Bone Lord (Book 1)
Dante King
Copyright © 2019 by Dante King
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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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
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About the Author
Chapter One
Threads of fate, the sum of all a man was, all he is, and all he could be.
Sometimes, the gods would entwine their own fate threads with those of mortal men, granting men of choice supernatural abilities. But that was long ago, and the only god left was a real prick. The God of Light. The God of All That Is Holy. The God of Chastity and Virtue and all the other things that turned a real man’s stomach.
He had no interest in giving me power. I’d asked him, and he’d promptly told me to fuck off before sending a squad of his lackeys after me.
Still, I’d survived since then by evading every one of his holy assholes. They were stronger than me, and always would be. At least until I found myself another god.
But a mortal man made do with what he had. Or with what he could take. In my case, it was Grave Oath, a powerful weapon, forged in the Underworld by an archlich, blessed by the hand of the Death Goddess herself.
Or so the weapon’s previous owner had said before I’d killed him with it.
For me, it was nothing more than a dagger that could rend bone and steel alike. And that wasn’t its only trick, as the soldiers who’d joined me in the unlit crypt would soon discover.
Three armed and armored soldiers rounded the bend, their torches flickering over the enchanted wards carved into the walls. I was hidden to them as they split in different directions and scoured the chamber. The tombs were all empty, the burial treasures taken centuries ago by the first people to dive the crypt.
I held my breath as a soldier approached my trap. He stepped on the triggering mechanism, and the metal spikes bit into his right leg.
“Fuck!” the poor bastard roared, grabbing his leg and clawing at the vices.
The second soldier just kept scanning the darkness further down the passageway, and the largest soldier ignored his companion’s pleas for help and knelt to inspect my trap. “This isn’t old,” he said as he drew a cutlass the size of a claymore. “Looks like we’ve got company. Someone else must have caught word of the skull.”
The weathered blade reflected the light of his torch and further illuminated the rest of his body. He was a giant, and probably a real one at that.
He would prove the most trouble, so I’d neutralize him first.
I drew Grave Oath and crept toward the soldiers with soundless, slow steps, taking care not to leave the concealment of the shadows left untouched by their torches.
“Would one of you fuckers help me!” the trapped man yelled as he made more futile attempts to pull his leg free of the mental pincers.
“You walked into it,” the second soldier said, having turned back while inspecting the opposite side. “Get yourself out of it.”
The man with the cutlass started to chuckle, but I was already behind him, I slipped my dagger through the gap in his leather breastplate and skewered his right kidney. From any other blade, he might have died after 20 minutes, once he bled out, but Grave Oath was different. Whether it was the special metal or the Death Goddess’ enchantment didn’t matter to me. Nor did it matter to my new friend. The soul was torn from his body, and what landed on the crypt floor was a withered husk of a man, a hundred pounds lighter and looking a hundred years older.
“You,” the trapped soldier said as he reached out to grab me.
I ducked beneath his arms, circled behind him, and slashed the hamstring of his uninjured leg. His screams filled my ears as the other soldier charged me. Before he could bring his ax down to slice me open, I flung a handful of throwing stars. The first hit him in the heart, the second punctured his throat, and the third struck him between the eyes.
I needed to claim his life before it escaped his body, so I drove Grave Oath through his heart. After the blade had taken his soul, I returned to the man I’d left screaming in my trap.
“Your friend over there mentioned a skull.” I lifted the soldier’s chin with the point of my dagger. He had stopped screaming and now looked at me with wide eyes.
“You’re the Soultaker…” His voice quavered, and he let out a fearful sob. “Please, kill me any other way. I beg you, don’t use the dagger.”
“You work for Sergeant Rollar, don’t you?”
The man made a small nod, careful not to press into my dagger.
“Then you’re responsible for what I found two day’s stride south of here.”
It wasn’t a question. I knew this soldier was part of a battalion that had pillaged the village. It was why I’d followed them. I’d intended on getting justice for the innocents they’d killed.
“We were just having a little fun. What’s a few peasants to you? You’re the Soultaker.”
“Tell me of the skull. What does Rollar want with it?”
“He thinks it belonged to the Death Goddess before she was killed. I never believed it was here. I was just happy to get away from the camp.”
The skull of the Death Goddess? Even if it were a fake, I could sell it in the nearest trade outpost. Or I could visit Rollar and see how much he was willing to pay for it.
“Thank you for that information. It seems coming here
