Coven Queen Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Title

  Other Works

  Full Title

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  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

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Coven Queen

  Also by Jeramy Goble

  Science-fiction/space opera:

  The Akallian Tales Trilogy:

  Souls of Astraeus (fall 2013)

  Games of Astraeus (summer 2015)

  Fates of Astraeus (spring 2016)

  Coven Queen

  Jeramy Goble

  Coven Queen is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Jeramy Goble

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author or publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Noachian Books

  North Carolina

  Noachian-books.com

  Noachian Books and the portrayal of a flooded Martian silhouette, with stone tablet insets,

  are trademarks of Noachian Books

  Edited by Laura M. Hughes

  Printed in the United States of America

  jeramygoble.com

  facebook.com/JeramyGoble

  twitter.com/JeramyGoble

  Book & jacket design by Jeramy Goble

  Cover art by Ivan Vujovic - vujovic.artstation.com

  Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Goble, Jeramy.

  Title: Coven queen / Jeramy Goble.

  Description: Maggie Valley, NC : Noachian Books, 2017.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017914145 | ISBN 978-0-9990435-0-9 (hardcover) | ISBN 978-0-9990435-1-6 (pbk.) | ISBN 978-0-9990435-2-3 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Women heroes--Fiction. | Witches--Fiction. | Warlocks--Fiction. | Witchcraft--Fiction. | Magic--Fiction. | Fantasy fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Fantasy / Dark Fantasy. | FICTION / Occult & Supernatural. | GSAFD: Fantasy fiction. | Occult fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3607.O26 C68 2016 (print) | LCC PS3607.O26 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6--dc23.

  First Edition

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For those who see the light in the dark.

  Prologue

  NO MEMORY pesters me more than the night I first slogged up the slopes of the Vacant Grave with my mother.

  I can still feel her hand shielding my own against the crisp bite of winter as she dragged me up the mountain. Her skin’s warmth puzzled and fascinated me, but her brisk pace demanded most of my attention be focused on my feet. Her long strides forced me to shuffle and skip awkwardly up the rough mountain path, poorly kept and littered with loose stones that had crumbled down from the exposed dirt of the rugged trail. Tree roots stretched and arched across the width of the path, occasionally requiring me to hop over them and pray to the light that I landed on my feet.

  But smooth steps or firm landings were never guaranteed. The lone guard at the trail's summit was neither tasked nor concerned with its upkeep, and so the torches along the path—those that still carried a flame—were few and far between. Though the abyssal darkness made the climb treacherous, the slight moonlight helped guide our steps.

  The snow was less forgiving.

  The snow frustrated me terribly, though I do not fault it now. The snow was a gift. In hindsight, it might even have been trying to deter us from reaching our destination. I struggled against it with every absentminded jerk of my mother’s hand. The footsteps of other recent climbers conspired with the whipping gales to compact the slick and icy trail. Dislodged clumps of muddy snow sounded like crinkling leather as we struggled to maintain our footing.

  The distance to the top of the mountain is no longer a mystery to me as it was those many years ago, but I still vividly remember thinking that the frozen path would surely never end, and that the peak would never come. The fact that we were traveling alone made no sense to me, either. I wanted to repeat the questions I had offered my mother when we first set out. Where were we going? Why were we going? But the soft sniffs and whimpers from behind the hood of her cloak frightened me into silence. I held my tongue for the longest time. Perhaps I should not have, but I did.

  Eventually, lit torches began to outnumber those that had burned out. As we drew closer to the peak, I found myself distracted by pulsing shadows cast by fires flickering just off the trail. I made out shapes of people, bundled in blankets and huddled together around their meager flames. Almost as quickly as I noticed the curious strangers in the darkness, I was ambushed by a putrid odor of stale urine and fresh feces akin to that which lingered around the livestock pens at the market. It was so overpowering that I vomited within seconds of being struck by it.

  As soon as Mother felt me hesitate, she jerked my hand once more. There would be no rest.

  The increase in lit torches and campfires at least made the ground easier to negotiate. The stench of human waste remained, though, intertwined with charred game and infrequent hints of wine—like the breath of the foreigners who came to visit and feast with my mother. The silence of the frigid darkness had been our only comfort; now it too was spoiled, by conversations and laughter from those camped near the top of the trail.

  We crested the summit and my heart thumped with excitement as I assumed we were nearing our destination. But my anticipation returned to dread when I remembered that I didn’t know where we were going. I looked to my mother to see if she would finally fill me in. She didn’t.

  The trail forked, split in two by a mammoth cedar. To the right, the most worn path ended in a tall, crudely-chiseled opening leading into the mountain. The path to the left narrowed before disappearing around and behind the entry’s outcropping. Next to the mountain’s threshold was a rusted brazier hosting a dwindling pile of coals and their pitiful flame. Above it, a modest cauldron hung from an iron spit. An Acorilinian guard crouched over to stir its contents.

  Without warning, just before the fork, Mother yanked on my hood like one might the reins of a disobedient horse. The huge cedar flew into view as I spun towards her. I remember thinking that it must be a lonely tree. Mother did not look at me or say a word, only stared ahead to the Vacant Grave’s dark entrance. I couldn’t make out details of the whispered conversations, but I could see a few people, dressed similarly to those camping along the trail, speaking with the guard. He spoke with them only briefly before examining something the visitors handed to him. After the quick exchange had taken place, the visitors then entered the cleft and vanished down the darkened steps just inside.

  Another pair of camping strangers approached the guard. At first, their conversation unfolded much like the one before, but the volume soon increased. Mumbles became shouts. One of the visiting
pair broke off and sprinted for the mountain.

  “Halt!” the guard shouted, but the vagrant was not interested in listening.

  With a few quick bounds, the man reached the top of the stairs. The guard was prepared, and reacted quickly. He snatched a dagger and threw it, catching the stranger in the neck. The man instinctively grabbed at the mortal wound, by which time the guard had already drawn his sword to threaten the surviving stranger. Shrieking at the sight of her companion’s murder, the woman took a final look at the entryway before staggering back and collapsing onto her rear.

  The guard sheathed his sword, storming over to the mountain entrance. Darkness partially obscured him as he descended a few steps. We watched in silence. He stepped on the dead man’s face, reaching down to jerk his dagger free before shoving the body down the stairs with the tip of his boot. After he returned to his post, he knelt and produced what looked to be a length of rope, which he tossed at the woman now sobbing hysterically in a mound of snow.

  I wanted no part of whatever was before us, and especially what might be down those stairs.

  “Mama,” I whimpered, “please let us go home! Please!”

  My mother, Queen Amala, the symbol of everything I knew as strength and power, finally turned to me as I cried to flee. Her face was unknown to me. It was contorted, crippled by despair. She was not angry with me. She was lost.

  On reflection, I realize I might have come up with some miraculous combination of words to dissuade her from going through what was about to transpire; but then, I only knew to beg, and to be afraid.

  She turned away quickly, but it was too late. My plea had broken her focus. For half a second she had shown me her pain, her hesitation. It petrified me. I tried to tug my arm away.

  She jerked my hand once again and I stumbled as she dragged me nearer. Only the shimmer of moonlight on her wet cheeks gave any indication that she had no desire to take me inside the mountain. Tighter and tighter, her grip constricted around my hand while I wriggled in futile resistance. I did not want this. I did not want to go in. I would risk any level of punishment if I could only get free and run away—but no.

  I squirmed, using my free hand to try and dig out the other, but the clink of the guard’s armor distracted me. I stopped struggling long enough to focus on him. I wanted to hear what he was going to say, or what he was going to ask my mother to present, like I had seen him do with the previous visitors. But we simply walked past. No exchange or pause took place. The guard nodded in recognition and solemn respect. He must have known we were coming, and known not to bring attention to our dark journey.

  Once I realized there would be no discussion between my mother and the guard, I once again pried a finger into her clenched fist—only to have my free hand slapped away.

  “Please, mama!”

  I looked back at the guard. His face was compressed by a sadness that I did not understand at the time. His focus was straight ahead and down as he did everything he could not to look at me. I could not rely on him, or anyone else, for assistance.

  Again, I worked to free my hand, but the time had come. The Vacant Grave's mouth was upon us.

  A gust of air escaped the depths and choked me with an even more concentrated stench than that which I'd smelled along the trail. I vomited again, but soon transitioned to dry heaving. My mother covered her nose with her free arm, and I did the same.

  Her grasp was still too firm. Every sense in my young body, combined with foreboding over the journey and my mother’s silence, was stabbing at my nerves, telling me to kick, fight, scream—anything to get away. Then I lost my footing, and was once again torn from my anger and fear to focus on my feet.

  The passage widened unexpectedly, and the steps became shallower. Lit sconces of varying styles grew frequent and bright. As we walked, we passed a dark stranger tending to the sconces. They wore a dark cloak with a white symbol I didn’t recognize at the time. I know it now as the ancient symbol of the extinct Nurudians.

  With the light and wider steps came landings, appearing at regular intervals, leading off into the darkness of narrow halls filled with what appeared to be catacombs and crypts. These side passages were crowded with shadows, which I recognized as groups of people similar to those I had seen out along the trail, waiting to enter the Vacant Grave. Whether they had come to visit the remains of departed kin known only to them, or to take part in something more nefarious, I could not say, but I found myself terrified by the prospect of encountering others along the stairs and passages.

  That fear eventually dissipated. No one spoke to us. No one looked to us. Their attention was given over to the darkness, and to the dishonored dead. Indeed, the Vacant Grave was not vacant, but filled with those deemed unworthy of remembrance by Acorilan’s judges.

  For some time, grieving moans accompanied our steps as we journeyed deeper into the mountain. Gradually, though, we came across fewer and fewer visitors. The tombs and crypts grew emptier, the piles of human waste less frequent, older, and crustier.

  Deeper we delved. The shadows between the sconces grew, until Mother took one of the last torches off the wall. The light surrounded us, then; but fear, in all its forms and flavors, refused to leave me that night. It would only mutate, and grow. My fear of that which I could see and smell was replaced by terror of the forsaken darkness ahead.

  I wanted to speak. With each step we took, I wanted to say something, but I could not. My mouth, like my heart and like my soul, was stifled from fright. One foot in front of the other was all I could manage. Even that proved a fragile act.

  An updraft swept up from the mountain’s belly and almost snuffed our torch. The flame returned, but my balance was less resilient. I slipped, shrieking “Mama!” as I slid on the cold, wet stone steps, and tumbled painfully down the mountain’s putrid throat.

  The darkness swallowed me as the distance between me and my mother grew. Her flickering flame spun over my vision as I fell, its occasional appearance the only semblance of safety. My scream reverberated and seemed to swell in volume, shooting an itchy, burning wave of horror into my veins.

  I could not fathom what might happen. At that age, I had no real appreciation for death—nor could I conceive of the many things worse than death.

  I tumbled down in a series of bruising thuds before slamming face-first into cold rock. Pain left me weeping. I could not see the floor, but from all that I had seen—and smelled—so far, I knew I had to get my face off the ground. Forcing myself to roll onto my back, I continued to cry as my mother's flame rushed into view.

  “Jularra,” she rasped, brushing hair from my face. She looked me over as if she had dropped an expensive vase rather than her only daughter. “Are you all right?”

  I found myself unable to respond. Her own cheeks streaked with tears, Mother cupped my face and leaned over me.

  “You’re not injured,” she said. “Good.”

  I closed my eyes, my battered body demanding more time to recover. Only when my bruises stopped screaming at me did I begin to get a sense of the new chamber's size.

  The muscles around my ears twitched, sending prickles up the sides of my head in response to the smooth, high-pitched whistles starting to float up and around the chamber. The sounds were delicate. Unnerving. My desire to survive and take stock of what I had fallen into overcame my pain. My eyelids crept open.

  I stared up into a cavity of astonishing scale and design. The towering ceiling was lost in darkness and guarded by a sea of hanging stalactites. Each of the countless spikes was unique, but together they formed an imposing pattern. Scenes of Acorilan—my country’s shadows, its secrets, and its nightmares—were meticulously chipped and cut into every drooping ornament. Tales of ancient knowledge and long-lost practices unfolded across the faces of the many teeth high above; water that had filtered its way through the mountain moistened each of the land’s fears and regrets, and dripped down onto the floor as if the room was salivating.

  Teeth were exactly what the
stalactites resembled to my naive eye, far below. And were it not for the unexpected movement on the ground, I might have been driven mad by the thought of being consumed by the mountain.

  Something shifted, and an unnatural crimson light nearby was disturbed. My eyes panned down from the ceiling. At first, all I could see was an intricately carved face, set deep into a recess in the wall. A black hole in place of its mouth looked big enough to slide a body into. But just as I began to identify additional carvings of what appeared to be depictions of rituals and invocations, a figure began to take shape.

  Nearby, another started to appear in front of its own recess. Two others emerged from the darkness opposite. I stood petrified, waiting for them to launch from their little alcoves and transform into horrifying forms that would tear at my flesh and quench their thirst for my soul.

  But the specters remained. They stood in front of their tombs—before the holes their bodies were placed into, and forgotten, years before. The sounds continued as they turned their gazes on me, and on my mother.

  I did not know why they looked to us. I did not want to know. The haunting sounds that accompanied their arrival plummeted into grotesque bass bellows. As the four fully-realized female apparitions assumed their complete shape, a new, discordant drone poured slowly into the chamber. I closed my eyes and begged one more time.

  “Mama, please.”

  Mother squeezed my hand. As she did, a hissing, sliding tone floated out from amid the drone. Something was near. Something old.

  Once again, survival became curiosity. I had to see.

  I registered only the flame of my mother’s torch before catching sight of something else behind her. My pain fled as I clamored for my mother and clawed up against her chest in fright. She wrapped her arm around me. It was then that I felt her trembling, and upon feeling her fear, I wet myself.