Page 139 of The Shadow Fae Rhapsody
I follow the death trail until I reach the open square of the fortress in the upper bailey.
Through the billowing smoke, I see him rampaging like the wrath of an avenging god. The beast is two times the height of an elf, with demonic horns, claws, and covered with furs. His inhuman eyes are a dark, molten fluid. That carnivorous look on his face bears no resemblance to the man I know. Shadows surround him as he tears through enemies and allies alike.
“Svenn!” I scream at him.
He answers it with a roar to the sky. It reverberates through the ground, shaking the walls around us.
“Svenn…” I mutter, covering my sensitive ears.
Horns sprout from his head, growing and spiraling. His jaw opens once again, and the bellowing is so loud I’m afraid it may bring down the entire fortress.
Briallen thrashes at the intimidating presence before us. It’s a natural instinct of all living beings to steer away from death. I quickly dismount from the panicking horse.
Garret makes his way through the chaos towards us.
“Easy,” he murmurs to my neighing mount.
“What happened? Why is he in that shape?” I ask him. But the knight has no answer for me.
We continue to watch the storm of death and fury before us. Svenn pulverizes a band of orcs like they are mere bugs in his path. One of the younger knights beside me vomits.
“It’s best if you look away,” Garrett counsels, bracing my back.
“This bloodletting is mine to bear…” I wince, staring ahead at the unfolding carnage. I have unleashed this beast into this world.
Svenn breaks the bones of his enemies, snapping them like twigs. His dark eyes gleam like the devil, perfectly at home in this hellish battlefield.
But Svenn is not uninjured.
My stomach dip over the arrows jutting out all over his body. Sword, spears, and axes. How is he still walking with that much damage?
“Wake up, Svenn!” My throat feels parched and raw from all the screaming, but I don’t stop. Not until he hears me. “Svenn!”
He turns to me, crushing the skull of an orc with one hand and ripping the throat of another with the other. Our gazes meet and my heart lurches to my throat. There is no light whatsoever in the depth of those eyes.And he doesn’t recognize me.
“Get out of his way!” Lord Nemarion commands his infantry too little too late. The shadows devour his soldiers into its dark embrace. “Kvatosh help us. The vampire is a force to be reckoned with.”
No. Svenn is the Reckoning.
The end of all things. A creature created to cull the human race and subjugate them to his master’s command.
He throws a spear at Aelfric. My lightning-fast knight narrowly avoids the attack.
“Svenn!” I call upon him again to cease this madness.
Please.
My heart turns to stone when his shadows swallow Lord Wesley and the newly arrived enforcement.
Heavens help me.
Un, what do I do?
Then I see it. A sinister presence coils around him.
I was right.
The dwarven dagger come in pairs. A tear trickles out of the corner of my eye. Svenn is influenced by a curse…
