Read Lichgates: Book One of the Grimoire Saga (an Epic Fantasy Adventure) for Free Online Page B

across the throngs of monsters below.
    The crowd had been jeering and laughing when the doors opened, but the room hushed when they saw Braeden. Bodies parted to give him a clear path through to the end of the hall, and Kara caught her breath. Hundreds of tall, gray-skinned men and women filled the room, their faces twisted in snarls, but they were outnumbered by creatures that were even more frightening. Centaurs reared to better vantage points, kicking others in the head as they did. Several hairy minotaurs snorted, snot dripping from their noses as they gazed at the procession without blinking. Wolves howled from some unseen place.
    Three black marble thrones sat on a raised platform at the end of the room, growing ever-nearer as Kara’s silent convoy walked closer. Another gray-skinned man sat in the center throne but stood as the crowd parted. He was even taller than the soldier who had examined her back in the cave, his skin a deeper charcoal color than the rest. He sneered.
    When they were close enough, the soldier’s grip on her arm tightened. He kicked the back of her knee, forcing her to the tile floor. She winced and glared at the man by the thrones, but he was smirking at Braeden and apparently uninterested in her pain.
    “It has been too long, son,” he said, beginning down the platform’s steps.
    Kara couldn’t place his accent. He drew out his vowels and overly enunciated his consonants, as if pausing to adore the sound of his own voice.
    She looked at the gray man and turned back to Braeden. Their jaws were both square, their hair dark, but Braeden’s olive skin tone contrasted starkly from his father’s ashen complexion.
    “Now look. The human is confused.” The man turned to Kara, and the edge to his voice made her skin crawl.
    “Stop, Carden,” Braeden said, gritting his teeth. Something clicked in her mind, and she thought back to their short conversation in the mobile prison: Braeden had been running from his own father.
    Carden crossed his arms. “Why are you not in your natural form, boy? You look hideous.”
    “No.” Braeden shook his head. “Never again. Not willingly.”
    “Unwillingly, then.”
    Carden grabbed the crown of his son’s head. A gray light rippled across Braeden’s skin, and his body convulsed, the skin fading from its olive tone to the same charcoal gray color as his father’s. The green shirt tightened as he grew taller, and smoke poured from the rips in his clothes. Kara gasped.
    Carden laughed and released his son’s head, allowing Braeden’s skin to fade back to the olive hue she recognized. Braeden caught her eye with a sharp glare before shaking his head and returning his gaze to the floor.
    “Welcome home, boy!” Carden’s voice boomed.
    “I don’t want this!” Braeden’s voice echoed over his father’s and commanded the hall’s attention. “All I want is to be left alone. I won’t get in your way. I never have.”
    “You haven’t yet, no. But when I couldn’t produce another Heir with the bloodline, I realized you weren’t dead. You have a duty to your people to help me turn the tides of this world. Our banishment will end in my lifetime, and I must have an Heir to follow me. You don’t have a choice.”
    Kara glanced from the king to the prince chained at his feet before she turned to look at the plethora of monsters in the towering throne room. Not only was he a prince, but he could change shape to look like the gray-skinned creatures all around her. She shook her head and shivered. She was in deep.
    “Why is the human here, isen?” Carden asked.
    Icy panic raced through Kara’s chest, but was made worse when she realized exactly what Carden had said. He’d called Deidre an isen, so—according to the letter Kara read back in the library—Deidre could steal souls. She could’ve stolen Kara’s soul, but had instead brought her here. Why?
    “She’s a present.” Deidre grinned and pulled Kara to her feet.
    Carden frowned. “She is