Godsbane

Prologue

The cold, gray depths of the Eastern Sea threaten to swallow the girl whole. The rip current tugs relentlessly on her flailing limbs, every breath pulling more and more of the salty water into her too full lungs.

The Dark God of Death encroaches.

Leathery skin in blackest night flits across her peripheral—a glimpse of the creature of myth sent to collect her. Fire erupts from within as the sea beast grazes its serpentine body across the girl’s spine, forever marring her porcelain skin.

Something long-slumbering awakens in her veins, power not in or of this world. Snippets of fate flash before her as the creature spurs her onto the shore.

Onyx hair.

Crimson blood.

A burning throne.

A name the soul knows but the mind cannot understand.

Shadowy death.

Blood-tinged water pours from her mouth in violent coughs as oxygen tries to fill her lungs again.

Vines spring up from the dunes with each slide of the girl’s frail hands as she crawls across the beach.

Shadows wash away the blinding light of day as the sun vanishes from the heights of the noonday sky—an illuminated crescent on the sand the only evidence of its continued existence.

Time halts with the eclipse as reality shatters into two.

There is what was before and there is what will be. A child entered the sea, but something ancient and powerful emerged from the watery depths.

Touched by a god and destined to rule.