Take My Heart...: Dark Ages - Fantasy (Dark Gods & Tainted Souls Book 3) (21 page)

Chapter Thirty Seven.

She smiled at him. He stood alone with the woman who was the Lucky Lady alone on the ship deck and she looked just like a normal person now. She spoke words and not thoughts at him and was actually smiling. He looked at her smiling face and smiled. himself.

“What cheers you lady?” he asked.

“You Northmen cheer me, you are so manly and useful. I really think I’ll have to get some temples in the North when this is over and if we win, and it’s seeming like we might now, it’ll all be down to you three,” she said.

“Us three?” he asked.

“You of course and your friends Grimm and lovely Goldie, all three of you are so good you just feel the path and run to it. I’ve never seen a people so willing to be guided by their instincts, you’re not about rules and history you just do what feels right and it most often is.”

Seth felt a pang of homesickness when she mentioned Grimm and Goldie. It had been so long since he’d seen them and had left them on that battlefield. It seemed like a lifetime ago and the duke seemed like a nice foe compared to this new one.

She laughed, reading his thoughts. “Let’s go eat,” she said.

“You can eat?” he said.

“I can pretend, it makes you comfortable if I do.”

She took his hand in hers and it was cold as ice. They walked through the narrow wooden corridors till they reached the Captains quarters, which he knew well. They walked through the ornate door and he saw there was a feast laid out.

“You’ll need your strength,” she said.

Seth looked at the food and felt a hunger like he hadn’t in ages. He hadn’t eaten in days he realized, but hadn’t needed to until now. He ripped a piece of chicken from a full cooked one and bit into it like a savage. She laughed as he devoured it, as the food hit his suffering stomach his thoughts came back to his friends.

“You know where they are? Grimm and Goldie?” he asked.

“Of course, would you like to see them?” she said.

“Yes,” he said.

She looked to the air in front of them and closed her eyes for just a blink. Suddenly in front of him, the air was clear and he saw Grimm. He was walking along a sunlit plain, next to him were Silver and the Wolvern.

He was stunned and then saddened, what the hell had Grimm done. Now he was trapped as well.

“Why is here there? That’s bad,” Seth said, his hunger gone.

“He follows his path well. The prisoner wants that land and he’s trying to take it back, we need someone like Grimm to help stop him. We are like generals in a battle Seth and this war is coming to us on many fronts. This world, yours and the land of the dead, he seeks to control them all.”

“What can Grimm do?” Seth asked.

She laughed again, “You’ve missed so much,” She showed him visions of Grimm drinking the wine, of calling Minsetta, running through the Desert and slaying some bald man with terrifying eyes. He’s been busy. Seth saw Minsetta though his eyes, saw her face with the black pits of eyes and sharp teeth, she was dead, but brought back, another monster.

“Minsetta’s back and on our side?” he asked.

“She has her own plans but she will help along the way,” she said.

“What of Goldie and Seraphina?” Seth asked.

“Goldie has been busy as well, he helps me more than he may know.” She showed a vision of Goldie, he was in town and it was preparing for a battle. He saw the people putting up stacks and enforcing walls. He knew siege planning when he saw it. She showed him the challenges and him winning, he laughed as Goldie won the drinking and the fighting.

“He has made them believe in me again and thus I have the strength to fight, clearly I’m not a fighter Seth but sadly I’m one of the strongest left so I have little choice. Seraphina is in the worst of places, at his side, wondering how to get herself out of it,” she said.

He knew it was time. They had been preparing him and he knew he’d have to fight someone. It was the feeling of fear that was following him in the temple of statues, it was the one they called the prisoner, it was the force behind all this death, but he had no idea what it was.

“I can show you him and her as well, but he’s strong and will see you as well, but I think it’s time, this ship is traveling and we're going to face him. I’m not one to sit around and wait for bad things to happen, we're bringing the war to his shores, but you need to see him first.”

She closed her eyes again and the air started to shimmer in front of him. Seth saw it was hard for her and was surprised, how could anything be hard for her?

Soon as he saw it he was filled with a deep terror. In front of him stood a man. A normal, attractive young man but his eyes held such a deep and terrible darkness. Next to him stood a group of women. He saw they seemed to radiate some power as well. Behind him was a vast crowd of the black dogs, hundreds and hundreds. As he looked the man locked eyes with him.

He felt that wave of fear running into him, he thought of it. He was just one man how could he possibly fight against this thing. He felt the hopelessness of it and saw visions of all his friends slaughtered and dead and this one raising statues to himself and those women beside him.

He felt such a deep terror and then saw her, next to the man stood Seraphina. His emotions changed to concern.

“Fight it,” the Lady said. “If you give him too much strength it’ll be bad, don’t fear him.”

Seth focused on Seraphina and let him worry about her, what was she doing with that monster. The lady closed the void with a look of effort and sat panting at the table.

“Well, that wasn’t fun. Get ready we’ll be there soon and you’ll have to fight him.”

“Him a god, me, just me,” he said and felt the fear again.

“Yes, just you. I’ll be busy with his sisters.”

***

She’d seen Seth. It was clear as day. She’d been looking at those horrible dog creatures starting to really worry she’d picked the wrong side and she’d seen him appear. At first, she had just been thinking of him and then she’d seen him watching her and them. It was as if his eyes were just floating there but then she’d seen a vision of some fine room and Seth sitting with a woman and looking at them. The man smiled and walked to her.

“That was him wasn’t it? The Druheim?” he said with manic excitement.

There was no lying to him or them, her thoughts were there and soon they’d know her doubts. As soon as she saw him, she wanted to run to him for protection, he always made her feel safe, but there was no safe against this.

“It was, but I don’t know the Lady,” she said.

He smiled again. “I do. The fools have shown their hand, they are coming here? I never thought she’d have that much guts.”

“Sisters?” he yelled. “Did you see that?” he said.

They looked at him with no understanding. “See what?” said the first.

“The Druheim and the Lady, spying on us, they are coming here.” He said.

“Really? I thought we’d have to try and track them down, did you see an army? Who do they bring?” said his eldest sister, she was smiling as well. This land was theirs and they held all the advantage.

“No one, it’s just him and her. I could feel his fear, he is terrified to face me!” he cried with glee.

“As he should be Brother, as he should be,” she said.

Seraphina looked around her and thought to run but knew she couldn’t. If she turned against them, they would know within moments. She didn’t want more power she just wanted this to be over.

“I think someone is in love with him, change of heart?” the woman said to her. There was no point lying to them.

“You’re evil and I won’t help you, you’d best just kill me and be done with it,” she said resigned She was so sick of this life and she couldn’t fight them all, she had no strength to keep going.

The man laughed. “Kill you? Why would we ever do that, sisters do you have a nice room for her?” he said.

“Why? yes, we do but why brother, she’s not going to help us?” a younger one asked.

“Not now, but a few years in a dungeon changes a lot of opinions. I know from experience.”

Chapter Thirty Eight.

Her people were no use. Not a single one of them would come with her. Even her power of the tongue could not command them. They were insane with fear. The black dogs had started to turn their attacks on them as well and it wasn’t safe for them to leave the city. Every time she and the Wolvern ventured out it was becoming a matter of life and death. She was starting to get afraid herself. She was too strong to let the mindless fear in but she didn’t want to die by being mauled apart by these stupid beasts.

Now they had an ally though. She liked him, he was a warrior and fought well with an axe, bow, and sword. He had all these weapons strapped to him and had a quiver of black tipped arrows which was brimming full. He scouted ahead of them, even though she was faster, she had taken a bite to the leg and was limping, the Wolvern was worse off and had been bitten more times that she could count. The fire of the kill had gone out of her friend.

The Northman came jogging back across the field towards them.

“We have to head east. I could see a lot of them and if I didn’t know better I’d say they were guarding something,” he said, in a version of Northern that was exactly like hers, he smiled at her. “Are you a Silver Skin?” he asked.

“Well as you can see I have silver hair, not skin but we were called that a few thousand years ago by your people,” she said

what did he know of it, he seemed to have a very deep knowledge of these matters.

He seemed to think hard about something closing his eyes. They fluttered beneath his eyes lids quickly like he was dreaming. When he opened them he smiled again and spoke. She was stunned as he said a greeting in her language. Not northern but the tongue of the moon, a man like him shouldn’t know it.

She slapped his face hard. “You don’t use those words, it’s for us alone,” he rubbed his bearded face and laughed.

“Ok pretty one,” he said back in moon tongue, she went to slap him again but the Wolvern just howled at them. They started to move towards the east, picking up pace. It was strange how could someone like him know their tongue. He spoke it wrong like learning from a book but the words were almost right.

“What do they guard,” the Wolvern spoke to them.

“From what you’ve said,” Grimm spoke back. “I’m guessing it’s their way into this place. They are dumb beasts and certainly couldn’t make their own rift here, but like any dogs they have a Master and I think he’s built them a door,” Grimm said.

“But why? They weren’t so bad before, now they are relentless,” she said to him.

“They make fear, that’s their job, before it was easy, the dead were monsters, but now this place is back to the way it was, no more fear, so they have to create it,” he said.

Again she was stunned at his knowledge. They had told him of what Seth had done here and he seemed to understand straightaway.

They moved east for a few miles until they came to a small hill and he gestured for them to crouch, the wind was blowing back at them which was good. She slid on her belly along the grass of the hill until she and they could just see over the rise. Before them was a natural cave. It was a large black hole in a cliff face and all around it were ripped and torn bodies. There were white skinned people of her own kind, most bloated and disfigured and many of the human dead. Around them were, at least, ten of the dogs and they were some of the biggest they had seen. They ripped into the bodies casually as if they were just there for a feed.

“Inside?” she said.

“Yeah, I’m guessing it’s pretty deep and somewhere inside will be the rift,” he said.

She looked at the Wolvern. “What do we do? I can’t close it I have no idea how ” she said.

He does,
the Wolvern spoke back on both their minds.

Grimm looked at them. “I’m pretty sure I can close it if we want to,” he said.

“If we want to?” Silver said back. “Of course, we do that’s why we’re here right?”

“That’s not why I’m here,” he said back to her.

“What?”

Seth
said the Wolvern simply.

“Seth,” Grimm spoke back.

“What about him?” she asked.

“Whatever built this rift is on the other side. It’s not a crossing to my world I can promise you that. Can’t you feel it? There is such a horrible energy around this place. I can feel it, it’s just sucking in all these fear and horror and feeding it through to the other side. I finally understand how all the pieces fit, the rift, the fear, the destruction of the temples in my land. The creature Seth must fight is making itself strong and the gods weak. They defeated him before but that’s why he trapped the sun. They converted hundreds of thousands of desert people from sun worship to their own weak Pellosi gods, why? To weaken the Bringer and make trapping it possible. Now all this fear is running from your world and making him strong. We have to close this rift, but I’m going through as well if Seth needs another blade. I have one.”