by K. F. Breene
CHOSEN
By K.F. Breene
Website: http://kfbreene.com/
Blog: www.kfbreene.org
Facebook: www.facebook.com/authorKF
Twitter: @KFBreene
Copyright © 2014 by K.F. Breene
Other Titles by K.F. Breene
Skyline Series (Contemporary Romance)
Building Trouble, Book 1
Uneven Foundation, Book 2
Solid Ground, Book 3
Jessica Brodie Diaries (Contemporary Romance)
Back in the Saddle, Book 1 – FREE
Hanging On, Book 2
A Wild Ride, Book 3
Growing Pains (Contemporary Romance)
Lost and Found, Book 1 - FREE
Overcoming Fear, Book 2
Butterflies in Honey, Book 3
Love and Chaos, Cassie’s Story
Darkness Series (Paranormal Romance)
Into the Darkness, Novella 1 - FREE
Braving the Elements, Novella 2
On a Razor’s Edge, Novella 3
Demons, Novella 4
Warrior Chronicles (Fantasy)
Chosen, Book 1
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 1
The night pressed against the windows of the small house, so dense it felt solid. The five-year-old girl opened her eyes slowly, allowing sleep to recede. She registered a foreign push against her skull; an overwhelming tension battering at her mental shields. Confused, she opened herself up, trying to figure out what was happening. As if pushed out into a storm, her mind was flooded with emotions—determination, fatigue, sorrow, anxiety, rage—she was nearly dragged under with the explosion of turmoil around her. She stumbled out of bed, calling for her mother.
“Go back to bed, young Shanti. Your mother has gone to see about something.”
Putting her hand out, trying to physically block the mental bombardment, Shanti squinted into the darkness, making out her grandmother sitting by the window in the front room.
“What is going on, Gamma? Why are you afraid?”
Her grandmother waved her away urgently. “I just had a bad dream, darling. Go back to bed.”
“But—“
“GO! Shanti GO!” her grandmother screamed as she bolted upright, grabbing a throwing knife from her belt.
Startled, Shanti watched as the door burst open, hinges creaking like a ruler bent too far. A large man filled the room, looking around for an attack. Only seeing an aged woman and a little girl, his gaze scanned the room for a threat, stopping on the suit of arms above the fireplace. After a beat, his focus went straight to Shanti.
Her grandmother sprang to life. One knife was quickly dispatched to the middle of his neck. The man pawed at it feebly, his strength sapping with each spurt of blood. He tripped on nothing, his legs losing purchase. His weight crashed into the wall, falling a moment later as a wet gurgle bubbled out of his mouth.
Another man pushed into the room behind the first. His gaze snagged on his fallen comrade, limp on the floor. Crouching, he readied for an attack. Seeing the grandmother, knife in hand, ready to throw, he lunged. A thick arm knocked her to the side as her knife found his belly. Her frail body hit the wall and tumbled to the ground.
Shanti watched as the man staggered, clutching at his stomach. Another knife blossomed in the back of his neck, as Shanti’s grandmother prepared to throw yet another from a crumpled heap on the floor beneath the mantle. The man turned and stabbed downward with his sword, ripping a scream from Shanti’s throat as she watched the blade pierce her grandmother’s chest. He staggered again, not knowing he was dead until he finally slumped against the table. Man and wood went crashing to the ground.
Blood oozed from her grandmother’s lifeless body, reaching across the ground as if pleading. Pain beat on Shanti’s chest. A whimper turned into a cry. Fear turned her numb. Screams tore at the night around her.
The overwhelming sensations continued to batter at Shanti’s mind, now mixing with her own tumult. Agony bubbled up, overriding thought. Bright flashes burst behind her eyes, stealing her breath. Then came the rage, tingling her muscles and squeezing out courage. With it came something else. Something harvested from pain, growing and building. A deep well of churning, tortured power.
Dazed, she walked out of the house brimming with something newly awakened. She sucked in every detail of her surroundings; the flames, the screaming.
Shanti walked next door on wooden legs to check on Chase and his mother. Chase was the same age, but without the budding gifts. He liked to work with his hands. A builder. His profession was already chosen by his parents. He would be great someday.
Chase’s door gaped; it had been kicked in. Horrible screaming scratched at Shanti’s ears. The never ending beat of emotions in a fever pitch pounded at her mind, making her stagger into the house clutching her head, calling for Chase. Then she saw him, lying on the ground in a puddle of blood, his sightless eyes staring up at her, accusing.
Further inside the room, two strangers filled the space with their dirty lust. One was trying to lift the limp form of Chase’s mother from the ground. Another man waited, undoing his pants. His gaze swung Shanti’s way.
“Look, Rune, another one. She’s young, but I’ll take her.” The man started toward Shanti, exposing Chase’s mom’s face, slackened. Dying.
A white hot light started in Shanti’s gut and grew, rising, filling her with heat. It rose through her body, lighting her blood on fire. It grew within her skull, latched on to the agony, and turned it into rage so hot, so primal, it could only be called the budding of Wrath.
Power ripped from her body, blinding her momentarily. She clutched the two disgusting minds as her teachers had taught her, holding them within her newly awakened grip. With a shot of power beyond anything the town had seen so far, she stabbed into their minds. The men screamed. Fingers white as they clutched their heads, they sank to the ground in agony.
Panting, half-delirious, the girl turned. Headed out into the night. This had to be stopped. These men had to be dealt with. Her town must be protected.
Everywhere her gaze touched was ruin. Blazing houses, bloodied people—her friends, her neighbors. Keshla lay across the lane, face in the dirt, blood matting her hair. Someone else lay in a boneless heap beyond that.
Pain such that Shanti had n
ever experienced brewed, pumping out more power, unlocking hidden depths, power bubbling up, replacing the horror, giving purpose to her tears. She walked along the lane and threw her mind wide, touching everything in range. She clutched foreign minds in a death grip before blasting them with a shot of power. New screams wrenched the night. All male. Beastly, horrific, terrible screams that were filled with pain so acute that death was welcomed.
She kept walking, killing some quickly, slowly killing others. She reached the square, death in her wake. A man sat atop a horse, a smug grin plastered to his disgusting face. He watched the destruction around him with confident pride; carrying out his job with pleasure. He was the leader, and therefore, deserved a special death.
She killed everyone else off quickly, then, every mind Shanti could identify receiving a killing blast. Except for this man. She looked straight at this man, ignoring the screaming, ignoring the cries and the raging fires destroying homes. She cradled his mind like a baby dove. Then she thought of fire. A blue flame, tickling his skin with the kiss of heat. Increasing the pressure, the soft caress became a bite of razor blades. In her mind’s eye it licked between his toes before climbing up his legs and wrapping around his shins. It scraped against the back of his knees before reaching higher, brushing his fingers in a searing embrace.
His cruel smile winked out as confusion stole his countenance. He patted at his body, trying to smother the invisible flame. Not understanding the pain he couldn’t see.
She pumped more power into it.
Pain bit into him, a thousand points of contact. His patting became more pronounced. Harder. Hands slapping at his legs and chest, rubbing at his face. Terrified screams erupted from his throat before he flung himself off his frightened horse. He hit the dirt with a thud and began to roll, feeling the fire though still not able to see it.
Shanti hit him with more flame. Hotter. Licking his face. Burning his eyes. Closing his throat. Excruciating pain so intense he screamed himself hoarse. Writhing now, and free to do so. Feeling death eat away at his consciousness one pain-filled moment after the next. Dying slowly, like Chase’s mother.
Pain stabbing her heart, sorrow eating away at her heart, Shanti lost consciousness and fell.
***
Shanti awoke, letting the familiar nightmare evaporate like mist. She sat on the hard, brittle ground, sweeping the area with a tired gaze. As before, all she saw was dead, decaying trees dotting the landscape.
She dug in her bag one last time, looking for nourishment—a scrap, a morsel, anything. But she’d finished her water a day ago. Her food the day before that. Her empty stomach sucked the ribs into the middle of her body, trying to fill that void. Her brain thumped against the inside of her skull with dehydration.
She didn’t have long. She had to find something to eat and drink or her journey would end right here, in this crypt that used to hold a forest.
Heaving herself to her feet, she squinted into the bright sunshine. What frustrated her—when she had the ability to feel anything besides defeat—was that she had planned this route specifically for the forest that should’ve been here. For a forest that should’ve resembled the one in which she’d grown up. There should have been animals and water and life, blast it! She should have been resting and rejuvenating, using the life force of untouched lands to renew her Gift.
She was in the last leg of her journey, nearing the Great Sea, and instead of fulfilling her supposed destiny, she was knocking at death’s door.
Fat lot of good it did sending the Chosen. Chosen to waste away then fail. Chosen to carefully select a route based on outdated information and have no alternative. Chosen to let her people die slowly from starvation or quickly from defiance. Actually, either of those would have been better than the alternative.
Shanti washed those thoughts from her mind. She was too tired to feel any emotion. What was the point? What was she going to do, get really angry at herself and punch a tree? That wasn’t nearly as gratifying as punching the enemy. Plus, these trees had had it hard enough. They shed bits of charred bark like soiled feathers, dead all the way down to the root. She could usually sense life within nature, but there wasn’t a single spark of life around here.
Wasn’t that just fitting…
Half a day later she was staggering. Delirious, she had started to hallucinate, seeing strange visions flit through the dead trees. Her brain pounded so hard it felt like it was trying to rip out of the casing of her skull. Worse still, she was freezing in the hot afternoon sun. Dehydration and heat exhaustion had set in. Her body was shutting down. It was trying to save whatever it could to prolong the inevitable, but without its vital needs met, it had no choice but to keep sliding. She sunk down next to a tree to use the last of her resources to search. If there was someone close, maybe she could hold on.
Her squat turned into a tumble, shivers racking her body as the sun beat down on her bare skin. She didn’t even get a chance to open her mind before darkness consumed her.
Her last, snide thought was: Chosen my ass.
Chapter 2
“What is it?” Gracas asked. He stared down at an oddly shaped bundle. Despite the rule against it, he stood with his hands in his pockets.
“A girl, I think,” Leilius commented slowly.
Both boys stood frowning down at the twiggy, brown-splotched limbs slumped against the burnt trunk. It almost looked like a skeleton had been held next to the tree on a string, and then released, falling in a cascade of bones to form a pile at the base. The frayed, dirt crusted sheet covering the pile of probably dead human needed to be incinerated to rid it of the obvious bacterial infestation.
“Kick it,” Gracas whispered. A boy just budding into manhood, Gracas was still fascinated by slugs and bugs and, apparently, slightly alien dead things.
“I’m not going to kick it! What if it is a girl? The last time I kicked a girl my dad slapped me across the room then made me do hard labor for a week. And she deserved it!” Leilius was only a year older than Gracas, but he was one step higher in the chain of command. It was a small step, but it was large enough for his chest to puff up with importance.
“It could be a Mugdock girl,” Gracas spat. “They’d be the type to just dump one of their women.”
“The skin’s too light to be Mugdock.”
“It looks brown to me.”
“That’s dirt, I think.”
“Kick it,” Gracas prodded again, leaning over to get a proper glance into the bundle of probable human and possible female.
“What if it smooshes? Commodore Sanders just had me shine my shoes. You kick it.”
***
Sanders stopped in mid-stride as he noticed the two cadets staring at the ground a ways away from camp. Biting back a swear, he changed course. “What’s going on?”
The boys jumped and flinched at the same time.
“N-nothing, sir,” Gracas stuttered, peeling away to the side.
Leilius, losing the arch in his back, hurriedly backed up next to Gracas. Apparently not quite sure where to look, but not wanting to meet Sanders’ glare, he turned his face to the sky. “We’ve found an unidentified object, sir.” He followed his words with a vaguely pointed finger.
Sanders glanced at the base of a dead tree, found a pile of clothes not fit for a beggar, and turned back to the two nitwits. It was then the image of a pale leg filtered through his red hazed thoughts.
His gaze snapped back to the tree as his eyebrows drooped. It was a girl!
In a rush of movement, he threw out a hand to balance against the destroyed tree. With his other hand he flicked away a piece of fabric, revealing a mat of light hair coated in grime. He felt along a fragile neck until he reached the base. There, weakly pushing at his fingers, was a pulse.
“Gracas, tell Marc to meet us at camp! Make sure he gets his doctoring kit. Leilius, fetch water.”
The boys barely waited for the whip crack of commands to end before scurrying away. Commander Sanders scooped u
p the girl.
There couldn’t have been a worse scouting party to find her. Except for him, currently doing penance for tardiness, all five boys were in training, and showing no progress. They were the five worst cadets in the entire training camp, and if it weren’t for the Captain’s leniency in punishment, the boys would have been apprenticed out a long time ago. They needed to find something they were good at, because soldiering wasn’t in their future. Or doctoring, as in Marc’s case.
Back at camp, Sanders gently lowered the long waif in front of Marc. The young idiot at least had the sense to lay out a blanket.
Marc kneeled beside the girl slowly, his hands resting on his knees. With wide eyes he asked, “Is she dead?”
“You’re the doctor, moron!” Rachie, another trainee, shouted. The rest of the boys smirked, shifting closer to get a look at the girl.
“Silence!” Sanders barked. His glare backed the boys away.
It also made Marc flinch back.
Sanders pulled his irritation back in and hatched it down. He didn’t need anybody pissing themselves, and this girl was in a bad way. He adopted the high, quiet voice he used with his two-year-old niece. “She has a faint pulse. Don’t you remember anything of your training about faint pulses?”
Marc gulped and stared down at the girl. He shook his head.
A vein began to thrum along Sanders’ neck. His manic smile did not hold any humor. What it did hold, however, was the promise of agonizing pain.
The boys all took another step back.
“Think, Marc,” Sanders tried. His voice sounded like a knife sliding across a whetstone. “Check for wounds.”
Marc raised his hand to shade his face from Sanders’ glower. The other hand hovered over the girl’s torso, shaking, afraid to touch her frail skin.
Sanders’ clenched his fists and took a steadying breath. Marc was barely on the man side of puberty, still a virgin, and had never seen anyone hurt with more than a broken arm. A half dead woman was out of his league. The kid tested way above anyone else in his class, and his teachers said he knew all the information backwards and forward. But he refused to apply his knowledge in real life, retreating into his own introverted world.
