Tortured: An Epic Dragons and Immortals Romantic Fantasy (Fallen Emrys Chronicles Book 3)

Chapter 1

I’m still human. I’m still human. I have to be human.

I pull my cheek smooth and draw the knife across my skin. Brown hairs nearly two inches long drift into the creek where I kneel. The setting sun provides just enough glow on the fluff of snow to illuminate my task.

Keenly alert, I suck in a breath of frozen air. Staying focused doesn’t take much effort even though I’ve been awake for six days, moving south across the plains after my escape from the citadel. With my new heightened senses, every screech, every crack, every snap of the sparse shrubbery by animal or human digs into me.

I am Kenrik, second prince of Talfryn. I am a human.

Sound will not leave me alone.

All because of Niawen’s light, which is inside me.

A light that should not be inside a mortal.

Is this what it is like for an immortal emrys? How could Niawen live with her hearing so acute and not go insane?

Niawen’s light couldn’t have made me like her. She couldn’t have given me her immortality. I am a mortal!

I picture Niawen, weakened and fragile because of her loss of light, as she takes off into the forest to the west. Her ashy blond locks gleam behind her in the moonlight. She stumbles in boots too large for her. We stole what we could to keep her warm as we smuggled out of the city.

I continue shaving. The scrape of metal against my own skin rakes through me, but I have to get rid of the beard. It’s a painful reminder of my imprisonment by a madman.

By the Lord of Rolant, Caedryn, who continues to send his assassins after me.

Let them come.

As long as Lord Caedryn thinks Niawen is with me, that we are continuing south, she will be safe.

That is my only aim in life.

Stay alive to protect Niawen. Trick Caedryn into believing she is with me. Draw his attention away from her as she flees west. I will gladly be hunted forever, just to keep Caedryn’s wrath away from her.

Nothing else matters.

I finger the chain around my neck and pull the dragon stone from beneath my jerkin. The pearlescent gem glimmers with beauty I am unworthy to carry. I wish Niawen did not give me the stone. She needs the protection of her dragon. I do not, especially since her light gives me the strength of twenty men.

I am still human.

Just keep telling yourself that.

I am still human.

Please tell me I didn’t take her immortality.

I finish shaving at the creekside and rise to my feet.

A crunch to my left immobilizes me.

Someone found me.

I’m not surprised. Caedryn sends new assassins before I even dispatch the last ones. They come in pairs, and when I kill them, Caedryn sends them in swarms.

I hold my breath. This will be another night of no sleep, but despite the frantic pace I set and the nights and days of looking over my shoulder, I’m not tired.

All because of her light, a power I have yet to fathom.

All I know is that it has changed me—

Is changing me.

My killer rounds a nearby boulder, but before he sees me, I crouch behind it. I have the sense that he doesn’t know where I am or he wouldn’t have swaggered so brazenly around the rock. Closing my eyes, I inhale silently through my nose. The smell of wood smoke and cooked rabbit fills my sinuses. The assassin left his warm fire to finish me off in the dimming twilight.

A heartbeat thrums in my ears. I try to ignore the oppressive gallop that finds me every time my attackers do. After I killed the third one, I realized it wasn’t my racing heartbeat. It was theirs.

I can hear their distinct rhythm from meters away.

As if showing foresight, time unveils the exact moment I should strike. I see what I should do before it happens. This is a new gift that emerged just two days prior.

Premonition.

Niawen never spoke of this ability.

Back to the present. My assailant lifts his sword, his movements flickering into my sight as if he’s already completed a careful turn around the boulder, even though it has not yet happened. When his foot actually lands with a muted thud, I plunge my silver blade between the ribs and into the man’s heart. He slumps to the ground, groaning.

I slouch against the cold stone while the raking breaths of the man, and his thready pulse, needle me. Minutes later, his heartbeat stops, finally leaving me in peace.

I force myself to get up, to move on. Another assassin won’t be far behind.