by Steve Feasey
Lann began moving in the direction of his aunt when the sword sang its harsh battle cry again in his head. At the same moment, a horde of vile and terrible creatures appeared from within the huge arch-shaped construction, those at the front pushed out by the mass of others behind them as they surged forward. Things no human eyes should see spilt out into this world, causing him to shrivel inside with terror. As he watched, one of the monsters raised its head in Fleya’s direction and started moving towards her.
He heard Astrid shout out, and it was this sound, not the screaming cries of the Dreadblade, that spurred him into action. He wasn’t aware that he had set off down the hill, his legs only just staying beneath him and finding the next footing as he hurtled down the steep slope.
He too was screaming now, a great war cry that echoed the words of the blade, the two in unison once more as they sought to prevent the shadowy thing from reaching Fleya. There was a harsh, fizzing sound above him, and he caught the flash of the arrow in flight as it cut through the air not far over his head. Astrid’s aim was true, and he saw the arrowhead find a home in the foul creature’s chest, knocking it back for a moment. But it was only for a moment. The monster swiped at the arrow in annoyance, snapping the wooden shaft with a swat of its claws, even as a second found a home in its shoulder.
Time seemed to slow – a cruel trick of the mind that made Lann realise that no matter what he and Astrid tried, Fleya’s fate was sealed. The monster was almost on her, reaching out with long, curved talons to tear her apart. Without faltering, Lann raised the black sword, lifting his arm up over his shoulder before launching it forward again with all his might to hurl the blade.
End over end the dark blade tumbled through the space between the youth and the monster. He could hear it as it flew, and he knew the monster heard it too. But the dark creature would not be distracted from its goal. Its eyes still fixed on the witch, lips peeled back in a ghastly grimace, it swung its arm in a wide arc, raking those awful claws through Fleya’s body. Lann shuddered when he heard his aunt’s terrible cry of pain – a cry that was echoed, too late, by her attacker, the creature falling back and crashing to the ground as the sword buried itself deep in its throat.
Running to where his aunt lay, Astrid close behind him, Lann heard the shield maiden cry out. Turning his head in the direction of her voice, he watched as she pulled her hand back and prepared to throw something in the direction of the portal, from which monsters continued to pour. The severed piece of the asghoul’s antler flew out in a high arc, landing in the pulsing blackness of the opening. And as it did, he felt the world pinch back in on itself, snapping shut the terrible breach as if incensed that it had been so violated. No more of the vile creatures could enter now, but more than enough had already managed to cross over.
Lann sobbed as he neared the dying body of his aunt. Blood poured from the dreadful wounds she’d suffered, her clothes already soaked through with the stuff. His head was filled with a tumult of sound: the screeching, gibbering, moaning cacophony of the monstrous horde was matched by the Dreadblade’s screams as it demanded to be about its work. Over and above all this was his own bellowed cry of anguish as he threw his head back and cursed the gods.
Then Astrid was there. Falling to her knees beside his aunt, she looked first at Lann and then at the horrifying host massed behind him.
‘Go!’ she said, her eyes already full of tears. ‘I am with her. Go and do what you must!’
With one last look at Fleya, he turned towards that terrifying horde. Then, driven by rage and grief, he snatched up the sword and ran into it.
To anyone watching that day, it would have appeared that the boy and the dark blade he wielded were a force of nature. Wild, vicious and merciless, they set about the malevolent mass of creatures. Slashing and stabbing, cutting and hacking left and right, they were as relentless as they were ruthless. Limbs were severed, terrible wounds opened up, and blood flowed in torrents from the shrieking, howling things that had dared to come through the portal. Many ran or flew away before this onslaught, seeking to get as far away from the black blade as they could. Others tried to resist, and these were the first to fall, scythed down by the young man and his sword.
The Dreadblade sang in his hand and head. It drank deep that day, doing what it was forged to do. Wild with the bloodlust, Lann had no idea how long the slaughter went on for; time no longer had any meaning to the boy or the blade as they stabbed and slashed and cut. Everything was death and destruction.
When the killing was finally over, the blade fell silent, and both sword and wielder collapsed to the ground amidst the dead.
* * *
Astrid felt the silence too. She had been kneeling at Fleya’s side, cradling the woman in her arms as the last breath left her body. Now she lifted her head and saw Lann stagger and fall.
Reluctant to leave her charge, she gently placed Fleya back down on the earth and went to him. Lann was on his hands and knees, surrounded by the bodies of his victims. Astrid’s first thought was that he must be mortally wounded. He was a thing of red in a sea of the same colour; a sea made up of limbs and wings, heads and corpses. It was only his eyes that weren’t the colour of the death about him, and they now stared sightlessly out from a gruesome crimson mask.
‘Lann? Lann, it’s me … Astrid.’ Dropping down beside him, she frowned when he didn’t respond. ‘Lann. Let me help you up. Please.’ She reached out a hand to him, and when he eventually put his own in hers, she gently pulled him to his feet. Somehow the sword still remained grasped in his other hand, and she gingerly reached out and took it, returning it to the scabbard by his side.
‘Are you hurt?’ she asked.
Staring out into nothingness, he answered her question with a small, almost imperceptible shake of his head.
‘Fleya?’ he said, looking at her for the first time. He waited, then nodded when he saw the answer in her eyes. When he spoke again, his voice was little more than a whisper. ‘She knew. She knew she would not leave this place. And yet she still came.’
‘She thought she could stop Kelewulf. She had to try.’
At the mention of the necromancer, Lann turned to look in the direction of where he’d last seen the young man. But the circle was empty.
‘He’s gone,’ Astrid said.
‘I couldn’t reach that creature in time. I tried, but I couldn’t. And then –’ he stifled a sob – ‘then … I left her to die alone.’
Astrid shook her head and let out a shuddering sigh. ‘She was not alone. I was with her and spoke to her before she died. She somehow managed to hold on long enough for me to do that. She knew you could not be with her, Lann. She told me she had seen what would happen here today in a vision.’ Astrid paused and gathered herself. ‘She told me to tell you that she loved you, and that she was proud to have been a part of your life in this world.’
He looked down at his bloody hands, slowly turning them as if trying to grasp how they could have come to look like this. ‘I let myself be taken over by anger, and by the needs of the blade. I should have been at her side—’
‘No, Lann. You did what you had to do – what you were fated to do. Come. Come and say goodbye to her.’
Unable to speak, Lann could only nod. Tears fell, making pale tracks down through the blood that covered his face. Astrid took his hand and led him over to his aunt’s unmoving body. The majik that had sustained her for all of her long years in this world was gone now, and the woman he looked down on was elderly and frail, beautiful and at peace.
‘I am sorry for your loss, Lannigon Gudbrandr.’
The pair spun around at the sound of a man’s voice.
He was dressed in rags, like a beggar, and he had a long silver beard, but Lann immediately recognised the golden eyes.
Rakur.
‘Your aunt was a good woman who used her majik for the betterment of the people around her. She was much admired and will be missed in this world.’
Lann looked ston
ily at the god. ‘She wasn’t a fan of yours.’
‘No. Then again, few people are.’ The god turned his attention to the girl at Lann’s side, giving her a nod. ‘Astrid Rivengeld.’
‘You have me at a disadvantage. You are?’
‘I have many names, in different places. But to your people I am known as Rakur.’
The girl nodded, and he raised an eyebrow.
‘Usually the arrival of an old god is met with more deference.’
‘You are not the first god I have met in recent times.’ She stared out at the bloody field. ‘What I find hard to understand is why the gods who have ignored our prayers and worship for centuries have suddenly decided to come among us again?’
Rakur, too, looked about him at the carnage before turning back to them both. ‘Ah, but these are not ordinary times, are they? And neither of you are ordinary people.’
‘And yet my aunt still had to die,’ Lann said, the anger in his words clear to hear.
‘You would have had me meddle with fate and save her?’
‘Yes.’
‘And if I had, would your rage have been so great when you saw her struck down like that? Your fury sustained you here today in a way that no other emotion could. How many of these foul creatures did you kill, fuelled by that same rage?’
‘Not enough. Many escaped.’
‘Yes. And this world and the people of these lands will suffer because of that. But their suffering would have been far greater had it not been for you.’ The god gave a little shake of his head. ‘She had to die. It was written. We interfere with the fates of you humans at great risk.’
‘Yet you interfered with my fate. You gave me the dark sword, knowing I would never be the same again.’
‘Ah, but did I? Maybe I just facilitated something that was meant to be.’
‘What are you saying?’ Lann said, frowning. ‘That I was … destined to wield the weapon?’
‘Who else?’
Lann waited for the god to continue, shaking his head when the deity stared back at him blankly. ‘It’s true what they say about you. You speak only in riddles. Half-truths and words designed to trick us. My aunt knew this. She warned me never to trust you.’
Rakur smiled, but there was no humour in his look. ‘Then let me speak plainly to you, Lannigon Gudbrandr. Your aunt told you many things, but she withheld something crucial. When we first met, you asked me whether I was your father. Do you remember?’
Lann nodded.
‘You also asked me what happened to the gods when people stopped believing in them.’ He hesitated as if weighing up how best to go on. ‘Who was the sword forged for?’
‘Trogir.’ Lann remembered his time in the catacombs. ‘He who banished the dark god Lorgukk. And after he’d saved the world from the dark god, you and the other gods tried to kill him.’
Rakur nodded. ‘He was insane. The fight against Lorgukk had taken his senses. Power can corrupt the purest heart. He wanted to rule over this human world on his own. If that had happened, we would simply have been swapping one tyrannical monster for another. But we were unsuccessful. He escaped. Trogir wandered this world for hundreds of years, half mad, and unaware of who he was.’ He lifted his extraordinary eyes and looked at Lann. ‘He found peace when he finally found love.’
Realisation dawned on Lann. ‘My mother … She fell in love with the god Trogir?’
Rakur nodded. ‘By then he was neither god nor man. He fell in love with Lette every bit as much as she loved him. You were a result of that happiness.’
Lann felt the sword stir at his side.
‘The Dreadblade. Nobody else can wield it, can they?’
‘No. Not while you live.’ The god studied the boy for a moment. ‘Now do you understand what I meant when I told you I have not interfered with your fate?’ He made a gesture that took in the carnage behind them. ‘This is your fate, Lannigon Gudbrandr. Yours too, Astrid Rivengeld. And your journey together has only just begun. Your destinies, and that of the young necromancer Kelewulf, are like intertwined ropes stretching out before you all. Your aunt knew this. She gave her life so you might know it too.’
He glanced behind him, as though called by a voice only he could hear. ‘I must leave you now.’
Lann took a step towards him. ‘Wait. You say we have a path to walk together – what do we do now?’
But the god had turned his back on them and was slowly walking away. He called back over his shoulder, his voice coming to them faintly. ‘First, you and the Dreadblade must rid these lands of the vile creatures that escaped you today. Make these lands safe again.’
‘And then? What about Kelewulf?’
‘Hasz. That is where you must journey if you wish to stop the necromancer. Today was merely a test of his new-found powers. To bring Lorgukk back to this world, he needs the dark god’s heart. And that is in Hasz. But beware. The Hasz’een have no love for the Volken people. You will have to be brave, little demigod.’ He laughed at this, the mocking sound carried away on the wind and disappearing just as he himself did.
The rush of wings made Lann turn. A crow flew past him, so close he could feel air on his face. Looking to where Fleya’s body had been, he saw that only the clothes she’d been wearing remained.
He looked past the garments towards the two crows perched on a large lichen-covered rock. The creatures seemed to be intently watching him and Astrid.
‘Lette and Fleya. They are together again,’ Astrid said softly.
‘Yes. My aunt will be happy. She missed her sister very much.’ He swallowed, his mind a jumbled mix of feelings and emotions. He knew Fleya had faced Kelewulf with full knowledge of what would happen. He also somehow knew that she was happy now, and free. But he felt desolate without her.
‘And they will always be with you, Lann. You know that, don’t you?’
‘With us,’ he said, glancing at her. ‘I cannot do this alone, Astrid. I would not be standing here now if you had not come along with me.’ He remembered an expression his aunt had been fond of, the memory making him smile, despite everything. ‘We are leaves being blown around on the breath of the gods. Will you allow yourself to sail on those winds with me a little longer?’
The grin she gave him in return made his heart lift for the first time since they’d arrived in Vissergott. ‘I would like that.’
As one, the crows cawed – a triumphant sound. Then, unfurling their wings, they leaped into the sky and flew off towards the sea – towards the West and the land of the Hasz’een.
Lann had no choice but to follow.
At least he would not do so alone.
Acknowledgements
I did something I said I’d never do with this book – I pitched the idea to my editor while I was in the middle of writing another book. And when I did, I was a little taken back by her reaction: ‘Write that book. That’s the book you should write next.’ Her enthusiasm for the idea was such that I took her advice and started work on it straight away.
Dark Blade was a long time in the making. Some of that was down to me and some of it wasn’t, but the fact that it exists at all is thanks to a group of people who have believed in me throughout my writing career, even when I’d lost my own faith.
Thanks to everyone at Bloomsbury Children’s for their hard work on Dark Blade, but in particular: Rebecca McNally for that initial encouragement; Callum Kenny for his enthusiasm and for being not just a flipping great editor, but for ‘getting it’; Fliss Stevens for spotting my errors and stopping me from looking like a fool; Ian Lamb, Emily Moran and the marketing team. And thank you to all the other wonderful people working behind the scenes who helped make the majik happen.
I also have to thank my agent, Catherine Pellegrino, who has been with me through thick and thin, good times and bad. You picked me out of the slush pile and have been a great source of encouragement when I need an ear to bend or someone to moan to.
Thank you also to the ridiculously talented Francesca Baerald, who
turned my inept scribble into the fabulous map of Strom and its surrounding kingdoms. And ZhiHui Su for devising and creating such a wonderful cover.
Finally I’d like to thank my family for everything they have had to put up with. Zoe, Hope and Kyran – I love you, and this book is as much yours as it is mine. x
About the Author
Steve Feasey lives in Hertfordshire with his wife and children. He says he didn’t learn much at school, but he was always a voracious reader. He started writing fiction in his thirties, inspired by his own favourite writers: Stephen King, Elmore Leonard and Charles Dickens. His first book, Changeling, was shortlisted for the Waterstones Prize and became a successful series. He is also the author of the acclaimed Mutant City series. This is his first novel set in the world of Stromgard.
@stevefeasey
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First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
