Forged: The World of Nightwalkers

  Forged is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A Ballantine Books eBook Edition

  Copyright © 2014 by Jacquelyn Frank

  Excerpt from Cursed by Fire by Jacquelyn Frank copyright © 2014 by Jacquelyn Frank

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York.

  BALLANTINE and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Random House LLC.

  This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book Cursed by Fire by Jacquelyn Frank. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

  ISBN 978-0-345-53492-7

  eBook ISBN 978-0-345-54674-6

  Cover design: Lynn Andreozzi

  Cover illustration: Craig White

  www.ballantinebooks.com

  v3.1

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Glossary and Pronunciation Table

  The Lost Scroll of Kindred

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Dedication

  Other Books by This Author

  Excerpt from Cursed by Fire

  GLOSSARY

  AND PRONUNCIATION TABLE

  Kamenwati: (Kah-men-WAH-ti)

  Menes: (MEN-es)

  Apep: (Ā-pep)

  Asikri: (Ah-SĒ-crē)

  Docia: (DŌ-shuh)

  Ka: (kah) Egyptian soul

  Hatshepsut: (hat-SHEP-soot)

  Tameri: (Tah-MARE-ē)

  Chatha: (Chath-UH)

  Pharaoh: (FEY-roh) Egyptian king or queen. This is used in reference to both male and female rulers. In this case, the rulers of the Bodywalkers.

  Ouroboros: (You-row-BORE-us) A snake or dragon devouring its own tail, a sign of infinity or perpetual life.

  Panahasi: (pan-uh-HAS-ē)

  Legna: (LĀY-nuh)

  Note: All the h’s in the Gargoyle’s names are silent unless the name begins with h or the h logically occurs in the name.

  THE LOST SCROLL OF KINDRED

  … And so it will come to pass in the forward times that the nations of the Nightwalkers will be shattered, driven apart, and become strangers to one another. Hidden, by misfortune and by purpose, these twelve nations will come to cross-purposes and fade from each other’s existences. In the forward times these nations will face toil and struggle unlike any time before, and only by coming together once more can they hope to face the evil that will set upon them. But they are lost to one another … and so will remain lost, until a great enemy is defeated … and a new one resurrects itself …

  CHAPTER ONE

  Approximately three hundred years ago

  His name had been taken from him.

  All those years ago, when he had first been forged, they had robbed him of everything that he had been and had left him with nothing … stripped and raw, without even a name. From the moment he had been reborn into the thing that he now was he had been called many things. Slave. Idiot. Fool. Those words were his name now. What do you think, fool? Fetch me that water, slave. Don’t you know what you are doing you idiot!!?

  But no longer. Tonight he would be free, one way or another, and he would not flinch from what it would take to grasp that freedom. Whether it be actual escape or whether it be death.

  All he had to do was get the stone. That was all. Just one small piece of rock that had been bound to him at the very same moment his existence had been forged into this horrid life. One small stone would mean the difference between life and death to him. Freedom or oblivion. There were no other choices. He could no longer tolerate any other state of being.

  But the task was harder than it seemed. His master guarded the stone zealously, as he did all of the stones of his slaves. He felt a twinge of regret that he would be leaving the others behind to wallow in their enslaved states, but he could not worry about them and he could not enlist their help. He would not risk any lives but his own. More important, he did not know if he could trust any one of them not to betray him.

  Yes, it was selfish in its way, he acknowledged to himself, but he had no choice but to be selfish. This folly would be his and his alone.

  All he needed was one small stone.

  He waited until the room had emptied of everyone save himself and his master. He lingered nonchalantly, trying not to look like he was up to anything that could be perceived as remotely rebellious.

  His lord was a dark and powerful man. He was very high up in the chain of command, his life busy and focused on the war he was heading against his enemies. However, he was not all-powerful. True, he had been talented enough to forge many slaves like himself, but his master answered to a mistress of his own.

  He fawned over her constantly, bidding his slaves to do any number of tasks, both benign and horrific, on her behalf. And though his master was the one who had enslaved him, it was this mistress he directed his impotent captive fury toward. Oh, they were equally responsible for the individual slaves they created, but his master’s mistress was the twisted mind that birthed the terrible tasks his master would bid him to take care of.

  And no matter how reprehensible the task, as long as his master held that stone, he’d had no choice but to comply. And so he had done terrible things. Things that sometimes he had taken great pleasure in doing, despite knowing how dark the ultimate goals of his master might be. He had stolen things. He had headed raiding parties against his master’s enemies.

  He had committed cold-blooded murder.

  And the night he had realized that he was beginning to take delight in these murderous tasks was the night that he began to see how reprehensible he himself was becoming. He could only blame his master to a point, but he had gone above and beyond the duties outlined to him and he had taken pleasure in it all. He had gone from being a man enslaved and despising his captor to a true and loyal servant who took pride in the way he accomplished these dark, vile deeds.

  He had truly become a disgusting reflection of his master. He had so much penance to pay for his deeds that he probably didn’t even deserve freedom. But to keep away from freedom meant that he would only continue to perform more harm on others. He would continue to descend into damnation, and that he could not abide.

  But it was this loyalty toward his master that made his master drop his guard, leaving the stones unprotected against his very best and most loyal of slaves. Just the same, if he failed, he would never be trusted again, and would suffer everything from cruel torture to absolute death. He had seen his master’s wrath in action up close and personal. Hell, he had often been the instrument through which his master had exacted his vengeance on those who crossed him. He knew just how creatively the man could sketch death on another.

  The room was empty, but that meant nothing. He walked slowly and purposefully toward the box holding th
e stones. A simple wooden jewelry box with blue velvet lining and a high polish that made the wood gleam. It was in the shape of a hexagon with another hexagon of etched glass in the center of the lid. The central design on the glass was of a lily. Had it had color, it would have been a black lily. Black lilies were his master’s mark. He was sometimes instructed to cast a black lily on the ground near a scene of action; whether it be something as brutal as a vengeance murder or something as benign as an altar of worship, he’d dispatched his master’s mark. It was not some corny token, however, like in movies or television—some way of saying “I was here!” or “Fear my wrath!” The black lily was a profound symbol for death, a death his master chased with a single-minded fury. Not the deaths of those around him, but his own.

  For his master was a powerful immortal, doomed to live life over and over again, always remembering the suffering that had come the lifetime before. Not many recognized this, but as his master’s right-hand man, it was hard to miss how the man craved permanent death.

  He hesitated a moment before touching the box. He knew it was ensorcelled, that it would raise an immediate alarm and explode with defensive, painful magic against him. Through the glass he saw the small collection of colorful stones, each ranging from being as gray as granite to being beautiful shades of red and everything in between. His, he knew, was the cinnamon-colored stone just big enough to fit his hand around. It was clear as glass, as brilliantly faceted as a ruby without the deep blood-like coloring. It matched his eyes perfectly. It was what it was. A stone. A protected stone. His touchstone. A stone he would be bound to for the rest of his days. It had been taken from his hide the day he had been forged and now … now he was a slave to it. Every day he must sleep in contact with it. If he did not … the consequences were horrific. To be parted from the stone for long periods was to risk permanent being.

  He fisted his hand, turning his flesh and bloodskin to stone … a dark gray stone. With a carefully controlled show of force, he rammed his fist through the glass. He was powerful enough to grind everything within the box into dust if he was not careful, and that would mean not only his end, but the end of all the others connected to all those other stones.

  The reactive magic was horrifically painful. It lashed at him, driving him back, pushing him away from the object he so desperately needed. He lunged forward against it, but still the force drove him back.

  No! No! I cannot fail this!

  He needed to succeed and he needed to do so quickly. The alarm screaming out of the room would bring others in mere moments. Using every last ounce of strength and will he possessed, he lunged forward once more, grabbed for his touchstone, and closed his fist around it.

  The box toppled to the ground, the other touchstones within it scattering wildly. But he paid them no attention. He was turning into the push of the magic, letting it shove him violently out of the room. He plowed over two acolytes that had come running at the sound of the alarm. A third lifted a weapon, a gun, and fired at pointblank range into his chest, right over his beating heart, right below the brand that forever marked him. The stone of his skin deflected most of the bullet’s impact, but he felt and saw a chunk of it go flying. The pain was brilliant and fierce, but he paid it no mind. He’d felt worse. For now he focused on grabbing the acolyte, yanking him closer and smashing his hand, touchstone within, into the man’s skull. The man crumbled and he let him fall, discarding him like trash. As always he allowed no remorse to fill his mind. That would come later. In that moment he needed to fight, for his freedom and for the right to pay penance—for the new sins he was about to rack up as well as for the old.

  Shaking that thought off, he made his way outdoors, the night cold and brisk and stunningly perfect as he spread his wings and launched himself into the air with three steady pumps of his wings.

  He knew they would be on his heels, but he also knew he was free.

  Free.

  And no one would ever take that away from him again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Present day

  Captive.

  Chained. Like a beast. Like … like an animal awaiting butchering. Awaiting those that would devour him.

  Ahnvil wanted to scream, but he would give his captors no such pleasure. He moved and the sound of chains scraping over the cement floor of his prison instantly came to him. He was shackled at the ankles as well as the wrists and thrown behind a wall of steel bars for good measure. His prison was a basement of some sort that he could sense was fully underground.

  The sound of conversation floated to him, and his ears pricked up. He moved forward as far as his manacles allowed and began to pace, as if agitated. It was what they had come to expect of him. The feeling of superiority this supposed knowledge gave them made them sloppy and, he hoped, would give him an advantage.

  “I’ve got to show you this,” the Templar priest was saying in semi-hushed tones to his companion. He doubted there was even anyone to overhear them, but their desire to be secretive was telling and he was going to make sure to be very attentive … while not seeming to be so. Perhaps he would finally find out why they had bothered chaining him up and keeping him captive instead of simply killing him and striking a serious blow to their enemies who depended on his strength and abilities. Of course there was always the possibility they were going to let time do it for them …

  “What is it?” the second Templar, a short, balding male, wanted to know. Seriously? Ahnvil thought dryly, Of all the humans he could choose to be reborn in, this is what he chose? It goes to show that some Bodywalkers are just smarter and stronger and better than others.

  A Bodywalker was a body with two shared souls. One was the human that had been naturally born to it. The other soul was that of an ancient Egyptian, a powerful man or woman that could be reborn in the host body of the human, in effect sharing that body with the original soul. Only, these Bodywalkers, the Templars, did not share. They subjugated the innocent human soul … just as they had once subjugated him.

  The Bodywalker he knew, the ones he was devoted to, the Politic, they were different. They cared for their human hosts, they Blended with them and respected them and shared their lives with them in harmony. The way it should be.

  And since Bodywalkers could choose exactly whom they could be reborn into … it seemed ridiculous that this one had chosen such an inferior physical specimen.

  As they came fully into range of his prison cell, he could see his captor: tall and handsome, if older, with salt-and-pepper hair and a deep dimple in his left cheek. This one had obviously chosen based on aesthetics.

  “Oh my! Where did you get that?” Baldie asked with surprise when he caught sight of the captive in the cage.

  “Not that,” Dimples said impatiently. “I’ll tell you why I’ve caught that in just a moment.”

  “Oh. Well, what then?”

  Dimples went to a drawer in a nearby worktable, a table that held any number of things, including all kinds of components for the spells the Templars worked. They were dark, vicious powers that ought not to be messed with. The same dark powers that had created him.

  Dimples pulled a steel box from the drawer and opened it, the tremulous touch of his fingers revealing exactly how excited he was about what was inside the box. He reached in and withdrew a necklace, the pendant of which glinted sharply when the light from above struck it.

  “What is it?” Baldie asked, snatching it out of his companion’s hands. Dimples immediately snatched it back, holding it again with reverence.

  “It’s called Adoma’s Amulet,” he said breathily.

  “Really?” Now Baldie had adopted Dimple’s reverent tone. “What does it do, Panahasi?”

  “I have no idea,” Panahasi said.

  Baldie frowned with consternation and impatience. “If you don’t know what it does, what’s so special about it?”

  “What’s special is that I found it in Kamenwati’s belongings before his things were cleaned away!”

  Their
captive’s ears burned at the recognizable name. Kamenwati was the most powerful Templar priest ever known. He had been the right hand to the most powerful priestess, Odjit.

  That is, until Kamen had defected to the other side. Ahnvil’s side.

  Ironic, considering he was Ahnvil’s creator. His former master.

  Baldie reacted accordingly. “Ohhh! And what makes you think it’s special, other than that?”

  “Well, apparently Kamen had been researching it virulently. It was with tome upon tome, sitting on his desk. But the only thing he had found thus far was this passage.” Panahasi withdrew a small book from the box and flipped it open to a marked page. Ahnvil winced as he watched this, wondering how the book didn’t simply fall apart in Panahasi’s hands, given how obviously old it was. But neither of the Templars seemed to respect or even notice that. They were too busy trying hard to stand on the shoulders of another’s works, someone who was far and away more worthy of reaping the benefits of those works, if by way of his power alone … and even Ahnvil had to admit that, despite his own hostile reasons for despising Kamen.

  “It reads: ‘The slave, born of the infinite Nightwalkers, will set free the power within. The one that harnesses Adoma’s Amulet will have such power as to make a god weep.’ ”

  “Oh my,” Baldie breathed, clearly finally understanding the scope of what his friend held. “Oh!” he said with sudden animation. “That’s what the Gargoyle is for!” He glanced over at their prisoner.