Sorrow's Isle

by Jen Williams

  Copyright © 2015 Jen Williams

  The right of Jen Williams to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group in 2015

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

  eISBN: 978 1 4722 2972 4

  Cover illustration © Headline Publishing Group, Cindi L/Shutterstock and DarkGeometryStudios/Shutterstock

  HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

  An Hachette UK Company

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.headline.co.uk

  www.hachette.co.uk

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About Jen Williams

  About the Book

  Also by Jen Williams

  Praise

  Author’s Note

  Sorrow’s Isle

  An exclusive extract from the upcoming THE IRON GHOST

  More from Jen Williams

  About Jen Williams

  JEN WILLIAMS lives in London with her partner and her cat. She started writing about pirates and dragons as a young girl and has never stopped. Her short stories have featured in numerous anthologies. Jen’s first novel, The Copper Promise, was released last year to great acclaim and her second, The Iron Ghost, is out soon.

  About the Book

  An exclusive digital short story by dazzling epic-fantasy talent, Jen Williams, author of THE COPPER PROMISE.

  Reckless adventurers Wydrin of Crosshaven and her companion, Sir Sebastian, never turn down a quest that bears the promise of coin.

  So it is that they find themselves mooring on the jagged rocks of the desolate Sorrow’s Isle, in search of an oarsman’s sister missing somewhere on its cursed shores.

  Now they must navigate amid the deathly tales that haunt the isle, or else be swallowed for ever into the depths of magic and danger that lie within . . .

  By Jen Williams and available from Headline

  The Copper Promise

  Praise for Jen Williams and The Copper Promise:

  ‘The Copper Promise is dark, often bloody, frequently frightening, but there’s also bucket loads of camaraderie, sarcasm, and an unashamed love of fantasy and the fantastic’ Den Patrick, author of The Boy with the Porcelain Blade

  ‘A fresh take on classic tropes, this debut novel of dragons, lost magic and dungeon adventure is 21st century fantasy at its best’ SFX magazine

  ‘The Copper Promise is near-perfect fantasy-adventure fun and a breath of fresh air in a genre choking on its own grittiness. Read it and remind yourself what made you fall in love with fantasy books’ Starburst Magazine

  ‘A gripping, fast-paced adventure that’s a must-read’ SciFiNow

  ‘The Copper Promise is an excellent book, stuffed with all the ingredients of sword and sorcery mixed to a fresh new recipe. It’s a shamelessly good old-fashioned blood-and-thunder tale, heroic fantasy the way it’s meant to be’ Joanne Hall, www.hierath.wordpress.com

  ‘Williams’ vivid imagination and worldbuilding will take her far, along with a real talent for dialogue’ Glen Mehn, www.glen.mehn.net

  ‘The characterisation is second to none, and there are some great new innovations and interesting reworkings of old tropes . . . This book may have been based on the promise of copper but it delivers gold’ www.quicksilverreads.wordpress.com

  ‘It is a killer of a fantasy novel that is indicative of how the classic genre of sword and sorcery is not only still very much alive, but also still the best the genre has to offer’ www.leocristea.wordpress.com

  ‘If there was one word I’d use to describe The Copper Promise, it would be “joyful”’ www.graemesff.blogspot.co.uk

  ‘Fast-paced and wonderfully-realised, Jen Williams’ first novel is a delight. The reader will encounter pirates, dragons, zombies, gods and demons, to name but a few, on their journey through this exciting new world’ www.readerdad.co.uk

  ‘Each page is a wild ride into the unknown and follows a cast of characters that you will root for from start to finish. An immensely enjoyable debut’ www.sleeplessmusingsofawellgroomedmoustachedman.wordpress.com

  ‘A wonderful sword and sorcery novel with some very memorable characters and a dragon to boot. If you enjoy full-throttle action, awesome monsters, and fun, snarky dialogues then The Copper Promise is definitely a story you won’t want to miss’ www.afantasticallibrarian.com

  ‘The Copper Promise is such a gem . . . the kind of story that got me reading fantasy in the first place and I honestly believe this will one day be looked on as a classic of the genre’ www.ebookwyrm.blogspot.co.uk

  Author’s Note:

  This short story follows Wydrin of Crosshaven and Sir Sebastian on a quest that takes place before the events of their first full-length novel, THE COPPER PROMISE.

  Wydrin leaned forward in the boat, bringing her head closer to Sebastian. The night was clear and quiet, the stars overhead frozen in their brilliance.

  ‘I still say we don’t look for missing people,’ she said, pitching her voice low. She glanced towards the figure at the prow of the boat. In the dark she could make out very little of him, save for his rhythmic movements as he dragged the oars through the water. He wore a hood, despite the warmth of the summer’s night. ‘It’s hardly a job for a sell-sword.’

  ‘And I say we take whatever work is going,’ said Sebastian. He shifted in the boat, stretching out his long legs in front of him. ‘It’s not like we can just pick and choose at the moment. Especially after the last man we were employed to protect ended up losing a finger.’

  Wydrin leaned back.

  ‘Our fee bought him a warning. No one else would have got that much.’

  ‘He probably thought he was safe from the woman who was supposed to be guarding him,’ said Sebastian. In the starlight, Wydrin could see that he was half smiling now. ‘Perhaps he thought you were joking.’

  ‘Then he learnt more than one lesson that night.’ Wydrin patted her dagger where it rested at her belt. ‘Don’t grope the serving woman’s daughter, don’t ignore a fair given warning and don’t trust a sell-sword.’

  ‘Well, he definitely learnt one of those lessons, at least,’ said Sebastian. ‘Besides which, this isn’t really a case of finding a missing person. They know where she is. They just don’t want to fetch her.’

  He nodded to where the island was now looming to their right. It was tiny by Crosshaven standards, and Wydrin suspected it would take no more than a couple of hours to walk to the far side, but she could already see the jagged black rocks that gave it its name: Sorrow’s Isle. Difficult to spot from a well-lit ship, those rocks had torn the bottom out of more than one vessel over the years, and remains littered the sea around them. Their tiny boat slipped between nautical corpses, a scavenger amongst the dead.

  ‘All right, but why at night?’ she said. ‘The sun over our heads would make this place a good deal less daunting.’

  ‘It is cursed at all hours,’ the man with the oars cut in. ‘But they say that if the island sees you in daylight, it will always remember your face. One day you’ll come back here and you won’t know why, only that you need to see what lies in the caves, and the
n you will be lost forever.’

  Wydrin rolled her eyes at that.

  ‘Sounds delightful.’

  They drew up to the rocky shore just as a thin band of pale sky to the east announced the dawn. Sebastian and Wydrin climbed out of the boat carefully; the sand was rough and uncertain under their feet. The man in the boat quickly began pushing his vessel back out into deeper water, keeping his back to them.

  ‘Hey, aren’t you going to wait for us?’ asked Wydrin. It felt cooler on the island and a breeze was pushing at the back of her neck.

  ‘Not in these waters,’ he said, still not looking at them. ‘You have the signal. Use it and I will come.’

  The man clambered into the boat, fumbling the oars in his hurry to get moving again.

  ‘Who are you to this girl?’ called Wydrin. ‘Does she know you?’

  ‘I am her brother,’ said the man. He moved away from them, shoulders bunching as he yanked the oars through the water. The pair watched him go for a moment.

  ‘Not a brave man then,’ said Sebastian, mildly.

  The island was about as desolate a place as Wydrin had ever seen. No trees to speak of, no grass, just a collection of rocks and small, stunted bushes. In the growing silvery light of dawn she could see a clutch of bird nests clinging to a sheer outcrop of stone to their left, and on the breeze she could smell bird shit and seaweed. Directly behind them the rock was pitted with holes – most no bigger than a hand span across – with a few big enough even for Sebastian to walk through without bowing his head. She shivered, and then frowned.

  ‘She will have gone into the tunnels,’ said Sebastian, gesturing at the caves. ‘We should move slowly in there, and watch our footing.’ He took the pack off his shoulder and removed their travel lamp, fiddling about with it until its soft yellow light illuminated his face.

  ‘Why would she have gone in there? Not enough certain death where she’s from?’

  In the lamp light, Sebastian gave Wydrin a look. ‘Did you not listen to the story they told us?’

  She waved a hand at him. ‘Oh, they did start going on about some king or other, but I thought they were just trying to impress us with local history.’

  ‘Come on,’ Sebastian stood up, holding the lamp out in front of him. ‘Let’s try the biggest entrance first. I’ll tell you what you missed as we go.’

  Wydrin drew one of her daggers and they made their way down into the cave. Sebastian’s lamp painted the walls in buttery light, revealing rock thick with barnacles and tainted with salt, like a ghost of the sea. The smell of seaweed and rot was powerful.

  ‘Around two hundred years ago, there was a king,’ began Sebastian as they picked their way carefully down the tunnel. The floor was littered with sea shells and jagged rocks. ‘King Vestra. He was a terrible ruler, your usual tyrant. He lived in ludicrous luxury while his people starved. Eventually his subjects rose up against him and he fled, taking those knights he still considered loyal and striking out across the sea to find somewhere else to be a bastard. One night, when the winds were calm, they came across Sorrow’s Isle.’

  Sebastian paused. Ahead of them the tunnel split in two. Wydrin knelt, gesturing at him to lower the lamp.

  ‘Here, look,’ she ran her fingers lightly over the cave floor. ‘She hasn’t left much of a footprint, but she’s scuffed the sand up some. We want the left-hand passage.’

  They moved on, and Sebastian continued.

  ‘The king saw the glinting of lights on the shoreline – blue, green and white – and convinced himself it was the glittering of fabulous gems.’

  Wydrin laughed.

  ‘They came ashore, and King Vestra ordered his knights to start looking for the treasures he was sure must exist, but he didn’t quite trust his men, so accompanied them into the dark. Every now and then they saw the lights again, always in the distance, drawing them deeper and deeper into the heart of the island. Down in the dark, one by one, the king’s knights vanished until he was left wandering alone, all hope of finding a way out lost.’

  ‘Oh great,’ said Wydrin. Around them the walls of the tunnel were drawing in. ‘No, please, do continue. This is exactly what I want to hear right now.’

  ‘Eventually he came to a great central cavern, where there were lights, and beautiful women of strange aspect.’

  Wydrin grinned.

  ‘That old chestnut.’

  ‘The women were, as I said, beautiful, with eyes that glowed like sapphires, and dresses made of silver scales. The most beautiful of them all, a tall woman with a silver crown – a queen, obviously – asked King Vestra if he would join her on the throne. He, only able to guess at the fabulous wealth of these silver-clad beauties, agreed. Immediately the women fell upon him and tore him to pieces with their sharp teeth, until only his bones remained. The queen took the bones, using them as the armrests of her throne, and his skull as a drinking vessel.’

  ‘It’s a good story, I’ll give you that,’ said Wydrin. ‘Evil kings, evil queens, questionable fashion, a gory ending – it’s got everything. What does it have to do with the girl we’re looking for?’

  The tunnel had widened out again and now there was soft black sand underfoot. Here the girl’s footprints were as clear as day.

  ‘You’ll like this. The girl believes herself to be a direct descendent of King Vestra. She has, apparently, been obsessed with stories of the king since she was small, and now she has come out here to see if they are true. That is what her family claim.’

  Wydrin shook her head.

  ‘She came out here by herself? To check whether an old fairy tale was true?’

  ‘Stole a boat, brought it to the island. Her family came after her but stopped when they realised where she was headed.’

  ‘I don’t know if I’m impressed or embarrassed for the kid.’

  ‘Personally, I’d like a word with the family,’ Sebastian held up the lamp, illuminating a number of small holes in the wall at head height. ‘I’m not turning away coin, but even so . . .’

  There was a sudden skittering noise all around. In an instant Wydrin had both daggers in her hands and she turned a tight circle, but she could see nothing untoward. Sebastian had thrown back his cloak, ready to draw his short sword.

  ‘What is that?’

  The sound was louder now, a scratching chittering that made the hair on the back of Wydrin’s neck stand on end. She glanced towards the passage they’d just left, but nothing had followed them down.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Sebastian. He moved to put the oil lamp down. ‘Perhaps we should . . .’

  The circle of yellow light revealed movement on the ground around their feet. Enormous crabs, some as big as dinner plates, were surging across the sand, their shells a lurid orange speckled with black. Wydrin yelped and took an involuntary step backwards. Her foot landed on the shell of a crab and for a moment she lost her footing, waving her arms for balance. In retaliation the crab snapped at the back of her ankle with a pincer as long as her hand, and she narrowly avoided having her feet cut out from under her.

  ‘Shit!’

  Awkwardly Sebastian dropped the lamp and drew his sword, using its metal length to push the creatures away, but they clung on, swarming over his boots and worrying at his leather greaves. In the confusion of the dark came the echoing snap snap as the crabs chopped hungrily at this unexpected source of fresh meat.

  Wydrin, a dagger in either fist, stabbed downwards with all her strength and was rewarded with a fleshy crack as Ashes and Frostling pierced the shell of a crab trying to make off with her toes. Grinning triumphantly she repeated the manoeuvre, spearing several smaller crabs, until she spotted movement on the wall behind Sebastian’s head.

  ‘Seb, they’re coming out the walls!’

  Sebastian spun, trying to shake a trio of crabs from his gauntlet, only to see more of the beasts dropping from the holes in the tunnel wall. He staggered backwards; many were climbing up the back of his cloak, their armoured legs tangled in the t
hick wool. Wydrin leapt towards him and smacked the back of his cloak with the flat of her dagger, trying to knock the crabs free.

  ‘Ow! What are you doing?’

  ‘Just bloody keep still a minute . . .’

  There was a flash of movement and a small figure streaked across the chamber, yelling something unintelligible. Wydrin caught a glimpse of something long and silver just as the biggest crab in front of them split in two. There was more shouting and several other crabs burst into bits.

  ‘Hold on!’ Wydrin lowered her dagger. ‘Hey!’

  The figure was a child with dark brown skin and hair black as ink. She looked to be no older than ten, and wore tough, sensible clothing: a woollen undershirt with a leather tunic that hung loose on her skinny frame. In her hands she held a short sword that was obviously far too big for her, its long straight blade dark with crab guts. The girl stood holding it above her head as if poised for one last killing blow. She was breathing hard, her narrow chest rising and falling.

  ‘Woah, okay, I think that’s enough . . .’ Wydrin approached the girl with one hand held out. The crabs, alarmed by the sight of their slain brethren, were quickly retreating back through their secret holes. Sebastian swore quietly to himself as he shook off the last of his passengers. ‘Are you Varnie?’

  At the sound of her name, the girl lowered the sword. The point of it hit the floor with a clang.

  ‘Who are you? Are you adventurers? You’re sell-swords, aren’t you? Did my brother send you?’

  ‘We’re your escort home, kid.’

  Immediately, and with obvious effort, Varnie brought her sword swooping back up again, and Wydrin took a hurried step backwards.

  ‘I’m not going until I know the truth!’

  ‘By the Graces, kid, stop waving that thing about.’

  The girl glared at them both, her eyes wild, but the sword was a touch too heavy and she let it drop again.

  ‘I saved your lives,’ she said in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘You owe me.’