PART ONE
CLAN OF THE FORSAKEN
PROLOGUE
The grass was mossy and green beneath his boots, the air smelling of soil and rain. With the spring snows mostly melted, the vast lava field teemed with life. He crept with his brother through the sprawling maze of rock, so tall he couldn’t see over the top. Silently, they watched and listened for signs of game hiding among the crevices.
A rustle made them both turn their heads. His brother raised his bow, following the sound until the hare appeared. The boy let the arrow fly and it sailed through the air, piercing the creature through its neck. “Did you see that, Aldrik?”
“That shot was beneath you,” Aldrik said. “You could have struck it in the head.”
Reyker’s face fell. It was easy to diminish the boy, to make him question his abilities. Aldrik knew it was cruel, but someone had to push him. Katrin, the boy’s mother, was far too soft on him, and their father let Reyker think too highly of his small accomplishments. Reyker’s other weakness—his desperate desire to please his older brother, to make him proud—was a whetstone Aldrik used to sharpen the boy’s focus, to hone his strength like a blade.
“Let’s find another, then,” Reyker said, retrieving his arrow and picking up the hare by its hind legs. “I’ll strike the next one straight through the eye.”
As they made their way between two long sections of rock that rose up like a tunnel from the earth, a new sound came from behind them—the crunch of feet on the ground, the shuffle of bodies. The noises of something stalking closer, but these were boots, not the paws or hooves of game.
Aldrik drew his sword. “Announce yourselves or be slain!”
Laughter answered. Above the rock wall he saw the telltale flash of steel. “We are the wolves at your door, lordlings,” a booming voice said. “It is you who shall be slain.”
“Aldrik?” Reyker whispered. “Who are they?”
“Enemies.” Aldrik and Reyker’s father was lord of the lands of Vaknavangur, and he served Jarl Gudmund, a powerful overlord who claimed to be a child of All-God Sjaf’s loins rather than simply one of the god’s many distant descendants. Vaknavangur was surrounded by tribes who disputed Gudmund’s claim as king of the Streamlands. “Your sword, Reyker. Now.”
The boy drew his sword with trembling hands.
Aldrik grabbed his arm and shook him. “You are a rival lord’s son. They won’t hesitate to gut you. Remember your training. Kill them before they kill you. No mercy.”
“No mercy.” The boy steadied his hands on the hilt.
Eight armed men clambered over the rocks and leaped down, circling them. One was huge with a misshapen nose—a brawny ogre.
“Your father was warned to stay out of Jarl Eldjarn’s affairs,” the ogre said. “Yet he sent men to aid the campaign against Eldjarn on behalf of Gudmund the Pretender. He should’ve listened. Perhaps he finally will, when we send him his sons’ heads.”
The warriors closed in on Aldrik.
Aldrik sliced his sword through three of them before the men had even begun to swing their weapons. But the ogre was faster than the others, and Aldrik had to duck under the arc the hulking man’s axe made.
“I’ve got the snake-eyed bastard,” the ogre said to his comrades. “Get the boy.”
Three warriors stepped toward Reyker, and something fluttered in Aldrik’s chest, a rancid taste rising from his belly. Is this what fear feels like? He ignored it, bringing his sword up to meet the ogre’s axe. The blow sent vibrations up his arm. The axe’s blade hovered just above his head.
“Is it true your harlot mother was a volva?” the ogre asked. “Is that why you have eyes like a demon?”
“True enough.” Aldrik smiled. These men had no idea the danger they’d walked into, the secret strength he possessed because of his witch mother. Aldrik shoved, and the giant stumbled into the wall of rock behind him.
Aldrik glanced at Reyker. The boy had blocked the strike of one warrior’s axe, but he was merely defending himself. He did not take the opening the man left, did not let loose the killing blow Aldrik knew he was capable of delivering.
“Fight, Reyker! Kill them!”
The boy did not listen.
The ogre launched himself at Aldrik once more, and their weapons locked. “After I gut you, I’m going to eat your demon heart and gain your half-breed powers. Then I’ll send the rest of you to Ildja in pieces.”
Aldrik dropped his guard, baiting his opponent, and the ogre rushed forward, crashing his axe into Aldrik’s stomach. Pain shot through his nerves, and it was a struggle to stay on his feet. The ogre came closer, grinning. “You’ve overlooked one thing,” Aldrik said.
The pain was worth it for the look on the ogre’s face as he watched the bleeding hole in Aldrik’s belly close, the skin knitting itself back together.
“My mother was blessed by Ildja. As was I.”
Aldrik thrust his sword below the ogre’s ribs and sliced sideways, eviscerating him. The ogre hit his knees, holding his intestines as they spilled out into his hands.
“No witch’s mutt, are you?” the ogre mumbled—his dying words, as he toppled sideways into a puddle of blood.
Aldrik made quick work of cutting down two of the warriors who’d gone after Reyker. The third—who wore a torque of braided gold that marked him as a keeper of the god shrines, a warrior priest who killed only in the name of the gods—had dropped his sword and backed away.
Aldrik kept an eye on the priest as he grabbed Reyker and searched his wounds, ensuring none were life-threatening. Then he shook the boy so hard his teeth clacked together. “Why didn’t you kill them?”
“I couldn’t,” the boy said. “I couldn’t.”
“Gud-mund,” the priest gasped, staring at Aldrik. “You are the god-man I’ve heard whispers about, not your overlord. Only flesh born of the serpent-goddess herself can evade death.”
A beat of silence passed before Aldrik scoffed. “There is no god-man, you fool. That’s a yarn spun by weak jarls desperately clinging to power they did not earn.”
The priest kneeled. “I’ve witnessed it with my own eyes. You are the one we have searched for. I pledge my fealty to you, son of Ildja.”
Something shifted inside of Aldrik, tumblers sliding gears into place, unlocking a door he didn’t want to open.
It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true.
He’d heard the prophecies of a god-man, progeny of Ildja, the eater of souls. But he was not that man. He had a mother, a volva from one of the covens in the Haunted Isles. She had died giving birth to him—that was what his father had told him.