Page 1 of Empire of Dark

Chapter One

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They were born with extraordinary powers, these diversions of evolution.

Panthenites and malefics.

Then humans made them into gods. Worshipped them.

Time passed, as did their favor as gods.

But they never disappeared.

They never lost their powers.

The metal clashed next to my ear, blade on blade, and I smiled.

Well, this was fun.

My skin had been tingling since we walked into this pub, telling me exactly who was around, so the blade coming down at my head shouldn’t have been a surprise.

Malefics all around.

I rolled across a rough-hewn table to avoid the hit and landed on my feet, my own blade swinging up in a wide arc to block the next blow from a brute with bulging eyes and a mountain-man beard that had decided a woman half his size was a match for him.

His blade locked onto mine, reversing my momentum, and he shoved me backward with a roar. I crashed hard on a round table and spun off it, dropping to the floor.

Ooof.

In the melee, the tip of someone’s boot had landed under my stomach, jabbing me hard in my diaphragm. As I curled into myself, gasping for breath at the brutal blow and the pain vibrating along my spine, I surveyed the body that was attached to the boot. A malefic with blood dripping from his ear and his head swaying back and forth like he’d just had the snot knocked out of him.

It looked painful, but at least he wasn’t an immediate danger to me.

A simple meal. That was all we’d wanted.

A meal, maybe a drink or two, and then some sleep before we tackled the mission tomorrow.

The Grog & Ale had seemed like the perfect place. Quaint, multi-colored stained-glass windows lined the front of the stucco building with the swooping slate roof, reminding me of a nineteenth century coaching inn I’d once seen in a German village. Never mind that we were in the middle of the Swiss Alps.

As we’d walked down the cobblestone street, the sun had been setting in a mountain valley behind the building, sending an orangey glow about the white stucco of the pub. Postcard perfect, the ideal place to relax after the travel.

Or so we had thought.

Simple had turned into complicated the moment we’d entered the pub to find it swarming with malefics, but thathadn’t stopped Triaten. No. Like the panthenite leader he was, he strode in like we owned the place and found us a corner booth—he was ballsy, but not stupid.

Granted, he was one of the panthenites’ best, a warrior with every right to his swagger. But still. He’d promised me simple. Time to talk.

We hadn’t even gotten our plates of food before all hell had broken loose.

My fingers curled into the dirty wooden floor. With my breath back in place, I surveyed the space above me. I’d landed a table away from the bearded malefic trying to slice my head off and he was having a hard time pushing other people in mid-battle out of the way to get to me.

I glanced across the pub to Triaten.

He was in the far corner, taking on four drunk, angry malefics, two of them with swords swinging. All that, and he still had an eye on me. He winked.

Show-off.

But also, thanks, Uncle Tri.

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