The stranger’s cackle radiated through the still air.
“This… This is your king?” the man mocked.
Rhaif’s hand tightened around the staff in his left hand. “Who is this person?”
“Strangers from across the seas,” Lex said.
“How many?”
“Two ships. Fifty men,” Dorian answered.
“And the others?”
“Dead,” Lex said shortly. “Would you like their heads? They’re still rolling in the surf, I think—Oh wait. You can’t can you?”
Rhaif’s jaw clenched. “Another remark like that, Second Sun, and I’ll have you beheaded,” he warned. He took another step towards the stranger, and Bard took a step sideways, releasing him.
“Who are you?” Rhaif asked the stranger.
The man spat on Rhaif’s boots. “Why should I tell you?”
“You are a stranger in my kingdom,” Rhaif answered. “If you’d not like to end up like your brethren, you’ll bow before me and tell me who you are.”
The man’s chortle sounded from his lips again. “You are not my king,” the man seethed. “My king is Sir Aeron of Mathis, Son of Aderon, High King of the Seven Seas, and ruler of Man. There are a thousand ships with their eyes on this land. It is only a matter of time before your shores are breeched. Your people will perish. We will toss your children from your walls. This kingdom will cripple beneath our weight. You will all be our slaves. You—”
Rhaif snapped his finger.
The cut of a sword sliced through the air.
The stranger’s head fell onto the sand and rolled into the surf.
“Lies.”
Dorian’s eyes widened at the word his brother had just uttered.
Rhaif clenched the staff. “If any of you so much as utters a single word of what was spoken here, I’ll make sure you never speak again,” he growled. “Tell no one. This stays here.”
Nyssa squeezed Dorian’s arm as he exchanged a long look with Lex. Lex gave a short nod, and Dorian met his sister’s eyes.
This was it.
The moment Aydra and Draven had warned them of.
They would leave.
Tonight.
APPENDIX
AYDRA RAVENSPEAK'S MARK
MARK OF THE VENARI KING
NOCTUANS
A GROUP OF creatures forced into a curse, only allowed free roam of Haerland at night during the Dead Moons. The Dead Moons last for fourteen days, and happen every seventy-two days. These are the creatures forced to live beneath such tyranny.
Aberd
- The Aberd is a great marsupial creature. It swings through the canopy of the trees without sound, using its longer-than-body tail for balance and also to help them move at great speed. They have hands similar to ours; long, lanky arms, black fur, yellow slitted pupils, and razor-sharp teeth. Their cackling whoops surround you in an ambush from above, and slit your throat from behind before devouring you.
Aviteth
- The Aviteth is the Noctuan brother of the Aenean Orel. A great bird, six feet tall, wingspan twice that size. Its feathers shimmer black as a shadow. There are only three left in this Age, having been killed for sport in the last. Their cry follows the Ulfram’s howl. It is so high-pitched and splintering that it causes the eardrum to bleed, therefore giving away your location. There is no way of hiding from them. The smell of blood guides them to their prey. It drives their entire being. You are still alive when they begin to shred the flesh from your bones.
Berdijay
- A shadow giant made of swamp and ash and your worst fears. Twenty feet tall. Eyes red as blood. A giant of rotting melted flesh, burned and braided like hair on his body. He smells of your worst fears and will consume you inside your mind. He speaks in riddles, confusing you and brining the nightmares you didn’t know existed to the front of your mind, forcing you to step inside it.
Bullhorn
- The Bullhorn is the Noctuans’ most familiar. He is the only one of his kind. A great beast no less than eight feet tall. He carries a double-headed axe in his elongated sausage fingers, long pointed nails like daggers. The Bullhorn has the head of the Ulfram, the lengthy tree-limb like magnificent grey horns of the bull, and the torso of a man. Its lower body is more like the haunches of the bull, but he stands on his wheel-sized hooves upright. The black thick fur that covers its entire body is thick around its hips, and splayed out as a mane around his head and down his back in a V.
Bygon
- The Bygon is known by her more familiar names: the shape-shifting siren, the nightingale, and the Dead Moons’ composer. Her songs carry through the trees on the wind, causing weak-minded person to fall prey to her lullaby. She carries them into a deep slumber and then devours their blood in spurts, keeping her prey alive as she consumes them. Her form shifts from mist in the air, forming as bone and blood, followed by muscle and then flesh, until she is fully corporeal before you as her true self: skin pale and luminescent as the moon, board-straight black hair, usually appearing wet and silk-like. Her eyes long, lips thin, jaw petite. The chartreuse green of her irises reminds you of moss. But this is not the form she will take you in under her spell. She will shift into a being more desirable to you, and engulf your blood under the cover of that guise.
Noirdiem
- The Noirdiem are deer-like creatures. Their bodies are barely corporeal, instead of flesh and muscles on their bones, they are merely iridescent skeletons, horns growing out of the heads of some. Their bodies glow elegantly against the dark of the forest around them. Different from the other Noctuans, these creatures are at peace with the darkness. They are said to be a sign of welcome from Duarb if they appear to you.
Rhamocour
- The Rhamocour is a great dragon-like beast. U-shaped scales darker than black cover its body, only giving way to the light when fire
