Mountain of Daggers (24 page)

Panting, he wiped the cold splattered blood from his face. He caught his reflection in the black mirror propped against the wall the witch had been facing. The image stared back at him with a disparaging smile and holding a small bundle to its bare chest.

Too late Ahren.
Chuckling, it gazed down on the wrapped baby in its arms.
What is of you is now mine.

Ahren swallowed the nauseating horror rising in his throat as a tiny hand reached up from the bundle toward the demon’s face.

Our child may have been conceived in flesh, but it has been born in darkness, born of me.
It laughed.

Shadows swirled through the air around Ahren like tattered translucent sheets. He squeezed the heavy cleaver in his hand.

The dark reflection rolled the newborn over and gently pulled the blanket away. Black eyes stared out from the baby’s quivering face. 
Say hello to your death, Ahren. Do you want to choose a name?

The flying shadows danced with the demon’s laughter. Ahren hurled the heavy blade at the obsidian mirror, shattering it into hundreds of tiny shards. The swarming shades vanished, leaving him alone in the dim yurta as the laughter faded in the distance.

We’ll meet again. I promise.

Ahren’s overwhelming fear washed away, leaving a calm focus. His shredded clothes lay like useless rags beside the bed. He snatched the witch’s threadbare cloak from the floor and threw it over his shoulders. He lifted a candle from a weathered table and held it against the yurta’s felt walls. The orange flame caressed the gray fabric then caught. “I look forward to it.”

About the Author

Raised in the swamps and pine forests of East Texas, Seth Skorkowsky always dreamed of being a writer. He gravitated to the darker sides of fantasy, preferring horror and pulp heroes over knights in shining armor. His debut novel,
Dämoren
, released in 2014. When not writing, Seth enjoys tabletop role-playing games, shooting sports, and traveling the world with his wife.

Seth will also be releasing his second Black Raven collection,
Sea of Quills
, fall of 2015. You can find out more about Seth at
www.skorkowsky.com

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Mountain of Daggers
, we urge you to post a review on sites like Amazon and Goodreads. Tell us—and others—what you thought! Studies show peer reviews are the most effective forms of advertising, especially for books from independent publishers; plus, connecting with our readers is always exciting and inspiring! Seth would love it.

Thank you!

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For more information about the Tales of the Black Raven series, go to
www.ragnarokpub.com