They called themselves the Silverknights. What began as a ragtag group of anarchists in Nuhav became a fledgling threat and then a stalwart revolution against their vampiric overlords.
The Silverknights, as imagined by their name, had managed to craft weapons of silver after sneaking the ore out of the mines for years. The powder keg finally exploded on afateful day when three high-ranking Olhavian officials were assassinated by the weapons.
Discovering the weakness of the vampires opened the floodgates for more death and destruction. Over the following decade, the Silverknights of Nuhav became as notorious as the Five Ministries of Olhav. And almost as powerful.
What signaled a new beginning in Olhav, however, was not the transient violence and intermittent Silverknight attacks.
It was a relationship formed in the shadows.
The man’s name was Heskel Angul. A handsome man, by all accounts, Heskel was a Silverknight of middling rank who rose to that of a captain. Never a general or leader in his own right, Alacine Mortis nonetheless found opportunity and the strangest, most bewildering thing of all in this man . . . affection.
Their tryst began in secret, as these things usually do. Ever ambitious, Noblewife Alacine had become bored with her master, Kavorin. There are no records of how Alacine and Heskel met, which comes as no surprise to this historian. Whatcanbe said, from firsthand accounts, is the hot-blooded seduction between the Silverknight and the powerful vampiress was earnest and true.
For the first time since she had been a human, Alacine found an ambitious, like-minded spirit in Heskel Angul. The fact they came from enemy factions was irrelevant—alsoas these things usually go.
Things came to a head ten years into their clandestine relationship, when Alacine became pregnant with Heskel’s child. In an attempt to provide an alibi, Alacine claimed Kavorin as the father once her belly began to swell.
It was possible, of course, since Alacine still performed her wifely duties with her husband. Spymaster Kavorin, however, had built a harem of young women and men of his own, andwas often seen cavorting with said harem. This humiliation irked Alacine greatly. It may have even led to Alacine straying and landing in Heskel’s arms.
Since she and her son had been turned by Kavorin Mortis, Alacine could not simply kill her nobleblood husband and be done with it, due to his bloodbond over her. So she turned to more secretive affairs to grow her web.
Whatever the inner politics of hers and Heskel’s relationship, once Alacine’s child was born, it became clear the half-blood whelp was not Kavorin’s child.
This, some sixty years ago, expedited the intensity of Alacine Mortis’ relationships. She told Kavorin his son had died in childbirth. She was forced to hide the dhampir whelp away, secreting him to where no one could find him: Nuhav. Heskel Angul even took in the child for a time, despite the pale skin.
As this was happening, Alacine’s fullblood son—murderer of his human father fifty years prior—found his own thralls and acquaintances to fill his time. He distanced himself from his mother while she gallivanted discreetly with her Silverknight mate.
It should be said, and should come as no surprise to the reader of this history, that this half-blood child between human Heskel Angul and vampiress Alacine Mortis was given a name in the dialect of his Silverknight father—an act of resistance in its own right.
Alacine named her son Lukain.
Chapter 26
Sephania
“In order to tell you what I know about your Loreblood, Sephania, I suppose we should start at the beginning,” Jinneth says.
When she releases my hand, I sit up and lean forward, rapt with attention. Anxiety runs through me, hoping I might finally discover somethingusefulabout my past, from the one person who holds the answers.
My mother gives me a soft smile, filled with sadness. “I am just happy to be alive to tell you these things. Confined to those dark, horrid prison cells, I thought the day would never come.” Her eyes shine when she glances across the rickety table at me. “I have you to thank for it.”
A lump forms in my throat. Suddenly my mother looks much older than her forty-something years, frown lines showing from a wisp of sunlight coming in through a window behind me. Her dark hair is lighter than I realized, with the sunlight peppering it with gray strands.
“Since I am as you see me”—she motions to her curvy body—“an ordinary human woman of middling years, I assume you have questioned your patrilineal descent. For you to have such unique blood in your veins, surely your father must be a unique, special man, no?”
I nod diligently, like a student at a tutor’s desk. Hope soars in my breast, lifting my heart to my throat.
“Then I am sorry to say, dear, you’ll be disappointed.”
My face sinks. “Buthow—”
She lifts a hand to cut me off, and it works. Jinneth sits back in her seat, threading her hands on her lap in a relaxed pose. “Your father’s name was Lenaro.”
Was. Past tense.
“He was . . .” My mother twirls her hand in the air, looking for the words. The wince on her face betrays how little she thinks of my father before even speaking about him. “. . . a piece of shit, really.”
I inhale sharply. “Mother!”
