Spark of Vengeance – Chapter One

We are now officially less than a week away.
Which means we are less than a week from diving back into Imdalind, and visiting a part of the story we have never heard before, all from Ryland’s Point of View.

I have to say that jumping back into the world of Imdalind has been a blast. Joclyn, Thom, and Wyn have been dying to get back in there with Ryland and kick some butt!
And kick some butt they do!

In fact… if you want a little sneak peek I have the perfect one for you!

I give you… Chapter One of Spark of Vengeance!

Grab it on Amazon and iBooks Today!

*All following is copyright 2018, Rebecca Ethington, Imdalind Press, Market Street Books. All matter unedited and subject change.*

Chapter One

3 Years Later
Genoa, Italy – Rescue Area Západ
Ryland LaRue-Krul

The water that had pooled in the street from last nights storm splashed over my pant leg as I ran. I could feel the cold drip through my jeans and down into my sneaker, but I ignored it. I continued forward, running through the cobbled streets toward the sound of screams, toward the spark of vile magic that was flitting between buildings as my father’s monsters chased down the few humans that were left in this part of Genoa.
Most humans had left the city the moment they were able. It wasn’t safe to be this far into the city, into any city. The country was safer. You could see them coming.
A scream sounded again and my earpiece crackled to life, the Bluetooth that connected my brother and I buzzing with static as his gruff voice sounded over the line.
“That sounded like a bite to me,” Thom said, his foot smashing into a large puddle with such force that water sprayed further up my leg. I cringed at the cold, the icy jets furthering my discomfort.
I nodded once, even though he couldn’t see me, and I, him.
“Ya,” I amended.
I knew Thom was there, I could feel his magic, hear the sound of his shoes as they hit against water and stone, but he was as cloaked as I was. Our magic was keeping us hidden from mortal and magic alike. We were nothing more than shadows and phantom splashes as we ran down the ancient alley.
Lamplight that flickered through grungy windows and over the damp cobbles began to extinguish as the screams sounded again. The few mortals who still lived in this part of Genoa dampened the little sparks of hope from their windows, scared the light would give them away.
Scared the creatures would find them.
The few flickering lights that remained gave the winding pathway an eerie glow, the deep blue shadows looking like a bruise against a once vibrant street in the middle of the city. The already dark stone buildings were hung with layers of yellow and grey, the dim ribbons of lamplight washed with the light of the moon as it peaked out from behind silver lined clouds.
Eerie was not the word for it.
It was a scene from a million vampire movies, a million video games. Here, however, it was real. It was life.
My back tensed as another scream ripped through the night, the sound causing more lights to vanish. The world grew darker and I expected a vampire to burst from the shadows.
“That makes two of them,” I responded, turning from his phantom and back to the street, “How many Vily do you suppose there are?”
“Not so many we can’t kick some ass,” I heard the laugh in Thom’s voice but I couldn’t force mine to join him.
It had been three years since the world had shifted into this war on magic, a war started by my father when he unleashed millions of poisoned Vily onto the world. I hadn’t gotten used to the daily rescue missions, used to a world that would sooner kill me than understand me.
Of course, the majority of the globe was more apt to label me an alien than the Prince I had been raised to be.
That hadn’t stopped them from smothering my picture on every news broadcast in the world, however.
Wanted. 1 Million Reward.
The first time I had seen the picture had been a slap. I should have been honored that they wanted me so badly, but it was the broken, crazed boy in the picture that had shocked me most.
My father had created more demons than the ones that flew around the earth ripping the crap out of humans, he had created them inside of me. I was fighting both.
Luckily, when my father had died so had much of the monster he had let fester inside of me.
“Ryland!” Thom snapped in my ear, his voice a gruff belt against my back. I stood up straighter, running faster as I pushed the memory of my ‘old west’ reward poster from my mind.
“I’m here, Thom.” My voice was hard, but more in my own disappointment in having lost focus on what we were doing.
“Good,” Thom said, his tone making the glare he was throwing my way obvious. “Then stay with me. I’m going to soar high and arrive from the north, you stay on this path and hopefully we can kill a few more of these monsters today.”
“Perfect,” I responded, picking up my pace just as I felt a rush of wind by my side.
The powerful torrent of his magic tugged at the shaggy curls that hung over my ears. My dark hair swayed as Thom’s magic picked him up, mine moving me faster.
The white-hot heat of my power rampaged through my veins as the screams came again, followed closely by the sound of ripping flesh. I was closer than I thought.
“One corner,” I hissed to my brother, falling into the code we had built in the millions of other rescue missions that we had conducted.
“One roof,” he returned, giving his distance as I had. “Do you have a count?”
I slowed to a walk, careful to maneuver around the last few puddles as I stepped into the intersection of alley and street and turned to the carnage-ridden scene before me.
I would be concerned that the little monsters could see through my shield, but there was only one person who could do that, and she was sequestered in a makeshift hospital more than three hundred miles away.
The Vily’s looked like deformed terriers.
Their deep brown skin flaked and peeled away from them as they hovered between the bodies that lay strewn over the street. Their twisted wings fluttered awkwardly in an attempt to keep them airborne as they flitted through the remains of their feast.
Crumpled bodies were curled in doorways, hands still stretched toward what they had hoped would be an escape. They lay twisted over garden boxes, bright red drops of blood discoloring the white tulips that had only begun to bloom a few weeks before. Limbs were tangled, wide vacant eyes staring into the dark for a savior that would come too late. And through it all, were the winged monsters that ripped at their flesh.
Gnawed.
Chomped.
Destroyed.
My stomach twisted, my heart constricted and I felt my magic rush through me in a wave of anger. As much as I wanted to turn away in horror, I wanted more to destroy the little mutts and make them pay.
I pushed the need away, although I let my magic boil.
“Seven, maybe eight,” I said after a quick count, careful to keep my voice low, lest the little beasts hear me over the sound of their meal.
They may not be able to see me, but they could hear me. Luckily, not one lifted their head.
“How many survivors?” His voice was as dejected as I felt, he must be above me.
I looked from body to body, desperate to see even one sign of life, but I couldn’t even find where the screams had come from. It was only tangles of lost life sent adrift in the dark.
“Unknown.” I hated the answer the moment I gave it, although both he and I knew that didn’t mean they were all dead. We had found survivors in worse.
It didn’t make our job any easier.
Thom sighed in my ear piece, the sound blending with the devouring of flesh and bone in an awkward orchestra that brought my blood into a deeper boil, my magic nearly begging me to step in and kill them all. One explosion is all it would take. My fingers were already sparking. I was ready to release the wave, until the soft muffled sob of a woman somewhere in that mess turnedmy blood to ice.
“One,” Thom said, he had heard it too.
“Unplug in five,” I responded, already lifting my hand to my earpiece as I crouched down, my other hand stretching over a puddle that lay just below me.
“Four,” Thom returned, his suddenly labored voice making it clear he was moving into position.
“Three,” I said, and turned the volume up on the earpiece, continuing the countdown in my head as I let my outstretched palm hover over the pool of water, the surface beginning to ripple as my power surged just above it.
Two.
Magic roared under my skin, bristling over the puddle in a wave of the faintest purple. I didn’t even attempt to restrain the power, I let it flow, just enough light breaking through the shield that one of the creatures perked up, his ugly sphinx-like eyes narrowing as he noticed me, as he recognized what was coming.
Little fool was too late.
Before the thing could even open its mouth to scream, one silver line of fire shot through the air behind it, hitting it dead in the back and sending it flopping over its prey and tumbling down to the wet puddle below.
Nice shot, Thom.
My magic broke free with a roar before the creature hit the ground, the spark of power mixing with the water as it ran over the ground in an electric wave that zapped two of the little monsters who were feasting on one of the victims. The Vily’s bodies twisted as they screamed, gaining the attention of the other two as the lifeless bodies of their comrades fell over.
Watching the shock on the little monsters faces made all of this worth it.
They looked around in confusion as Thom took out another, the line of light that shot from his palm did its job, and while it hit the fourth Vily square in the chest, it also gave away his position.
The screams from the others increased as they rushed toward him, the air shimmering as his magic burst through his shield, giving him away even more.
“Nice, Thom,” I grumbled, trying to hit one of the monsters that were now following him and missing. “Now the pack will be here…”
“Well then you better hurry,” Thom yelled, loud enough that his voice pushed against my earpiece and exploded in my mind.
“Damn it!” I screamed, ripping the still buzzing piece from my ear, my own yell pulling the attention of one of the demons, and the dozens more that had begun to flock toward the sound of a commotion.
“Now who is calling to them,” Thom chastised as he spun in the air, his shield falling from him completely as he kicked off from the large brick building beside us.
The Vily’s excitement exploded as my brother materialized from nothing. They turned in a pack, snarling and screaming in eagerness to attack. Thom, however, only laughed.
“Come on you ugly pixies,” He taunted as his lanky frame flew through the air, sparks of light streaming from him to his demonic pursuers. “I’ll give you ten points if you can catch me!”
The strength of his magic carried him flawlessly as he continued forward, long brown dreads swinging as he shifted position again and shot straight up into the inky black night.
“Focus, Thom,” I chastised, pushing my sagging curls out of my eyes.
How did I end up being the adult in this situation?
“Find her,” He screamed after me.
The Vily’s screamed after him in a torrent of black and grey. The sound was meant as a warning, as intimidation. Thom, however, just yelled something in French and cut through the air like Superman.
I would be shocked, but it wasn’t the first time he had done this. Luckily this time Wyn wasn’t here to yell at us both.
Slamming the earpiece back onto my ear, I rushed toward the piles of corpses that were spread over the tiny alley. Right then, I wished that this was a video game. This was the part of these rescues that stuck with me, sorting through the dead to find the living. Yes, we had seen worse, but it had also been the same for three years. Time had not made it any easier.
It still wrenched at my soul like a rusty knife.
Placing my hand on the first grey tinted body, I let my magic press into the once vibrant man, desperately searching for any sign of life, for a pulse of a heart, for the tiniest breath.
There was nothing.
Heart tensing, muscles tightening, I moved to the next one, a young man whose skin was still warm with life, but none of it remained in him. Even if we had arrived minutes before, we still couldn’t have saved him. I counted at least ten bites, no one could survive that. From him I stepped to a middle aged man, and then to a young woman, to a child… nothing.
Moving faster in my desperation, I placed my palm against the forehead of a young blonde woman, her blood was still dripping through her veins, although her heart did not beat. The last bit of life was slipping away.
“Signora?” I hissed, knowing that I would not get an answer, knowing that I was too late. Even as I waited, I felt all signs of life in her stutter to a halt.
She lay next to what I instantly recognized as one of the hired soldiers that worked in these parts, and my anger fired. Families paid him for safe passage out of cities, to extract them from the red zone. Their journeys were rarely successful.
I had pulled hundreds of survivors out of the remains of their ransacked camps. I had returned days later to bury their dead. I tried not to be mad at the soldier, they were just as desperate to escape the world my father had unleashed, desperate to find their next meal. As I moved to each of those that littered the alley, however, moved to each lost life, I felt the anger swell.
My heart was like a vice, stomach twisting in an agony that at least reminded me I was alive, no matter how much everything hurt. All of this life, lost. It made me sick, it made my anger rumble to life and that subtle whisper of madness pull at the back of my brain.
He had done this. My father…
“I’ve almost lost them,” Thom’s voice buzzed in my ear, the quiet voice making me jump. “Have you found anyone? Have you found the woman?”
I exhaled, the wordless sound making everything clear. “Not yet.”
“Check them all,” Thom growled, his own brand of anger rumbling in his frustration. “I am sure some will start cycling back. I would hurry.”
I nodded in response, fully aware that he couldn’t see and went back to work, my magic flooding through the next two crumpled bodies before I stopped short, eyes narrowing into one of the many stone doorways that lined the alley.
A man’s large body slumped against the doorframe, blood smeared over an already stained white shirt. He had clearly been bitten multiple times. The image was just as heart-wrenching as the others, it still punched against my stomach. It was clear the man was dead, but it wasn’t the man that had caught my attention, it was the hand that wrapped around his side, clinging to the stained shirt.
Clinging.
Gripping.
Reaching.
The fingers were moving.
The man’s stance made it clear he had been trying to protect something. He had succeeded.
I rushed to the hand, feet slipping against wet cobbles before smashing into a puddle with a sound that shattered the silence like fragmented glass. Fingers wrapped around whoever was huddled behind the man, I let my magic flood them. The power rushed through her as I found every injury, every scrape, and the two bites.
Two.
She didn’t have long.
“I’ve got one,” I hissed to Thom, his gasp of an inhale making it clear he hadn’t expected it either. “I think it’s the woman we heard. She’s been bitten twice…”
“Can you extract her on your own?” He interrupted, a low grunt hinting at some other battle he was fighting.
“I can,” I said with a grunt as I shifted the much larger man off of her frame. “Should I check the others?”
“Just get out of there,” Thom hissed, his tone full of a tension that wasn’t usual for him. “I’ll meet you at the checkpoint.”
The sound of a Vily hissed through the earpiece. The high-pitched snarl made me jump, sure the tiny thing was right behind me. Heart thudding in my chest, I turned, expecting to see gnashing teeth. There was nothing but the dark alley, the shadows of blue dipping into darkness as the bright moon hid behind a cloud. The creature was miles away, flying through the air beside my brother, not that that made it any better
The image was frightening and I restrained a shiver that rolled down my spine, knowing full well I was acting like a baby.
I was not interested in letting that trait continue.
Fighting the shiver, I turned back to the woman that lay dying near an ancient wooden door, her hand still clinging to the man’s shirt. Her hair was a mess, her body barely moving. If it wasn’t for the desperate tension in her hand, I would have assumed her just as dead as the rest of them.
“I believe that one belongs to me.”
I jerked up, ice rolling through my veins. The voice was an unfamiliar drawl, each word spoken assertively. There shouldn’t be anyone here, there was never anyone here. Not with screams so recent, not with the danger that the night ultimately provided.
There were never mortals here.
But this person, this woman, was not a mortal.
I could feel the faint whisper of her magic roll through the air toward me. Magic that was just as rotted and deformed as the Vily’s. The poisoned magic my father created, the raw unhealed magic of those who were bitten and survived on their own. The magic of the army my father had built. It was that possibility that was scaring me.
I was sure she wasn’t from his horde, most of them had sworn themselves under Joclyn. Many more had died, and some had been captured by governments, only to be tortured to death.
Since then, we had rescued anyone with a bite, we had scoured the earth looking for survivors.
But this woman was very much alive, and very much not human.
I wasn’t sure where she had come from, and why her magic was tainted, but everything about her screamed danger; right down to the way she was tucked into the deep purple shadows of the alley in such a way I was sure she had been watching me the whole time. The hood of her jacket was pulled so far down that I could only see the tip of their nose, the tiny bit of flesh as dark as the night that surrounded us.
“I’m sorry, do you know her?” My voice snapped with the same heat of my magic, the roar screaming both inside and out.
I stepped between this stranger and the injured woman, my wide stance a clear barrier between them.
“Do I know who?” Thom’s voice buzzed through the earpiece, the hushed reminder of my inevitable backup only slightly calming the magic that was eager to make its presence known.
“No,” the voice said, stepping away from the shadow and into the alley just enough that I could make out the dark lines of their face.
Unnaturally green eyes peered at me from pools of smooth black skin, the high cheekbones and painted red lips catching my breath.
Luckily, any attempts at seduction she was trying to smolder me with were only bouncing off my skin, my confusion and fear at seeing her here swallowing them whole.
“Well,” I began, careful to focus my nerves into the strong waves of power and not give this woman any sign of the fear that was twisting through my gut. “If you don’t know her, I don’t see how she can belong to you. I believe the term we humans use here is ‘finders keepers’.”
The woman smiled at that, a long twisted grin raking over her face as Thom’s growing frustration vibrated through my eardrum.
“Finders keepers? What are you…” He paused, swore so loud I fought the need to rip the earpiece off and then went off in a ramble that made me smile.
“Crap Ry, I keep telling you we need a code word just for situations like this, but no, Mr ‘Second-in-command’ insists that there is no need. Of course, we could learn from my centuries of experience…”
My grin grew with every word, the idea that I had backup, even if it was the surly sarcastic kind making me smile even more. Luckily, the woman took the grin as a posturing warning, and not the ridiculous humor it was.
“Humans,” she mused, pulling her hood down to reveal a closely shaven head. “I do not suggest that you take her. You do not know what will happen if you do.”
I could hear the threat, I could see it in her eyes. It barely fazed me, as much confidence that danced through her, I was sure she knew exactly what she was saying. Judging by the way she was continually stepping closer, however, she didn’t know who she was facing.
“I’m pretty sure, I got this, thanks.” I knew I was stalling, although chances were high that I could take her even without Thom here, I wasn’t foolish enough to risk it. All I was sensing from her was a fragment of the magic I carried, but there was the darkness there that scared me.
It was the darkness that was unknown.
Refusing to let my focus drift from the stranger, I released my magic allowing it to ripple through the air, searching for anything else I might have missed. Anyone that could be hiding in the shadows. There was nothing, poisoned or otherwise.
“ETA Three minutes,” Thom’s voice buzzed.
“Do you really wish to fight me?” She was intentionally putting a little bit of smolder in her voice now. The attempt made me smile, and I shook my head.
The short answer to her questions was no.
The long answer was something more along the lines of me not wanting to accidentally kill her, I didn’t know who she was, after all. I needed to find that out first, and I only knew of one sure way to accomplish that.
“I will if I have to,” I said with a sigh, shifting my weight one step closer to the hooded woman, fully aware I was putting the dying woman in danger, something that was possibly not smart considering the time she had left.
Luckily this shouldn’t take too long.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Thom said, but it was not in a plea, it was a flat-voiced reminder that he knew was falling on deaf ears.
“I can’t make any promises,” I responded to him audibly, letting my magic flare in a spark of energy that rolled over my skin, congregating in the palm of my hand in a flaming orb of the brightest blue, just waiting to hurl through the air toward her.
It was only then, with magic in hand, that the woman looked scared, that her eyes widened just enough that the bright green of them were swallowed by a bloodshot white.
“Well, at the very least don’t get yourself killed.” Thom was even more disinterested that time.
“She reminds me of your wife,” I said under my breath, the jab getting a grunt from Thom as the woman’s magic sparked, the crackle of the diseased power rushing to her hand.
Instead of the perfect orb of power I had conjured, however, her magic flickered and sparked like a firecracker. It dripped from her hand to the ground in globs of what looked like mucus where it fizzled against the water in a hiss of smoke. The magic was a spiral of colors, the damaged magic cycling in and out as she attempted to keep it alive.
I hadn’t seen power like this in years, and as hard as I tried to restrain it, my shock shown clear on my face. The woman smiled, letting the magic spark again with a grunt, it was obviously taking effort to bring that much power to the surface.
“Scared?’ She asked, jaw tight as the magic sparked again, one bright ribbon flying toward me before sliding to the ground.
“No.” I didn’t even try to restrain the smile, the crooked thing twisting my face as I hardened my jaw. “Do you align yourself under Joclyn Krul?”
I asked the question, needing to know, needing to make sure that I wasn’t about to kill one of our own, but the woman only smiled, the wide grin revealing bright white teeth.
“Ah, now I know why you look so familiar.”
It was then she attacked.
The heavy magic soared from her hand, making a bee-line right for me. I swore loudly and put up a shield, the powerful wall rippling dangerously under the impact.
Great. Her magic may look like a diseased swamp rat, but it packed a punch. I was going to have to be careful.
I growled between clenched teeth, letting my magic pulse through the air in a snake that attempted to wind around her, but she only batted the counter-magic away, one motion turning the long snake of iron to grey ash.
I swore again, this time it did not go unnoticed by my brother.
“One Minute, Ry,” Thom growled in my ear, the strain making it clear he was pushing himself as fast as he could. “Do we need her?”
Now it was my turn to growl, “I think I can handle this just fine on my own.”
My frustration erupted as my magic did, the attack hitting the woman square in the chest with a single pulse of the brightest white. The woman gasped for air and stumbled back, but I wasn’t dumb enough to leave it there, even at full strength that attack would only wind her.
“I don’t want to kill you,” I growled, hitting her with another attack before trying to bind her with my magic again.
She screamed at the impact of the second hit, little specks of blood covering her bright white teeth as she smiled against the wide white bands of my power that were wrapping around her.
“Oh, but I want to kill you.” She said, her voice strained even though she seemed to be enjoying herself. “We want to destroy you, and your brother.”
The world slowed at her words, at the harsh tones of her laugh, at the sensation of wind as Thom came up behind me, at the realization of what she had just said.
We.
It only took one pulse of magic to find them, restraining their magic just as my father had forced me to learn so long ago. Hundreds of people, her people, hiding on the rooftops.
I hadn’t been looking deep enough. I had been too focused on her, too focused on finding the weak magic, and now we were surrounded.
“No,” I hissed, tightening the bands that ran through her and sending a surge of magic right into her flesh. She screamed at the power, screamed at the pain, but I didn’t stop, I only let it grow, let it pulse as my mind desperately tried to find a way out of this.
I needed a bomb…
“Get down,” I yelled to Thom.
Pressing my magic away from me, I lifting the bound woman into the air. Her body twisting as she soared up into the dark night, until I pulled her to a stop twenty feet above, perfectly in line with the army she had hidden on the roof.
She looked down in horror as I smiled, my magic pressing one last surge into the bands that surrounded her.
With a flash of the brightest green, the bands exploded, sending an arsenal of shrapnel into the hidden army and her tumbling back down to where Thom and I stood below.
The screams of her backup echoed as I caught the limp and damaged body of the woman, throwing her over my shoulders as I nodded to the crumpled survivor, hoping that she was still alive.
“You get that one. We need to run.”
“What just happened?” Thom growled, fixing me with a look as he made his way over to the one human who had survived the massacre.
“I think our father’s army just attacked us.”
I knew it wasn’t possible. But something in my head was laughing that it was.

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