Liminal Hearts (Rules of Chaos Book 1)

Liminal Hearts

Rules of Chaos Book 1

Dawn R. Schuldenfrei

Copyright © 2019 Dawn R. Schuldenfrei

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-7335324-5-7

www.DawnRSchuldenfrei.com

Edited by Annetta Ribken.

You can find her at www.wordwebbing.com

Cover art by Paul Pederson.

You can find him at www.paulpederson.com

DEDICATION

For my kiddos. You’re wonderful and creative, and you inspire me every day.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you so much to my editor, Annetta Ribken for all her help. Also to Paul Pederson for the gorgeous cover art.

Especially, thanks to my parents for years of encouragement, not to mention kid- and dog-sitting.

CHAPTER ONE

A lone man with flowing white hair stood at the edge of the lake. Rolling hills graced the far shore and a few light clouds dusted the sky in the distance, taking on the beginnings of the sun’s color as it rose above the horizon. A light breeze rippled the water.

Gravel crunched and rolled as the man knelt onto the beach, opened a drawstring bag, and poured out five fist-sized objects. They rattled hollowly against each other as they fell. Sharp lines and interlocking swirls skittered across their surfaces. Even he, as ancient as he was, didn’t know their meaning.

A soundless hum vibrated through him when he touched them. As he held his hands over the bone talismans, he poured what little energy he still had into them. It pulled and twisted its way through the core of his being, as he ripped it out of himself and forced it to do his bidding. But his bidding it did do: the bones hummed with restored power, passed it between them, augmented it as it coursed through their sigils.

When it reached its peak it crackled and leapt outward in jagged black lines that somehow glowed even as they swallowed all light in their vicinity. Like dark lightning, it zigzagged over the beach. Rocks popped and bubbled beneath it and the smell of ozone rose into the morning.

He was cut off from his origins, cast out of his homeland, and could no longer access its vast resources of magic. Humans provided meager amounts of power that had fueled him during his exile. But while they could restore his innate abilities for a while, it was never enough to truly fill him. Before, power had surged through his entire being and beyond, connecting him to the very essence of the universe. Now, he lived in this insignificant shell, confined, limited to small magic run on stolen life.

But he had been given a gift. A tool to crack open much better power sources.

He had scoured this place for weeks, tracking, hunting. The creature was ancient and elusive, and the more he searched the more his quest drained him.

Finally, he found it. The creature, or creatures more accurately, were tricky. But herded together and trapped here, at one end of the great loch, they were at his mercy.

The sizzling blast of energy hit the cold water with a sharp hiss. It slithered down into the lake, filling the dark blue with a sickly brightness where it spread. From beneath the depths came a roar, then a wail. Then silence.

Darkness returned to the lake for just a moment before a dome of energy exploded upward. The talismans burned brightly and the man spread his arms wide. Power crashed into him, filling him, recreating him. He took it all in, as much as he could, drinking down the ancient magic with a thirst that hadn’t been satisfied in millennia.

At last he was sated, complete. He closed his eyes and breathed deep as the last waves of magic washed over him and dissipated.

It had worked, exactly as he’d been told.

The way was open for him now, a path to true restoration. He would devour the power of this world. And if he was no longer welcome in his original home, he would create a new one. This was only the beginning.

Anaya felt the rumblings of old magic, of something wrong. It woke her from her sleep, even though she knew what was happening was hundreds of miles away. Something in the fabric of the universe had shivered and shaken loose.

An explosive blast roared through her, pulling at the very atoms of her being. White hot energy pulsed through her veins, a lava flow that burned even as its heat filled her to the core, touching her magic and expanding it, overflowing it, until she was certain her physical body would dissolve into a mist of pure power.

She hadn’t felt this good, this complete, since she’d been exiled. Anaya had grown used to the aching emptiness, used to existing as a human. This rush was like going home again, washing away all the centuries in this world.

Then, just as suddenly as it had flowed into her, it sucked back out again, leaving nothing behind but ice cold memory.

She wobbled to the window of her London flat, grasping at the sill to hold herself upright. The morning sun lit the edge of the horizon with harsh, glowing reds. A thick quiet filled the air, even the usual city noises muted. In the distance she could make out a few shimmering waves, almost like heat rising from pavement in summer, as they receded north across the sky and disappeared.

Not heat energy though; this was a different kind of energy, an ancient being’s energy, or at least bits and pieces of it thrown outward, now retreating back.

But for that to happen, the being would have to be dead. Not just dead, but torn apart, for its power to be released like that. The original amount of magic must have been massive, from something old and powerful.

Something that should have been immortal.

But immortals couldn’t be killed. Could they?

The following day, Anaya stood next to Castle Urquhart on the shores of Loch Ness. Tourists crawled through the crumbling gray stone of the ruins and meandered across the lawn, but Anaya only had eyes for the loch. Sure, everyone looking for Nessie came here, but she didn’t really have any better idea for where to look. Although she already knew she wouldn’t be finding any living lake monster.

She didn’t know what she hoped to find, actually. Confirmation of what she already knew, she supposed. The magical blast had certainly come from Loch Ness, and if it was Nessie’s power, or the remnants of it, Nessie was dead and gone. Would her killer still be here? Who could destroy one of the most ancient supernatural creatures in existence in the first place?

Anaya had a sneaking suspicion, and she didn’t like it one bit. To kill a very powerful creature, you needed a very powerful creature. The occasional lake monsters in this world fit the bill, certainly. The fae had plenty of power, although she couldn’t imagine why they would bother with Nessie, considering the abilities they already commanded. No, an immensely strong person, who would want Nessie’s magic for themselves . . .

She had lived among the humans for a very long time now. She had almost no power herself, cut off from her home as she was. But others of her kind would certainly have the potential to wreak this kind of destruction. There was only one other exile she knew of, and she had heard stories, myths and legends, of him. Morcant. Thrown out of the unicorn homerealm long before herself, in a way he was the reason she had been cast out: the others feared she might become like him. Anaya feared it herself sometimes. When the ache of all she had left behind coursed through her very bones, when she needed some way to soothe it, fill it.

According to the humans’ stories, Morcant had found a way to fill that hole. To find some measure of power for himself. She had no wish to go down that path; she wasn’t like that. But sometimes, it was so hard to be.

Morcant was a killer, usually of humans. But if he had somehow figured out how to take the strength of more powerful creatures? Would he? And what would he be like now that he had learned to do so?

Damn, why was she stuck here to deal with this? Anaya was as outcast as Morcant; technically she had no obligation to try and stop him. She didn’t owe anything to the people of this world. She certainly had no responsibility to the other unicorns to be some kind of external police force for them. And yet, for all she feared becoming like Morcant, she wasn’t like him. She cared about things. That was what had gotten her into trouble in the first place, way back when. If she’d learned her lesson back then, she’d walk away. Let someone else handle everything.

But who else was there? The unicorns didn’t interfere in the human world. And Morcant was strong enough to take out Nessie, so there weren’t many more powerful than that. She could go to the local fae, see if they would help. But fae could be fickle, and might not help if the threat wasn’t directly against them. And Morcant was probably already on the move.

There was no one else. Same as last time. No one else to step in and do what was necessary. She’d be damned again, although she wasn’t sure how her situation could get worse. She already had no power, no friends, no family, and no people. The only thing left to lose was herself.

Anaya took a deep breath. The sounds of cameras and chattering voices penetrated her thoughts. She caught a whiff of lilac perfume as a tour group led by a woman carrying a colorful flag passed by. Children climbed the ramparts of the old castle as their parents attempted to shoo them down and angry-faced guards stomped over. The lake rippled quietly down below, gray-blue and hiding its depths.

The other people of this world had no responsibility for Morcant. He wasn’t one of theirs. Like it or not, he was one of hers. Someone had to try and stop him. Unfortunately, it seemed that someone was Anaya. She didn’t know how she could do that without access to her full powers, and she wasn’t about to use Morcant’s methods to fuel herself. Now or, she hoped, ever. She’d have to try and find him, try to stop him. And hopefully remain sane in the process.

First step was to figure out where Morcant had gone. Perhaps he was after a similar creature? The fae could probably organize to fight him off better than a lone lake monster would. So someplace like Loch Ness. She knew of a few places around the world supposed to have water monsters. Which one would he choose? Someplace like Loch Ness, not too far away, relatively speaking. An old creature, full of life and magic. She knew a place that fit all of those requirements.

Would Morcant choose that one? There was only one way to find out for sure. She’d have to go there and see what she could find. And without much magic at her disposal, that would take some research.

CHAPTER TWO

The Starksburgh Athenaeum was a nineteenth century stone building in the center of the small Vermont town. Wide cement steps led up to heavy wooden double doors flanked by lion statues, and tall windows with arched tops looked down on patrons entering below.

Inside, Tara stood at the front desk on the side of the room. Long tables filled the center area, while a bank of battered card catalogs lined the back wall. A wide doorway at the rear of the room led deeper into the building.

Soft footsteps still managed to echo off the marbled lobby floor. Tara looked up to see who was coming. Then she froze.

In front of her stood a unicorn.

Tara blinked, and the vision flickered away, replaced by a tall woman with deep black hair that fell in soft waves to her shoulders. It had a shimmery quality that split the light into iridescent rainbows when seen from an angle. She wore a blue cap-sleeved t-shirt that showed off the muscles of her arms, and she moved with the strength and steadiness of someone who knew how to use her body.

A bolt of heat went straight through Tara’s heart and down to her stomach. It was the closest she’d ever felt to physical desire.

The unicorn woman approached Tara’s desk. The sense of a sunny meadow covered with dew and blooming with flowers came with her.

Hello, she said.

Hi. Tara took a deep breath. Can I help you?

I understand you have a Champ collection here.

Yes, Tara replied. We’ve got just about every story that’s been told about him here, including some local tales that never caught national attention. Okay, so the woman was into cryptozoology or something. Tara’s first impression must have been a mini-hallucination. Too many fairy tales and not enough caffeine this morning.

Come on back this way. I’ll show you the Lake Champlain Room.

They went past curving iron staircases that led to a small upper walkway containing even more shelves of books. A computer stood