Book #2 in the Chrim Chronicles series
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The second book in the Chrim Chronicles occures in three different worlds that collide in an inevitable war.
The reckoning is coming.
I...
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Loreen
Some of their throats were cut so deep that their heads had detached, others had guts dangling out of their ripped open stomachs, and a few even had missing limbs. Army of the Dead we called them, but as these cold corpses charged at us they were the furthest thing from being dead.
Amongst cries for help, balls of fire and blue lines of electricity swooshed past me. From the sky rained rocks; the element of the Fynce line. Nearly all the tents were ablaze. Fresh corpses covered the bloodstained ground we killed each other on. I pushed myself through the chaos and fell against a wall inside the fortress.
A pair of small feet appeared before me, when looking up it was the little terror Neviana staring down at me with vacant looking eyes and a cold, blank face. "Taking a rest, Loreen?"
"Have you been paying attention, my queen?" I hauled myself up and nodded at the distance. "We're all dead either way. Won't make any difference if I take a rest, yeah."
"I distress." Neviana placed her hands on her back and blinked as she watched me ever so calmly. "If you don't go and fight out there, I'll be the one who will kill you here." She smiled and shrugged. "I would say that is a massive difference, wouldn't you agree?"
A long silence followed as I glared at her while doing everything in my power to stop myself from ripping off her little throat. Then, I smiled. "If that's your order, I'll go outside and fight for you as you watch on and see us die so you can sit on a petty little throne while pretending you mean something outside of this backward cult here that your ancestors built after getting exiled for being the bad seed of the seven bloodlines, a bad seed they apparently have never stopped passing on."
The muscles in her smug face loosened into disbelief, but before she had the time to respond I found myself back outside in the garden of slaughter, stepping over fallen soldiers, and shockingly I felt more comfortable there. Right then I began to wonder, leaving aside my grudges, was it really worse to be under Farren's reign than being here, ordered around by an evil little brat who'd rather see me drop dead?
Where hundreds of Supernaturals fought on my left and right, I came to a standstill and stared into nothing as I wondered just what and who I was fighting for. Sure, I'd been exiled from Chrim after my last remaining family was murdered, but there was an entire world out there. I didn't need to be anywhere near these people. And, I was certainly better off without them.
My lips opened up to a grin and I popped down my fangs, their points poking in my bottom lip. It was time to go, leave all these rats behind for once and for all, but not before I enforced my own reign of terror. I mean, really, after all that happened I deserved that much. Rushing through the clashing hordes, I bit in one neck after the other, knowing that last year's virus had turned my blood into poison. At this point I didn't even check nor care whether it was the enemy's neck I was biting into or our allies'.
In the end, no matter which side they fought on, they were all the same toxic waste.
Once I'd bitten my way through the armies, I found myself near the ocean where dozens of ships bobbed up and down the waves. Ignoring the screams of the battle right behind me, I bent down and grabbed one of the ropes to cut a boat loose, but the silence made me freeze. Slowly I straightened myself. There was silence. No more chaos, not a single boom or scream or cry, only utter silence. Something inside me told me that I should've sailed away right then, but my curiosity got the best of me and I turned around.
No one moved, they just stood there. Something was missing. With slow steps, I walked towards the death-ridden, smoldering campsite, sniffing in the scent of burned tents, and came to a sudden halt when I realized that there were no more mutilated corpses roaming around, they had just vanished; the Army of the Dead was no more.
My eyes slid to the right where Farren stood and we looked one another in the eye, both knowing that this was their doom. The only reason they'd come this far against our massive army was because of the Fynce line.
"Where'd they go?" I asked her. The curiosity almost turned painful.
Farren swallowed and looked away. "Nothing is powerful enough to raise the dead, they were only here temporary, and I guess their time is up."
"Farren..." I whispered. "You are royally fucked."
One single loud yell broke the silence, and, as some battled and others ran, one by one her soldiers collapsed on the ground. Before it'd been a fair battle, sweaty and bloody and filled with courage, but this scene was just painful to watch. It was like a colony of ants being crushed underneath a boot, swift and effortless.
A look of despair cast over her disfigured face as she nodded weakly, it was the look of someone who had just accepted their loss. "We had a good run." She laughed and, using the back of her hand, wiped off a stream of blood trickling down her nose. Resting the hatchet on her shoulder, she began to stroll forward, right towards the fortress. "Goodbye, Loreen."
