The Guardsman's Lover

By Jayne Kinch

Sixteen years after Ayden came to her aid on the Prime's Highway, former novice priestess Elysa is reunited with the kindly vampire when she is brought to Saron Castle, where Ayden is now the Commander of the Prime's Guard.
But just when it seems the couple have finally found happiness, a new threat emerges which threatens to tear them apart.
For Prime Viktor has also noticed Elysa and wants her for himself.

Each book in The Land of the Blood of Allaron Legend series is stand-alone, but for the greatest enjoyment, the following reading order is recommended:

The Daughter of Teragon
The Fair Isle Princess
The Guardsman's Lover
The Duchess of Farrow
The Warrior Queen
The Lady of Saron

Intended for mature readers only.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jayne Kinch
• Release date: Apr 19, 2018
• ISBN: 9781370424306

Jayne Kinch

Jayne’s debut novel—The Daughter of Teragon—was published in 2016. Since then, she has completed a further seven novels and is currently working on The Cursed Dagger, the final instalment of The Mages of Thiar Trilogy.When she isn’t writing, Jayne likes to take countryside walks, travel the world, collect cacti, and read fiction. She also owns and runs a secondhand bookshop in a historical seaside town on the south-east coast of England. Her reading tastes are quite eclectic, with genres ranging from historical fiction, paranormal romance, sci-fi, fantasy, and crime thrillers to name a few.Jayne is forty-something and lives with her long-suffering husband, a deaf cat with a loud personality, dozens of cacti, and more books than she can count!Follow her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/jaynekinchbooks

Book preview

The Guardsman’s Lover

By Jayne Kinch

Digital Edition

Copyright © 2018 Jayne Kinch

All rights reserved.

Digital Edition, licence notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this ebook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favourite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Cover Image: Adobe stock images: Beautiful man and woman dressed in medieval clothing stand in a room of the old abandoned castle by Dmytro Sandratskyi, Gold foil by Sailorr. Cover design and maps: MJB Images.

Table of Contents

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

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

About Jayne Kinch

Titles by Jayne Kinch

Chapter One

My eyes were closed and my head was bowed as I knelt before the altar with the other novices, the room silent except for the sound of our breathing and the bustle of the village beyond the temple grounds floating through the open doorway behind us.

I was supposed to be completing my silent prayer of thanks to the Goddess, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the full moon in two days’ time, when I would complete the Challenge of Silence and—after six, long months—would finally be permitted to speak.

I had thought the Challenge of Blindness was hard, where I was blindfolded for six months so that I would learn to trust my other senses, but the Challenge of Silence was proving to be even more difficult. So many times I had gone to speak, before realising I wasn’t allowed. The purpose of the challenge was to learn not everyone had a voice, and seeing as Da used to fondly say I couldn’t keep quiet for more than a few moments, I had certainly learnt that.

The next challenge was Hunger, which I wasn’t looking forward to either, as it meant for three months, I was only permitted to eat bread and gruel—the purpose of the challenge to empathise with those less fortunate than myself.

But at least I had got to enjoy the Springfest feast four days earlier—the day of the year when night and day were equal in length—which wouldn’t have happened had the full moon come before the celebrations. If the full moon had arrived first, my Hunger would have already started, and I’d have been forced to watch the others feasting while I went without.

I had been at the temple near the Lowlands’ village of Hopfield for just over a year, having joined the Sisterhood a month after my seventh birthday, and was the youngest daughter of landholders who ran a hop farm around half a morning’s ride from The Keep—the stone fortress which spanned the bottom of the Lowlands and separated the Northlands from Dornia and was home to the Dornian Prime’s Watch.

Holder Iven and his wife, Elva, had four surviving children. Gerit, their only son and the second eldest of their children, would take over the running of the hop farm when Da died, while Kirsa, two years older, had wedded the eldest son of a shepherd a week after her sixteenth birthday three summers before and was now living at her new family’s holding in the next village along, where one day she would become its mistress. Donia, seven years Gerit’s junior, would remain unwed and live out her days at the hop farm, helping Gerit and his wife run the holding, as my father’s only sister had stayed to help Ma and Da until her death a year before I was born.

As I was their third daughter and not the second son Ma and Da had been praying for meant, when my eighth birthday arrived, Da was required to send me to Alderford House in the north-west of the Lowlands—under Northlander law, landholder families were only permitted to keep their two eldest daughters and two eldest sons. If Duke Peytor didn’t require me to work in his residence or in the lands that made up his estate, my next stop would be the slave market, meaning I could end up anywhere in the Northlands. Including one of its many breeding farms or Saron Castle.

No one wanted to find themselves there.

Thankfully, this hadn’t happened. Instead, I was one of the lucky few to have been given a place in the Sisterhood—those who spent their lives in service to the Moon Goddess, the deity of the Northlands—Ma’s younger brother, a village guard at Lichford and a vampire, having travelled up to Alderford House three months before my seventh birthday to appeal to Duke Peytor directly that his youngest niece be allowed to join the Sisterhood.

I wasn’t supposed to know this—having overheard a conversation between Ma and Da when they had thought the four of us were asleep—but Uncle Olaf had given the duke a substantial amount of money to ensure he signed the paperwork releasing me into the care of the senior high priestess.

As a daughter of the Goddess, I would never wed nor have children, as it was forbidden. To do either would mean my permanent expulsion from the Sisterhood.

Not that I minded being barred from taking a husband. The few boys I had met—my brother’s friends and the slave boys who worked on Ma and Da’s farm, as well as those boys who came to the temple with their parents—I thought were very annoying and immature. I didn’t want to be friends with them, let alone wed them. Also, having witnessed Ma giving birth to her and Da’s much-anticipated second son, who had tragically been born dead six months before my departure for the temple—the hours of screaming and wailing that had echoed around our small cottage as Ma tried to push him into the world, and the blood which had soaked the bed sheets and covered the arms and white apron of the birthing sister—had made me never want children.

Ma and Da’s hop farm was less than a morning’s ride away, just outside the village of Houblon, but I hadn’t seen them or my siblings since that cold winter’s afternoon I had left with Uncle Olaf for the temple.

A requirement of the Sisterhood was that I left behind my birth family and all my belongings—the so-called Challenges of Family and Sacrifice. I hadn’t had many belongings to leave behind—just the three brown knee-length tunics and black leggings identical to what all landholder girls wore and what had been handed down from Kirsa to Donia before coming to me, both the tunics and the leggings covered in patches from the countless times Ma had mended them, and a battered cloth doll Uncle Olaf had gifted me my fifth Midwinter, which I had given to Donia to look after—but I had found it hard not to see my family.

Several times since leaving home, I had considered sneaking back to the holding to visit my family, but not only would it result in my expulsion from the Sisterhood—something that was made very clear to us before we took our vows—meaning the only place for me would be the slave market, I wouldn’t throw away what Uncle Olaf had done for me.

During my time at the temple, I had seen all too often the tears of those villagers who had come to pray for the children they’d sent to the slave market. I didn’t want to do that to Ma and Da.

I had also witnessed villagers pleading with Mother Alena—the senior high priestess of our temple—to take in their girls. Each time, Mother Alena would tell them that, if it were up to her, she would willingly give their daughter a place at the temple, but Northlander law required them to seek an audience with Duke Peytor, warning them the duke would expect a so-called release fee before giving his permission.

Sometimes, the villager would return a week or so later to inform Mother Alena that their daughter was now safely on her way to one of the temples dotted throughout the Northlands, their pockets far lighter than what they’d been the day they’d set out to Alderford House, but their smiles and the knowledge their beloved daughter was safe more than making up for the money they’d had to part with. A few girls were like me and had a vampire relative willing to pay the extortionate fee. But for the majority, it was the slave market.

I realised my mind was wandering.

Again.

I forced myself to concentrate on my prayers.

Mother Goddess, you who bathe us with your silver light...

Lifting my head, I opened my eyes and sneaked a peek at the six girls kneeling with me in a semi-circle in front of the altar—the stone statues of the Goddess as the Maiden, Mother, and Crone behind it—all of us clad in the pale green robes of a novice priestess.

We were all at various stages of our learning. Inka, the freckled girl kneeling to my left, frowning in concentration as she prayed, had only arrived at the temple the previous afternoon, and that morning Novice Anya had had to show her how to arrange her hair into the intricate knotted hairstyle of the Sisterhood.

I remembered learning how to get my own unruly raven-coloured curls into the knot.

Inka had spent much of the previous night weeping in her cot in the novices’ dormitory, missing home, but she would soon learn to be separated from her family. We all did.

As Inka was yet to receive her silver chain decorated with a teardrop pearl and take her vows—the ceremony would take place in two nights’ time on the sacred ground behind the temple, under the light of the full moon—it meant she could, if she wished, return home to her parents’ holding. But she had told us between her sobs that if she did, her da would send her to the slave market. Although Inka hadn’t said anything, I guessed from her reaction when we’d asked about her family that her mother had offered to take her place at the slave market so that her youngest daughter would be accepted into the Sisterhood.

The tall and slender fair-haired woman kneeling in between Inka and Novice Selda—her pale face lifted to the ceiling filled with such reverence as she swayed back and forth, her hands lying on her thighs clenched so tightly the knuckles had turned white and her fingernails digging into her palms hard enough to draw blood, it would be easy to think the Goddess was speaking to her directly—was Novice Darla. At nearly twenty-one, Darla was six months older than Anya and two years older than Selda and was close to completing her training, meaning she would soon be allowed to wear the white robes and silk sash of a high priestess.

As the two most senior novices, it was Darla and Anya’s responsibility to instruct us younger ones on the teachings of the Goddess and the Seven Sacred Truths, as well as scribing and numeracy. Novice Darla took the Sisterhood very seriously and would rebuke us if she thought we weren’t trying hard enough at our lessons. She certainly wouldn’t be happy if she knew that I was spying on her when I was supposed to be praying.

Kneeling to my right, and the other side of Anya, was Novice Livinda. Unlike the rest of us, Livinda was of noble blood, her father a descendant of a minor noble, and had arrived at the temple from her ancestor’s manor in the central Lowlands ten years earlier. Although she was the descendant of a minor noble, the moment she had taken her vows, Lady Livinda had revoked her noble title and was now simply known as Novice Livinda. Despite being noble born, Livinda didn’t have any airs and graces and was an older sister to us all.

Feeling my eyes on her, the skinny girl on Livinda’s right, with ink smudged on her chin and her blonde hair already coming loose from its knot, opened her eyes and smiled at me, then snapped her lids close once more. Novice Olya was my closest friend at the temple, the two of us having grown close while she had been my eyes during the Challenge of Blindness. Olya had recently completed her Hunger and was now doing the Challenge of Reflection, where she was required to contemplate how her actions affected others. She had whispered to me during lessons the previous morning, after Darla had berated her yet again for the number of mistakes in her scribing, if that included aggravating the older novices.

The high priestesses weren’t with us, having already finished their afternoon prayers. Some would be in the village, helping those in need. Priestesses didn’t have to fear vampires, as it was forbidden to harm anyone sworn into the Sisterhood, so we could walk about the village quite safely. Others were working within the grounds of the temple; tending the kitchen garden, milking the goats, and collecting the eggs. We would be joining them once we had finished our prayers and lessons for the day. All priestesses, from Inka the youngest, to Mother Alena—who was ancient, even older than Ma—did their fair share of the work.

Realising my mind was wandering yet again, I closed my eyes and forced myself to concentrate.

Mother Goddess, I give thanks for your...

A terrified scream outside the temple grounds broke my concentration. It was immediately followed by several more.

I snapped open my eyes, my prayers forgotten.

Vampires!

Next to me, Inka let out a frightened cry and went to get to her feet, but Novice Selda grabbed her forearm to stop her.

‘You’re safe,’ she told the younger girl. ‘They won’t venture inside the temple grounds.’

We were used to hearing such things, the village guard were forever tormenting the villagers, and knew we were safe within the walls of the temple, but Inka hadn’t been with us long enough to realise this.

‘But... but what of Sister Marjory and Sister Hilda?’ Inka asked, her brown eyes wide on her pale face. ‘They’re out in the village.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Selda said, patting Inka’s forearm to comfort her. ‘No vampire will dare hurt a priestess.’

Outside, angry bellows joined the screams, and I winced at the uncomfortable surge of energy which accompanied the shouts, hitting me like an invisible wall. The vampires were using their power.

All vampires had the ability to speak with power—which Uncle Olaf had once described as an exceptionally large burp forcing itself up his throat, much to the amusement of his nephew and two youngest nieces—and while they were perfectly capable of speaking normally, many would use it to further terrify their victims.

‘Sisters, we must pray for the villagers,’ Darla said, taking charge.

We obediently lowered our heads and closed our eyes but, knowing what was going on outside the temple walls, I couldn’t concentrate. I doubt that the others could either.

Meanwhile, the terrified screams continued, increasing in their number, as did the uncomfortable pressure as more vampires used their power against the villagers, the thick stone walls of the temple offering us little protection. Then there came the even more terrifying sound of steel against steel.

The vampires were fighting?

If one of them took blood and went into a Blood Frenzy, then not even belonging to the Sisterhood would protect us.

Our prayers forgotten, the seven of us stared at each other, the faces of the others reflecting the terror that I was feeling.

Novice Anya was the first to speak.

‘Something’s not right,’ she said, looking across the semi-circle at Darla, her voice wavering in fear. Next to Darla, Selda was quietly comforting Inka, who was sobbing. ‘That sounds like more than a normal vampire attack.’

Darla shot to her feet. ‘I’ll go to the gates and see if I can find out what’s happening.’ She started hurrying towards the door at the back of the room, skirting around the rows of wooden benches used by those visiting the temple, the candle flames guttering as she rushed past the candelabra positioned in the recesses running down each wall, her robes billowing around her ankles. ‘Novice Anya, you and Novice Livinda take the younger ones into the sacred room.’

I watched the older girl with a sinking feeling in my gut. I wanted to call her back but couldn’t break my Silence. To do so would mean a severe rebuking from Mother Alena, who would accuse me of not taking my commitment to the Sisterhood seriously. Not only that, I would have to start the six months all over again—which Anya had disclosed to Olya and me had happened to Darla when she was completing her Silence, the novice having disagreed with something one of the older novices had said and started arguing with her right in the middle of the feasting hall in front of not only the other novices and priestesses, but Mother Alena herself! Not that Darla would ever openly admit the event had happened and would be furious if she’d found out that Anya had disclosed such a scandalous thing to us.

‘Take care,’ Anya called after Darla, then turned to us and motioned that we stand. ‘Quickly, Novices.’

We got to our feet and followed Anya towards the arched doorway behind the stone altar, which led to the most sacred room within the temple, the others talking nervously amongst themselves. Outside, the screaming and sounds of battle continued. They sounded too close to be in the village, but rather within the temple grounds themselves.

Fighting within the sacred walls? Impossible.

When we reached the doorway, Livinda and Anya followed Selda into the sacred room, but when it came to Inka’s turn, the girl paused at the threshold. As Inka was yet to take her vows she wasn’t allowed to enter.

Spinning on her heel, Anya grabbed the younger girl by the hand and yanked her through the doorway, causing Inka to nearly topple down the narrow flight of steps, saying, ‘I think the Goddess will forgive you this one time, Inka.’

I was last, behind Olya, and was about to follow my friend inside the sacred room, when I heard someone hurtling through the doorway at the opposite end of the temple hall. Looking over my shoulder, I saw it was Darla. She was holding up her robes to run, a look of sheer terror on her pretty face.

‘Hide!’ she screamed, as she started down the narrow aisle in between the wooden benches, her bare feet slapping against the stone floor. ‘Novice Elysa, hide! The temple’s under attack!’

Suddenly, a squat vampire dressed in a blood-red cuirass decorated with a flanged mace suddenly rushed through the open doorway behind Darla, his cuirass and pale face streaked with blood. A Northlander Watchman.

For a moment I thought we were safe; that the Watchman was there to protect us from the village guard. But then he went straight for Darla, who let out a terrified wail as he wrapped his muscular arms around the woman’s waist and pulled her to him.

Frozen in place, I watched in horror as the Watchman buried his fangs in the screaming woman’s throat and started feeding. It seemed we were wrong, and it wasn’t the village guard attacking after all, but rather a rogue Watchman. Though why was he in a village nearly a day’s ride south of the Southern Fortress?

Why are they nearly a day’s ride away? I corrected, as three more Northlander Watchmen suddenly rushed through the same doorway as the first; blood on their faces and murder in their eyes. Despite the dire situation, I was annoyed to see all three had a sword on their hip. It was forbidden to bring weapons into a temple.

And wear footwear, I thought, eyeing the calf-high leather boots on the vampires’ feet.

Spotting me standing open-mouthed in the doorway, the vampires started down the aisle, and suddenly finding myself able to move, I spun on my heel and rushed through the doorway and down the set of steps into the sacred room, where the other novices were kneeling in front of the mural of the Mother. Anya and Livinda were trying to lead the younger ones in a prayer to the Goddess, but the terrified girls were too busy sobbing to recite the words.

The candlelit room was around ten strides across and had murals carved into three of its four stone walls, representing the Goddess as the Mother, Maiden, and Crone. There was only one way in and out. We were trapped.

Waving my hands in warning, I dashed over to the mural of the Crone, which was furthest from the doorway, and crawled in the space between the stone altar standing in front of it and the wall, twisting my body to fit in the tight space. I scooted up so that my eyes were level with the top end of the altar and watched horrified as the Watchmen piled into the sacred room.

Crying out in terror, the girls leapt to their feet, their prayer abandoned. Anya and Livinda moved in front of the three younger girls to protect them from the trespassing vampires.

‘How dare you enter this sacred place,’ Anya said to the Watchmen, her chin raised as she faced down the vampires. ‘Leave this ins—’ The novice let out a terrified shriek as the nearest Watchmen, unmoved by her rebuke, grabbed Anya by the back of the neck and shoved her face-down on the small altar in front of the mural of the Mother—feathers, pinecones, and other offerings placed there by the senior high priestess scattering in all directions, his free hand tugging at his laces.

His trousers undone, the burly Watchman grabbed the back of the struggling and sobbing woman’s robes and tore them in two, then started doing something to her that I didn’t fully understand but knew was forbidden.

Staggering back from them, Livinda turned and made for the doorway, but was swiftly caught by the sole Watchwoman of the group.

‘Spare me, I’m a descendant of Lord Gardry!’ the terrified novice wailed as she struggled in the much stronger vampire’s arms, her auburn hair, freed from its knot, hanging loose around her tear-streaked face.

The Watchwoman laughed. ‘Then your blood will taste all the sweeter,’ she said, and sank her fangs into the terrified woman’s neck, while in the centre of the room Selda struggled in the third Watchman’s grip as he drained the blood from her veins, the vampire seemingly oblivious to the woman’s fingernails raking great gouges down his meaty arms.

Peering around the side of the altar, I watched the scene in horror, my hands clamped over my mouth so that I wouldn’t inadvertently cry out and alert the vampires to my presence, and so I wouldn’t break my Silence. Not even a vampire attack would permit me to break the promise I had made to the Goddess.

Sudden movement over by the mural of the Maiden caught my attention. As I watched, Olya crawled out from behind the altar. She was followed by a sobbing Inka.

The pair got to their feet, then, keeping as close to the wall as possible, dashed over to the doorway and slipped from the room unnoticed. I prayed that they managed to get away and didn’t find themselves running straight into the one attacking Darla.

Meanwhile, over on the altar of the Mother, the Watchman brutalising Anya had his scrunched-up face lifted to the ceiling and was making strange grunting noises as he continued his assault on the woman. As I watched, he grabbed a handful of her dark hair, which had come loose from its knot, and yanked her head back. He buried his fangs in Anya’s neck and tore her throat wide open, spraying the novice’s blood across the mural of the Mother.

Unable to watch any more, I ducked behind the altar and closed my eyes tightly, fighting the urge not to throw up as my sisters’ screams continued to sound in my ears and the coppery scent of their blood filled my nostrils.

Please, Mother Goddess, don’t let them find me. Please, Mother Goddess, don’t let them find me. Please, Mother Goddess, don’t let them find me.

I knew I was going to die.

I couldn’t escape as there was only one door, and the vampires were between me and it. As soon as they were finished with the others, they would be coming for me. Their enhanced senses meant they would easily hear my pounding heart coming from behind the altar and scent the blood flowing through my veins.

Though my Uncle Olaf had told me that if a vampire ever went to attack me to tell them I was his niece—there was an unwritten rule among vampires not to hurt the relative of one of their own, unless they were the human’s owner or one of the Prime brothers, who hated all humans—I had already seen with Livinda that the vampires currently attacking the temple didn’t care about such things. My only hope was that other vampires, more fearful of the Goddess’s wrath than what the four attacking the temple were, realised what was happening and stopped them.

A sudden shout sounded beyond the doorway, and I opened my eyes just in time to see two female vampires rush into the room, bloody swords in their gloved hands. The shorter of the two women was also holding a crossbow. Unlike the three vampires already in the sacred room, the two newcomers were still wearing their open-faced helms.

For a blessed moment I thought my prayers had been answered, but then my heart sank when I saw both newcomers were wearing the black cuirass embossed with the bloodied battle-axe of the Dornian Prime’s Watch.

I would get no help from them.

Everyone knew Dornians didn’t worship the Goddess, meaning the Watchwomen wouldn’t care that I was a priestess. They had probably already murdered Inka and Olya and my other sisters in the temple grounds, and it was their blood decorating their swords.

As I watched, the Watchman holding Selda let out a battle cry, blasting me with his power. Shoving the bleeding novice to the floor, he whirled around to face the shorter of the two Watchwomen, drawing his sword. But before he had chance to use the weapon, there was a loud thwacking sound and he toppled backwards and hit the floor with a crash, a crossbow bolt sticking out from his armour directly over his heart, his lifeless eyes staring up at the ceiling.

The woman then spun on her heel, and using the broadsword in her right hand, beheaded the Northlander Watchwoman who was sneaking up behind her, her own sword raised. Meanwhile, her companion started towards the Northlander still busy assaulting Anya—the novice, by now, had fallen silent—the vampire too engrossed in what he was doing to realise the danger he was in as the Watchwoman’s sword descended upon him.

His head swiftly joined his companion’s on the stone floor of the temple.

The Watchwoman wiped her bloody sword on the edge of the deceased vampire’s cloak before sliding the weapon into the leather scabbard at her hip. Using her booted foot, she shoved the vampire off Anya, and the Watchman’s metal cuirass clashed loudly as he hit the floor, his breeches around his thighs, revealing his pale backside.

Stepping around the deceased vampire, the Watchwoman leaned over to check Anya’s body for signs of life, her face surprisingly compassionate. ‘This one’s dead,’ she said, dropping her arm, her voice tinged with sadness.

‘Same with these two,’ said her companion, who was crouched next to the mutilated remains of Livinda, gently stroking the dead novice’s cheek with a gloved finger, her crossbow lying on the floor next to her.

The first Watchwoman stepped back from the altar, and to my astonishment, bowed her head and said, ‘I’m sorry that we were too late to save your daughters, Mother Goddess. I’m also sorry for spilling blood within these sacred walls.’

Did Dornians worship the Goddess after all?

I bit my bottom lip to stop myself crying out in terror as the Watchwoman crouched next to Livinda suddenly looked over to where I was peeking out around the side of the altar of the Crone.

‘I know you’re there, child,’ she said softly. ‘Don’t worry, we won’t harm you.’

Too scared to move, I watched in horror as the Watchwoman stood up, skirted around the remains of Livinda and the Northlander Watchman, and walked over to where I was cowering, convinced I was about to be drained like my fellow sisters.

Reaching me, the Watchwoman sheathed her bloodied sword and crouched down in front of me, her cuirass and helm splattered with the blood of the dead Watchmen. But her face was clean, as was her companion’s. Neither vampire had fed.

Neither she nor her companion looked much older than Livinda, but as vampires didn’t age from the day that they were Turned, they could both be centuries old.

‘Are you hurt?’ the Watchwoman asked, her blue eyes regarding me kindly.

I shook my head.

‘Go to The Keep, you’ll be safe there,’ she said. ‘Tell them Violet and Meela sent you.’

The other Watchwoman, who, having picked up her companion’s crossbow and re-armed it, was standing in the doorway with the weapon poised ready to use, turned to me and gave a quick nod, then said to her companion, ‘Let’s go, Violet.’

‘I’m sorry that we must leave you here alone,’ Violet said, sounding genuinely regretful. ‘But be sure to go to The Keep. Go east from the village, through the forest to the stream, and follow it south. It’ll take longer to get there, but the stream will lead you straight to Henrik’s Barbican while at the same time ensuring that you avoid the fighting. Do not go west, or use the Prime’s Highway, as it isn’t safe.’

The Watchwoman paused, waiting for a response, and I nodded.

‘Violet!’ her companion urged, beckoning with her empty hand. ‘Come on, I can hear Harper ordering us to re-group.’

Violet looked over her shoulder. ‘Go on ahead, my love. I’ll be right behind you.’ She turned back to me. ‘Remember,’ she said as she stood up, ‘go east, not west.’

The Watchwoman then followed Meela out of the room, leaving me alone in what used to be a sacred space, but was now a place of blood and murder.

I was stunned they had left me unharmed; everyone knew Dornian vampires were even more sadistic than their Northlander counterparts when it came to the treatment of humans.

Alone in the sacred room, I remained hidden behind the altar of the Crone—the distant sounds of battle and the terrified screams of the villagers and my fellow priestesses, along with the angry bellows and power of vampires, coming through the open doorway—for what seemed like forever, until, scared other vampires would enter the temple looking for victims, I forced myself to move.

Crawling out from my hiding place, my back and legs protesting where I had been hunched in an uncomfortable position for so long, I stood up and stared around me, feeling strangely detached as I took in the bodies of my fallen sisters and the Watchmen, the puddles of blood on the floor, the spray of crimson on the walls and across the low ceiling, on the altars and the murals. The sacred room reeked of blood and of death.

Although I didn’t want it to, I found my gaze going to the bloodied body slumped across the altar of the Mother. Anya’s dead eyes were staring at nothing, her blood dripping from the altar and the ends of her dark hair onto the stone floor, mingling with the blood already pooled there.

I had known Novice Anya since my first day at the temple. It was Anya who’d wiped away my tears while I sobbed for my family and had helped me when I struggled to remember all fifteen verses of the Priestess’s Prayer to the Goddess.

These were my sisters. My family. How could such a thing have happened?

The brutalisation and murder of priestesses was considered the ultimate insult to the Goddess, and the place I had called home for the past year could no longer be considered sacred ground. Its walls would need to be taken down—stone by stone—and the area cleansed before it was rebuilt.

Knowing I had to leave, as others could come at any moment, I stumbled up the steps and through the arched doorway, into the temple hall, where yet more blood and death awaited me.

Novice Darla was sprawled face-down on the floor in between two wooden benches, her pale green robes soaked with her own blood. Next to Darla were the remains of her attacker, a crossbow bolt jutting out from his chest, his dark eyes staring at nothing.

Of Inka and Olya, there was no sign.

I had always liked the courtyard at the front of the temple, with its white paving slabs and raised flower beds, but now I was filled with horror as I stood in the temple’s arched doorway and took in the bodies lying amongst the bluebells, snowdrops, and purple and white crocuses, the paving slabs stained red with blood.

Over by the front entrance to the temple grounds, the bodies of Mother Alena and Sister Jena were sprawled in front of the heavy wooden doors. The doors were standing half-open where the two priestesses had been in the middle of pushing them closed when the Watchmen attacked.

On the temple’s front steps—each of the nine marble steps representing a challenge a novice had to complete to gain her white robes—lay Sister Nola, her throat torn wide open. She must’ve been coming to warn us of the danger. Next to her was the headless corpse of her attacker, his red cuirass stained with hers and his other victims’ blood.

In the street beyond the temple grounds, the doors and windows of the cottages and shops were shuttered and barred. In their desperate bid to hide, people hadn’t bothered packing away the trestle tables outside their shops, and overturned tables and spilled goods littered the cobbled street, along with several dead villagers and guards. Loose animals were wandering in between the debris and bodies, and a small boy was weaving up the street, the front of his tunic bloody, crying for his mama.

I hid in the temple’s darkened doorway as several Dornian Watchmen rode past on great warhorses, the sound of the horses’ hooves deafening. The two Watchwomen may not have hurt me, but I didn’t think the same would be true if others found me.

Although I couldn’t see it from my position, I could hear the battle still raging on outside the temple grounds and could feel the vampires’ power.

Knowing that if I left through the front entrance, I would end up walking straight into the middle of the fighting vampires, my only option was to scale the wall surrounding the temple grounds and flee through the dense forest lying to the north and east of the temple.

I had already decided that I wasn’t going to The Keep, despite Violet’s assurances that I would be safe there. She and her companion may have spared me, but I didn’t think the same would be true of other Dornian vampires. Like other Northlander children, I had been told stories on my ma’s knee of Dornian Watchmen going to Northlander holdings and villages, promising to take people to safety, only to imprison them in The Keep, where they would be tortured for weeks on end before they were eventually drained.

I’ll go to my uncle and ask him to take me to the nearest safe temple, I decided. I wouldn’t be breaking my vows if I was only going to him for aid. I was eight years old; too young to be travelling alone. Especially when there was a battle going on.

I waited until the Watchmen had ridden past the gates, then raced along the front of the temple building, the paving slabs cool under my bare feet. My boots and cloak were in the small room next to the temple hall, where I had placed them before going into the temple with the others for our afternoon prayers, but not wanting to see the bodies of my fallen sisters again, I didn’t go back