CHAPTER 1
England, 1189
Something was wrong.Gareth de Clare felt it in his bones—that prickle at the back of his neck, the way the night birds had gone silent, the unnatural stillness that meant death was stalking someone through these woods.
Tonight, it was stalking him.
“Hold.” He raised a fist, his men bringing their horses to a halt. The road through Blackwood Forest was treacherous in daylight. At night, with only a sliver of moon to guide them, it was madness. But Lord Alaric’s message had been urgent.
Come at once. A matter of grave importance.
Gareth had ridden out without question. Twelve years he’d served Alaric de Montrevain—since he was a boy of seven, fostered at Dunharrow Keep. Alaric had trained him, shaped him, made him into the warrior he was today. When Alaric summoned, Gareth answered. Even when the summons came in the dead of night. Even when it led through a forest that suddenly felt like a grave.
“My lord?” Sir Bran, his second, moved his horse alongside. “What is it?”
“I don’t know.” Gareth loosened his sword in its scabbard. The familiar weight of the blade was a comfort. “But I don’t like it.”
“Could be bandits.”
“Mayhap.” He didn’t believe it. Bandits avoided this road—Gareth had made sure of it. Three months of hunting them down had cleared the forest for honest travelers. The common folk had started calling him a hero for it. The king himself had taken notice.
The king.
Gareth’s jaw tightened. Six months ago, before going on crusade, Richard had granted him Greywatch Castle—along with title, lands, and enough gold to make a minor lord weep. A reward for saving the king’s cousin during a skirmish with Scottish raiders. Gareth had simply done his duty, but Richard was generous to those who served him well.
Alaric had smiled when he heard the news. Had clasped Gareth’s hand and called him son. Had said he was proud. But something in his eyes had flickered. Something cold. Something that looked almost like hate. Surely was a mere trick of the light, nothing more. And so, Gareth pushed the thought away. Alaric was his lord. His mentor. The closest thing to a father he’d ever known. Whatever darkness Gareth imagined, it was just his own guilt. His own fear of surpassing the man who’d made him.
“There.” Sir Bran pointed to a clearing ahead. “Torchlight.”
Too bright. Too exposed. Every instinct Gareth possessed screamed ’twas a trap.
“Wait here,” he said. “If I don’t return in?—”
The arrow took Bran through the throat.
The night exploded. Men poured from the trees—a dozen, two dozen, more. They wore no colors, carried no banners. Just swords and murder in their eyes.
Gareth drew his blade and buried it in the first man’s chest before his horse stopped moving. The second came from his left as he caught the blow on his shield and opened the man from hip to shoulder. A third. A fourth. He moved without thinking, his body doing what it had been trained to do since childhood.
“To me!” he roared. “Rally to me!”
But his men were falling. Sir Bran lay still in the mud. Young Thomas—barely eighteen—screamed as a blade found his belly. One by one, the six men who’d followed Gareth without question died in the darkness of Blackwood Forest.
Gareth killed seven men. Then eight. Then nine. His arm burned. Blood ran down his face from a cut he didn’t remember taking. Still they came.
And then he heard it.
“Make it slow.” The voice drifted from the shadows beyond the torchlight. Cultured. Cold. Familiar. “I want him to know who sent him to hell.”
Gareth went rigid.
No.
Lord Alaric de Montrevain stepped into the clearing. He was dressed for riding, not battle—fine wool and supple leather, not a speck of mud on his boots. He looked at Gareth the way a man might look at a dog who’d bitten its master.
“Alaric.” The name came out broken. “Why?”
“Why?” Alaric laughed, but there was no warmth in it. “You have to ask? I spent fifteen years positioning myself to be awarded Greywatch. Fifteen years of marriages, bribes, patient, careful work. And then you—” He spat the word. “My own creature, my own creation, swept in and took it from me.”
