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Excerpt from
Awakening Fire
by Larissa Emerald
PROLOGUE
Isle of Skye, Scotland
1120 AD
The crusty old man with long ropes of coal-black hair didn’t look like an angel, but he had earned the attention of Venn and his eleven brothers. With a flick of the wrist, the angel plucked an enormous boulder into the air and dropped it on the snarling barghest, plastering the demon onto the ground.
“Guid God, that was close.” Minutes ago, he’d thought he and his brothers would all be dead as, in force, they’d fought against the barthest that had attacked them from out of nowhere. Then that angel had joined their ranks and outdone them all. With heaving breaths, Venn crouched near the fire pit and thrust his sword into the flames. As the beast’s thick, yellow blood sizzled on the metal, Venn’s brothers gathered in a loose semicircle: Njorth, Ian, Euler, Rurik, Aidan, Brandt, Colby, Graham, Dustin, Tristan, Lachlan. All alive. Bruised, bloodied, clothing clawed and shredded. But alive. Thanks be to God.
Seth, as the angel called himself, perched atop the sandstone rock, apparently fishing dirt from under his fingernails. Beneath him, the boulder flattened the malicious barghest facedown into the dirt, limbs and head protruding, far larger than the biggest dog Venn had ever seen. A foul odor of rotten eggs permeated the air as the thing fought mightily against the stone’s weight. The barghest scored the earth with four-inch claws, flashed fangs the length of swords, and snarled.
Venn coughed at the stench, then winced as a biting pain seized his rib.
“Finish off the monster,” Njorth, the eldest brother, demanded.
“Nay.” Seth breathed deeply. His wings expanded and retracted in time with each inhalation. “Io will not die this day. My brother is cast into a net by his own feet.” With one hand reaching skyward, he summoned a somewhat smaller boulder at cliff’s edge, which he dropped on the barghest’s protruding head. “That may silence him for a while.”
The rasp in the angel’s voice brought to mind wheels catching on rough ground. “’Tis said that each man’s future is written before it occurs.” Seth passed his perceptive gaze over the brothers. When he came to Venn, his expression darkened, his eyes narrowed. “And ’tis true. Well, partially so. Occasional exceptions have been known to alter one’s course. Brothers, you have been chosen.”
Venn stood, met the angel’s piercing blue stare, and sheathed his sword. A biting wind scurried along the embankment at his back, then shot out over the cliff to meet the riotous waves, enhancing the swirl and shift of the late-morning fog.
The brothers were border guards, protecting their kin against skirmishes and raiding. Venn had been the last invited to this gathering, most likely due to his fierce disbelief in angels.
Not anymore.
“The two prime virtues ascribed to Highlanders are fidelity and courage. This day thou art offered a great challenge to draw on both of these merits. ” Seth glanced to the enormous tree several rods from the brothers as he circled his hand upward in a dramatic flourish.
The undercurrent in the air changed, foretelling an approaching storm. The ground shook with an intensity that sent Venn tumbling to the dirt. He rolled sideways to avoid the fire but still fell close enough to it to singe his hair. The pungent burned smell pinched his nose. He staggered to his feet.
As he got his bearings and raised his head, a tremendous sound akin to a ship splitting in half thundered painfully through his ears and chest. The tree rose, uprooted like God himself had reached down and plucked it from the earth. Soil and rocks dropped away, and Venn shifted his stance, muscles tensed, as his fight-or-flight instinct warred within.
Suspended in midair a furlong overhead, the tree began to rotate. Agonizingly slow, at first, then faster and faster, gaining momentum. Clumps of earth flew from the roots as a rain of rock and mud pelted the ground. Within the space of a few breaths, the oak created a whirl of limbs and branches, and leaves peeled away. Venn recoiled, shielding his eyes, as a burst of white light and a deafening boom pummeled them all. He glanced up in time to glimpse the trunk splintering apart, chunks of tree launching skyward and soaring across the land in every direction.
And then it was gone.
The maelstrom was over as quickly as it had begun, and eleven forked sticks dropped at Seth’s feet. Venn cursed under his breath and palmed his bearded face. What had they just witnessed?
He sprinted toward Njorth and clasped his elder brother’s arm, ready to drag him away from the alleged angel.
Seth shot him a reproachful glare, then knelt to retrieve the sticks. “Peace!” He tossed one to each of the twelve brothers, saving Venn for last.
Venn had not intended to comply with the angel’s bidding, but he caught the stick instinctively. As soon as his hand closed around the rough wood, an odd burning sensation spread under his skin, followed by pain slicing through him from neck to groin.
What had the angel done?
A pleased, knowing smile broke across Seth’s face as spasms continued twisting in Venn’s chest. He groaned, hearing his brothers do the same. He turned to find their heads thrown back, their arms spread wide, all seeming to be experiencing the same horror he was.
The sequence coursed through Venn three agonizing times. When the fit subsided, he gasped airless pants as if he’d raced across several deep furrows.
Seth’s smile vanished. “For every honest man bent to the purpose of noble deeds, there are thousands driven by greed, lust, revenge, and power. Hundreds vying for the secrets of youth, the secrets of the universe, the secrets to manipulating time and space. Men whose misplaced allegiance increases evil.”
Venn balanced the stick in his palm and tested its weight, curiosity replacing his agony. Oddly heavy, it felt like part of him, an extension of his arm.
“The Divine Tree has splintered and will take root in new domains. Thou hast been given a divining rod to direct you to your tree. As Immortal Guardians, you are to protect that tree and its secrets with your life. But most importantly . . . do not allow the Dark Realm entry into the tree. And if your tree dies, so shall you. And all of humanity will suffer the consequences for the loss of its knowledge. Go, and be well.”
As if that explained everything, Seth disintegrated into shimmering particles that faded to nothing.
“Wait,” Venn called. Immortal Guardians? Tales of Odin and Yggdrasill and the Christian uprising vied in a mist of confusion.
Why would Venn and his brothers be called to guard anything? Seth must be mad.
Venn tossed the divining rod aside. “Firewood,” he scoffed.
When he looked up, he met his brothers’ disapproving stares as they gathered their belongings. Njorth prodded his injured thigh, where an ugly gash oozed red. He grimaced, raised and lowered his leg. Then the wound dried up and closed.
His eyes widened. “Look at that. Healed.” He turned to his brothers, each of them looking in turn to see the cut now gone. He gave a small chuckle. “Oh, but it aches like hell.”
“Stop complaining,” their brother Ian grumbled.
Njorth gave Venn a hearty clap on the shoulder, a wallop meant to suffice for a long time. “This ain’t half-bad.”
They were immortal? No, it wasn’t possible.
Part of him wanted to ignore Seth’s directives as nonsense and head home, but he stole another glance at Njorth’s healed thigh. He eyed his other brothers, packed and ready, each fisting their shares of the tree. He swallowed, pulling a sheepskin pouch over his shoulder as his heartbeat escalated with indecision, then slowed in resignation.
Ah, hell, brothers fought side by side. He trod toward the fire pit to retrieve his divining rod from where he’d thrown it. As he fisted the wood, a prickling force pulsed up into his arm and shoulder, the rod seeming to yank him to the ea
st. He shook off the feeling, his attention was forced back to the barghest, whose menacing paws thrashed from beneath the boulders, announcing that its wild nature had revived.
“I can’t stand that beast,” Euler declared. He raised his sword, stepping closer to Io. “Let’s take his head and be done with him while we can.”
“No.” Seth’s booming voice crashed over them like a rolling wave.
“Hope he stays under there ’til he rots,” Njorth grumbled.
Venn backed cautiously away, a hand on his sword hilt, allowing a wide berth for the beast’s vicious claws. “Let’s go. I suggest we figure out the game rules somewhere else. Before we hav’ta yield more of our blood.”
CHAPTER ONE
Present Day
At the subterranean entrance to the Divine Tree sanctuary, Venn Hearst halted and raised his eyes to the etchings of a wolf and hawk emblazoned in the aged wood above the door, a nod to his alternate forms. Venn extended his tattooed wrist, positioning the elaborately inked tree, and the pulsing artery beneath it, below a glistening twisted root for the anointing ritual. An amber-colored drop of sap spilled over the image, then pooled and bubbled before it was absorbed into his skin, sending a sharp zing to each of his neurons before settling within the larger matching tat on his back.
The language of the universe rustled through the air. The Secrets men died to know, Guardians swore to protect, and the Dark Realms were determined to steal or destroy were housed within this sacred place.
His Divine Tree was one of the original dozen hidden around the globe. There were eleven left after the Divine Tree Guardians had lost his brother Tristan along with the Divine Tree in Germany in the mid-nineteen hundreds. The tree’s demise had caused the earth to shift on its axis ever so slightly, bringing them one step closer to Armageddon with an escalation of malevolent forces. Evil had blossomed with Hitler taking millions of lives before balance could be restored. It had been an uphill battle ever since.
Venn opened and closed his fist, considering the tattoo on his wrist. Not even one more tree could be lost.
“Benison,” it whispered.
“Blessings,” Venn returned. “My strength and loyalty are yours.”
With his vow, the door to the tree creaked opened, and he strode through the massive entry. He looked around the comfortable aboveground chambers and kept walking. Keeping watch wasn’t his intention this night. No, he sought the tombs within the root structure below and hoped the tree would communicate to him if something out of the ordinary was happening.
He grabbed a nearby flashlight from the alcove next to the door, flipped it on, and started along the narrow tunneled path, down a staircase that had been fashioned by twisted knots of wood and roots fused together over centuries. It wound deep into the layers of knowledge, to the catacomb of interconnected scripts, like a true, living computer.
Once in the belly, he ran a hand over an electrical switch. Battery powered lights illuminate the cave-like room in a pale glow. Venn glanced about and drew an awed breath. Holy shit. The place had grown.
With careful steps, he moved from the tunnel into a cavern, where rough splinters jutted out of smooth swirls in the timber’s pattern, creating a golden wooden cave. He used to come down here often in the beginning, during the early years of loneliness, always expecting to discover something exceptional. Which he usually did.
He’d learned that if he pricked himself on this special wood, a series of images would fire though his brain, teaching him something new, its lessons sharper and more thorough than those of any history or science channel on TV.
Centuries ago, he’d stumbled on this cavern and its amazing phenomenon quite by accident. The power the tree gave him had become an obsession, the data exchange an addiction. He knew better than to come back again after that. But this time he had no choice, his duty demanded he use every means available to him. He was well aware of the risks and didn’t intend to overstep his limits.
Something was off-kilter in the universe, and he needed to know why. The odd weather pattern—winter when it should be spring—was an ominous sign, Venn knew, even if humans simply took it as a fluke of nature. Just as humans showed symptoms of illness, so too did the machinations of the universe. And a shift between good and evil often triggered such nasty weather patterns.
He needed to be on high alert. “Custos,” he spoke quietly to the ancient tree. “Do you know what’s going on?”
There was no answer.
Taking a seat in a worn cradle of wood, he felt the need to connect with the Divine Tree . . . and to his brothers. He squeezed the back of his neck. Perhaps that’s what the problem was. Not outside at all, but within him.
He felt as isolated from everything as this tree was. What was it like to house all humanity but not feel humanity?
The groan and creak of the tree, as if it were caught by a strong gust of wind, caused Venn to lift his head. Seth stood framed in the tunnel doorway. “I didn’t think you’d be down here,” the angel said, walking into the chamber.
Now Venn knew there was trouble brewing. The angel rarely dropped in just to say hello. “What’s happenin’?” Venn asked in way of greeting.
Seth shrugged, his wings lifting and falling with the movement. “I’m not sure. But you must feel it also if you’re down here.”
“Indeed. Have a seat,” Venn motioned to another curve of wood.
Seth sat and crossed his legs, resting his back and folded wings against the smooth inner walls of the tree. “I dunno. On one hand the off weather pattern seems like a trivial thing, but coupled with all the unrest in the world―with ISIS beheading people in the Middle East and people protesting over police in the US―I think we need to pay close attention.”
“I agree. The planet is digressing into a state of anarchy and I’d bet my right arm that the Dark Realm is behind it all,” Venn proclaimed.
“No doubt.”
“I think you’d better hang around,” Venn suggested..
“Fine. You got a room to spare?” Seth asked, firing a glance from beneath heavy eyelids without lifting his head.
“No.”
Seth shrugged. “Then I can’t help you.”
Venn chuckled, knowing full well he’d just gained a house guest. “It’s hard to think back to when this guardianship began.” He rested his head back and closed his eyes, trying to see that far into the past. “You know you could have given us a little more information when you set us on this task.”
“What for? You figured it out.”
“Huh. It took me forever to learn to control my shifting. The hawk being able to manipulate time and space, and the wolf’s incredible strength. Shit, I was a mess in those days.”
“You’re still a mess,” Seth said with exaggerated distain.
Venn straightened. “Hey, I didn’t ask for this gig. You can head back up anytime.”
* * *
Emma sympathized with anyone who had to make transatlantic flights on a regular basis. The trip from Paris to Atlanta’s Hartsfield–Jackson airport had left her weary as a rag doll. Two hours later, she was still stifling yawns as she surveyed the snow-covered park where her mélange-metal statue would reside.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have made you stop here on the way from the airport. You must be exhausted.” Grams tugged the zipper of her trendy black leather jacket higher before passing the leash attached to her little, aging Yorkshire terrier, Izzy, from one hand to the other. The pup scooted around her legs. “It was thoughtless of me. I’m just so excited.”
Emma shrugged. “I’m fine,” she assured her grandmother, then twisted to face the trunk of the enormous tree they stood beneath when the next yawn came. A whisper of energy coiled around her, heat seeming to seep out of the bark itself. She pursed her mouth and clasped her arms around her rib cage. As if the move offered any protection. Fatigue always made her paranoid. She even sometimes saw visions, though she didn’t like to admit it, even to herself.
&nb
sp; She sighed. No use in worrying about something she couldn’t control, and she’d long since learned she wasn’t in the driver’s seat where her visions were concerned. Instead, she engaged in her most prevalent form of evasion, her art.
Nothing wrong with burying problems in a little work.
She studied the space again. Which metals would capture the hues of oyster shells in the sky? What subject would best fit the colors? Emma jotted down some mental notes for her next project. She watched the changing colors of dusk descend on the park as clouds loomed, back-lit in an eerie coppery shimmer. The diffused light made the snow appear almost warm, the rocks somehow spongy, and the trees . . . They were mystical.
Her apprehension escalated as the walkway in front of her blurred. Her knees grew weak.
No. Not this time.
She sucked in a deep breath and tensed, resisting. But she knew with sickening certainty that the vision was coming. There was no controlling it . . .
An arrow shaft protruded from her chest, and air wheezed through her stagnant lungs. In the wake of the brutal, radiating pain, time slowed. Her heart stopped.
Oh God.
An image of a huge gray wolf materialized, howling a cry of grief alongside her lifeless body, and it lingered, dimming slowly to a sepia shadow. Had she . . . died here?
Emma blinked, disoriented, as the brief manifestation faded, reality setting back in. Exhaling hard, she shifted her feet, peering down at her strappy, crystal-embellished, leopard-print sandals and seeking solid ground. Izzy licked at her toes where they peeked from her shoes, as if trying to console her as best he could.
Her gaze swept up her own body, and she settled shaky fingers over her beating heart. No blood. No arrow. Definitely alive.
Still, the suffocating sensation of a collapsed lung remained, causing her stomach to churn. How she even knew what one felt like alarmed her.
Stop thinking about it.
With determined strength, Emma overcame the pervasive mental intrusion, forcing her attention back to the grossly neglected Georgia park where she stood trembling, to the place her sculpture would call home. She’d had these dreams and visions her whole life, and when she’d researched the phenomenon, she’d discovered they were each giving her a glimpse of one of her past lives. If one believed in that sort of thing. Which she did. But knowing that didn’t make it any less disturbing.
Forever At Midnight: The Blood Keepers Series (The Blood Keepers Series, Vampire Novella Book 2) Page 7
