to pollute the air with bitterness she could taste in the back of her throat.

  “You will stand down,” Kawal commanded.

  Kish grinned, though the handsome pull of his face was lost in the shadows. Tonight, Isa saw his ugliness as evil spilled from his countenance. “No, I don’t think I will.” With the snap of Kish’s fingers, the two Ladroa and three demons attacked.

  Kawal had impeccable form as he handled his sword, but his soldier couldn’t say the same. One Ladroa cut at the soldier’s shins, bringing the man to his knees, as the second thief slashed the back of his neck until the man fell in a heap of blood and death. Bile coated her tongue when one of the shadowed men stepped away from the sword fight and knelt at the dead soldier’s side.

  “Is he…” Angelet whispered, but Isa shook her head and held up a hand to silence the woman.

  Because he was—the demon man was leaning over the body and could only be devouring flesh or drinking blood, Isa didn’t want to know. She wanted to be anywhere but the alleyway.

  Kish snapped his fingers again and the two Ladroa dropped their weapons and returned to their masters like dogs. Kawal gasped. His cloak was shredded. Blood dripped down his lip and arm. Isa could see the way his grip trembled on the hilt of the sword and she could taste the general’s genuine fear as the two remaining blood drinkers trapped him from the front and rear.

  “What…have you…done?” Kawal said through harsh gasps at Kish.

  “Survived,” he said softly. “Although you won’t be able to say the same. Did you see anything, Gad?’ Kish asked one of the Ladroa.

  A man shook his head. “Nothing, I don’t see the stone at all. Don’t you suppose the Knights would have sensed something if it were here. Perhaps she has already found it.”

  “Perhaps,” Kish said evenly with a final glance at Kawal as the general stumbled over the hunched back of the man devouring the dead soldier’s blood. “Farewell General Kawal, may your death be swift. Or may it not.”

  Kish and the Ladroa faded into the darkness. Kawal tried desperately to fight away the man at his front, but failed to defend against the dagger of the shadow at his back. In a matter of moments Kawal struggled to gather a breath. Dark veins wrapped around his jaw and cheeks as the demon facing him dragged his unusual blade across Kawal’s throat.

  Angelet’s fingernails dug into Isa’s skin as they watched, stunned and remarkably undiscovered, as Kawal slumped to the stones of the alleyway. Blood Knights. Isa was frigid with fear. That was the only explanation. She was watching Sha’run’s Blood Knights murder then feed just as the rumors said.

  Angelet covered her mouth and swallowed a gasp when Isa tossed her back against the wall. “Quiet,” she snapped. Isa wasn’t a stranger to blood and even death. As a thief, some of the runs turned deadly. Yet, the sight in the center of the alley churned her stomach with such violence she was certain she would be sick.

  Sounds of lapping blood, groans as Kawal suffered and lingered in life; the poisonous blade and teeth split skin and remaining armor as the two knights finished the general. Muggy heat was typical during the season of the blood moon, but Isa’s skin was raised in frosty chills as she watched the carnage in the alley. Angelet trembled with silent tears soaking her cheeks. Isa’s jaw clenched as her palm tightened around Angelet’s mouth. Together the two women waited until the knights finished. It seemed to take hours until the hooded demons rose. Every inch of skin was covered whether from black cloaks or gloves or knee-high boots, so Isa never caught a glimpse of face nor eye. She thanked the Mount for she was certain should she lay eyes on a Blood Knight her nights would be filled with nightmares until death. The air warmed once the three shadows faded back into darkness and returned to the underworld from where they’d come.

  When silence surrounded the alley, Isa dared leave her protection of garbage and enter the open alley. She took careful steps to avoid any light. It felt as though all the blood drained from her face as she reached a shaking palm to Kawal’s face.

  Isa swallowed bile when she took in the damage to his chest and middle. Blood soaked his fine tunic, his skin wasn’t the smooth brown, but instead a dark, sticky red. Kawal’s eyes stared lifeless at the crimson sky as black veins stretched lik
e fingers of lightning beneath the surface of his skin as poison spread.

  “He’s…h-h-he’s dead.” Isa was too stunned, she hadn’t noticed Angelet had slipped right against her body. “What were they?”

  Isa lowered to her haunches burying her fear and disgust as she reached for the untouched amulet, still around Kawal’s neck. “I think…Blood Knights.”

  “Oh, by the Mount,” Angelet said, quickly tapping her forehead and bowing her head. “Sha’run has returned.”

  “Blood Knights have always tormented the empires, it doesn’t mean Sha’run has stepped out of his borders,” Isa snapped. She stared toward the dark archway where Kish had stood before Kawal was picked of his flesh. “Lady, you said this was important to Kawal. Why would it be left behind. The thieves and knights behaved as though they couldn’t see it.”

  Angelet hugged her middle as she offered a swift glance at the amulet. “There is something strange with that stone, maybe that’s why they couldn’t see it. Kawal would not part with it. He told me that someday it would tame me, and I would submit to him because of it. The beasts that killed him were after blood, not jewelry. I know nothing more about that amulet.”

  Isa brushed her finger over the surface and gasped as she doubled over.

  “Isa, what is it?” Angelet clutched her shoulders and helped sit her upright. “He is poisoned, you shouldn’t touch.”

  “Can’t you feel it?” Isa said under her breath. Kish spoke of sensing the power Kawal had hidden. How could the knights, or Ladroa miss such a suffocating surge?

  Tilting her head to one side, Isa stared at the fiery stone. The draw to touch it overwhelming, but the electric power had wrapped so tightly around her insides she wasn’t sure she could stand such a force again.

  “Feel what? Isa, we should go,” Angelet whimpered as she glimpsed quickly over her shoulders.

  Isa ignored the calls for terror in the streets; forgot Kawal’s body was bleeding at her feet; disregarded Kish was uniting with Blood Knights, and reached for the clasp on the amulet. A fiery pulse burned her palm, but not so harsh Isa needed to recoil. The piece seemed to bring a comfort, a confidence she’d need to make it through the streets of Jershon tonight. Isa didn’t know if her fear created the sensation in her mind, or if this amulet was something more than met the eye. Perhaps the Blood Knight didn’t recognize the power, but Kawal knew. He must have known what the stone held inside, why else would the general never part with such an item. Taking the amulet, Isa abandoned Kawal’s body, desperate to put more space between herself and the horrible death.

  Angelet shook Isa’s shoulders and muttered something, but Isa ignored the woman as she clasped the amulet around her neck and folded the beautiful stone beneath the gown and cloak. Taking a deep breath, she embraced the surge of warmth spreading through her veins and met Angelet’s eye. “We must hurry. If Blood Knights are in Jershon, our journey is more dangerous than ever. Stay low, and follow me.”

  Chapter 24

  The Blood Moon

  Eerie silence followed Roark as he traipsed into the belly of Sortis. Most decent people remained tucked safely in their homes during the blood moon. As Roark made his way into the Merchant Square, the true nature of the Bloodlands played out like a dark production. Tucking the hood of the cloak Kiera had lent around his head, Roark kept his grip on his dagger and head down.

  Cries of wicked pleasure echoed in the night as men and women pillaged the streets and tormented those trying to flee to sanctuary. Roark was knocked by a drunken brawl that in daylight would be fists and bloody noses. Keeping his body out of reach, he narrowly missed a jagged knife slashing toward the fallen brawler’s neck. The man likely wouldn’t be alive by morning.

  Fire burned one of the churches of Baz who asked for worship of fabricated gods from Mulek. A statue of the goddess of love toppled and her leopard head cracked at the neck as the stone shattered across the steps of the temple. Soon the white head was covered in voracious mobs of people aiming for the gilded alters and candlesticks within. Roark pulled to the top shade of a merchant’s cart to orient his way toward the port. Night during a blood moon felt as though the city had descended into a fiery pit and made it easy to get turned around in familiar streets. But the wails and shrieks echoing in the night from both creature and human caused the most fear.

  Red house doors were opened into the streets; thieves, secret combinations, gangs, nothing was hidden in shadows.

  “You look like you might have a copper or two.”

  Roark spun over his shoulder once he’d jumped off the cart. One licked his cracking lips, the other picked at a pock mark festering on his pallid cheek. Both held daggers with forked tips as they crouched and stared at Roark hungrily.

  “Step back. I make my way to port,” Roark growled.

  “Makes his way to port, says he,” the pocked man hissed. “Shipper, says I and shippers have coppers.”

  Roark popped his dagger from the sheath and made certain the red gleam of the moon caught the edge of the blade. The man with dry lips glanced at the weapon and backed away, though the pocked fiend hardly cared.

  “I warn you to step back,” Roark insisted.

  The pocked man sneered and lunged. Roark dropped the pouch of food and met his blade with ease. One thing Lord Tama could be credited with would be Roark’s ability to survive during a blood moon. Before the trials of the cliffs, Roark would have only been able to pray he wouldn’t be seen by the scoundrels on the street. Now, he stood in the streets as one of the scoundrels he’d once feared.

  The hood fell off his head, and Roark dragged the edge of his dagger across the man’s knife. The first attacker with bleeding lips saw the pouch of meat and seemed to find more interest in a full belly than blood as he abandoned the battle.

  Roark plunged his blade, blocked, and jabbed until one swift move and his elbow was crooked around the pocked man’s neck. The scoundrel’s arm was trapped above his head as Roark kept him firmly subdued. Whispering in his ear, Roark tried not to breathe in the pungent odor of dried sweat. “I will give you one chance to walk away. Understand?”

  The man gave a swift nod. Roark released his hold and shoved the man to his knees in the street. The companion chomped gleefully on seafowl jerky, watching as Roark adjusted the cloak over his head again.

  Turning on his heel, the hair on the back of his neck stood on end and Roark strategically kept his grip on the dagger. As expected, a growl of frustration came to his back. Roark counted to three in his mind before wheeling around and plunging the dagger into the innards of the pocked man. The fiend gasped and clung desperately to Roark’s shoulders. Resting his forehead against the dirty skin of his victim, Roark narrowed his eyes. “I warned you to walk away.”

  Wine soaked breath blew out from the dying man’s lips and Roark had to swallow hard to keep the sick from burning up his throat.

  “You killed him,” the food thief said as he smacked his lips around the tips of his fingers. There wasn’t a hint of disappointment in his tone, simply an observation.

  With a glare he shoved past the second man and wiped the blood of his dagger across his leg.

  “Ro!”

  Clenching his jaw, Roark turned around and found Kiln and several crewmen rushing across the Merchant Square. They weren’t drunk, and Kiln’s frantic expression sent a rush of blood through Roark’s head. “What is it?”

  “Thank the Mount we found you. We’re shoving off sooner than planned. I wasn’t certain we’d find you when you never arrived at Skoka’s. Quickly, head to port.”

  “I am. What’s happened?”

  Kiln shook his head. “No, go haste. Something has gone amiss, we aren’t certain what has happened, but Bradach sent word we’re leaving. There are, rumors, Ro, rumors that the general of the imperial army is dead. Killed by a Lightborn.”

  “I heard it was a demon,” muttered another crewman.

  “I heard Blood Knight,” added another.

  Roark’
s lungs wouldn’t accept another breath as he gripped the lapels of Kiln’s tattered overcoat. “You heard Kawal has been murdered.” Darkness Roark had refused to let inside, even during the Ring, bled across his body like an extra layer of skin. “Tell me now. Is the general dead?”

  Kiln shoved Roark’s hands off his coat and scowled. “That is what we’ve heard. Baron Bradach was to trade with Emperor Baz and Kawal this evening, but something happened at the manse of the general. Everyone is fleeing. Bradach will abandon a meet and we are to prepare to leave. It is more than the expected violence on a blood moon for certain. Are you coming?”

  Roark dragged his hands through his hair and shot his gaze toward the manor on the hillside where Kawal found his cowardly refuge. The house was dark with only a few scattered lamps glowing in the windows. The russet night made it difficult to see, but there was a small billow of smoke bursting from the back rooftop. Obsession for Kawal’s blood had motivated Roark to survive, to fight, to find the Lightborn and destroy the man who’d destroyed him. If another had truly ended the general’s life—Roark couldn’t explain the frenzy bursting through his blood. All he knew was his head was spinning and blind fury raged through his thoughts. Kawal was his—destined to be his kill. Licking his lips with his dry tongue, Roark took several shallow breaths as he tried to steady the rapid thud of his pulse.

  “Ro, come,” Kiln shouted as he darted toward Tjuvar with the others.

  “I will follow soon.”

  Roark squinted in the night toward the edge of the city center where two figures huddled in the shadows. After a space in the chaos of the blood moon cleared, they took flight again. Roark turned his blade down and snuck in for a closer look. Two women darted toward the outer walls of Sortis that would lead to the borders of the Jershon empire. One was dressed like a chamber maid, her head covered in a linen wrap, and a dress that struck at her ankles. The other was different.