Dark Empathy Read online

  The Heartstone Saga

  Book 4: Dark Empathy

  By

  Archibald Bradford

  Copyright © 2019

  Cover Art by Erik Von Lehmann

  http://erikvonlehmann.deviantart.com/

  Introduction

  Dark Empathy is the fourth book in a series that tells the tale of Nameless as he enters a new chapter in his life: Aegis training. But he has much to learn, and the world isn’t waiting for him to finish…

  WARNING: This is a work of erotic fantasy, there is nudity, some swearing, a fair bit of violence, and plenty of naughty sex between man (and woman) and monster girl/girls. If that isn’t your cup of tea please give this book a pass!

  Otherwise please enjoy!

  For Rob, because cancer ain’t shit.

  Prologue:

  Fateful Recollections

  A natural sprinter, Malcolm Contrail’s breathing was steady as he ran through the woods. His pace was measured, if a bit reckless, but so far the only ill that had befallen him was a cut on his cheek from a wayward branch.

  How he felt, what he felt, at having betrayed everyone he claimed to love was hidden away behind a mask of intense focus.

  He could hear her wing-beats behind him, hear her closing. No matter how fast he could run, or for how long, he knew that she could fly faster.

  And even with his natural fortitude he was running out of steam.

  With a desperate surge of energy he dove into a roll over the crest of a hill and down the other side.

  Behind him he heard her curse as she had to pull up short to avoid hitting a tree.

  Her irritation was to be expected: when she first started chasing him she thought it was a game, but that was almost an hour ago, and still he fled.

  Evadne the Chimera’s wings folded close to her back as she landed in the woods.

  “Why are you running from me?! Please! I don’t understand, I just want to talk!” She called towards the drop he had gone over.

  With jet black hair and skin fair as winter’s first snow, she was a beauty to behold, no doubt capable of wrapping any man around her finger.

  But with broad shoulders and strong features to compliment his easy nature and warm laugh, Malcolm was the one that had seduced her.

  Five years ago, he came into her village with a group of refugees seeking the protection of the powerful Chimera tribe from the horrors of the never ending conflict between the Divine Republic and the monster girls they sought to enslave.

  He worked hard to earn his keep, and worked even harder to win her heart, eventually succeeding in finding a place amongst the exceedingly rare Chimera.

  But even though Evadne had given him her heartstone several years prior, the bond had yet to form between them.

  So instead they lived together as an unbonded couple in her mother’s cave, along with their two children.

  Unable to run any further, he kept himself out of sight behind one of the young trees, panting as he fought to catch his breath.

  “I’m sorry Evie, but it’s over. All of it. You have to let me go.”

  She crossed her arms over her breasts, looking vulnerable as she tucked her claws away and hugged herself.

  His words stung, but they made no sense.

  “Let you- You have my heartstone you jackass! Where you go, I go!” She shifted her weight onto one leg and placed her hand on her hip; “Is this because of my mother? You know she just wants to be close to her grandchildren! When the children are flying on their own we can find our own den.”

  Leaning one way and then the other she peered through the trees in a bid to catch sight of him.

  Malcolm’s eyes closed and his hand formed a fist around her heartstone pendant, with a painful tug he removed it from his neck.

  He had to take a deep breath before he was able to stand and step out to face her.

  “It’s too late. It’s too late to stop what’s coming.”

  Her heart leapt at his familiar features, but then she saw what he was wearing.

  Saw the uniform all Divine Republic soldiers wore.

  Anger, confusion and grief all raged inside her at the impossible sight, but rising above it all was fear, fear for her family.

  With a powerful flap of her wings she closed the distance and slammed him into a tree, the air leaving his lungs in a painful gasp.

  “What is coming?! What did you do?”

  His words came back to her in a wheeze as he struggled for air.

  “I d-did what I had to do, what I was trained to do, born to do. I got close to you.”

  Again she slammed him into the tree, tears now streaming down her face.

  “But, what about Kaylen and Petra? What about our babies?!”

  He coughed and a morose look stole over his features for a moment, his fist opening as he looked to her heart in his palm.

  “That wasn’t supposed to happen. It made it… difficult to report on what the Chimera were doing.”

  Her eyes widened and her blood ran cold as ice.

  “Wh-who, who did you tell?”

  “You know who.” He said quietly, neck straight now.

  “But we stopped!” She pled desperately; “We aren’t using it! I convinced them to listen to the Witches and the Valkyrie! Together we stopped it, just like you wanted!”

  His eyes narrowed into a glare, his head shaking slowly as his jaw tightened.

  “For now. You stopped it for now. I couldn’t take the chance. If your people harnessed entropic magic it could change the course of the war.”

  She balked, not at his high minded thinking, but at his phrasing.

  “Your people? I thought you were with us!”

  “I’m not.” He responded quickly and firmly; “I am loyal to the emperor and his senate, just like the uniform I’m wearing says. You and I are enemies, Evadne.”

  Her mouth worked as her grip on his shirt loosened, too shocked to know what to say or do next.

  But the memory of her children tugged at her and she let loose a snarling hiss of frustration as she snatched the pendant containing her stone from his limp hand and turned away from him.

  “You’re too late! Don’t go back! You can’t save them!”

  His words nearly proved fatal.

  While she stretched out her bat-like wings to take flight, the thick snake that was her tail lashed out at him, its fangs stopping just shy of sinking into his jugular.

  Her message was clear: there was nothing that would keep her from her children.

  But even as she took to the sky a deep gong-like boom sounded in the earth, startled birds similarly taking to the air all around as a shockwave caused the trees they were nesting in to vibrate and sway perilously.

  Eyes widening in horror, she looked upon a strange swirling plume of dark smoke rising in the distance.

  He was right: she was too late to stop what came next.

  Chapter 1:

  Awakening

  Adrian Shaw woke with a start, his eyes rolling as the violent ghost of his nightmare still haunted him.

  “You talk in your sleep.” A woman’s throaty voice interrupted the chaos of his thoughts.

  He swallowed a couple times to try to moisten his dry throat as he slowly became aware that he was safe; warm and cozy in Olena the Witch’s odd home in the woods.

  She lived inside a truly massive cedar, the bark seeming to have simply parted and opened up for her as the flesh of the tree formed a large semi-circular room which she had then filled with a bed and several tables, all arranged around a central divot where a fire cheerily burned.

  Strewn across the surface of the tables were countless mysterious bottles and vials, containing everything from sprigs of evergreen to the husk of a dead serpent. Nu
merous other containers hung from lengths of twine suspended from the bark of the dome-like ceiling alongside drying herbs, mushrooms and various animal bones.

  At least, he hoped they were animal bones; he made a point of not studying the larger ones too closely.

  With a grimace of pain he sat up, gripping his wounded arm as the tight skin around the injury strained with the movement.

  “H-how long have I been out?” He rasped as he looked to the Witch.

  She was standing near the fire in the middle of the circular room with her back to him, reaching above her head to tie a free length of twine around the neck of an opaque yellow bottle.

  “A day and a half, this time. Five total. Your fever broke during the night.” She finished the last knot and turned to face him; “You’re lucky, the infection alone nearly killed you.”

  He blinked in surprise, not from the news of his condition, but because she was topless, her shapely breasts swaying with her movements.

  Her head tilted to one side as he averted his eyes.

  “Ah yes. Humans and their modesty.”

  She carelessly draped a shawl over her shoulders to cover her chest before bringing him a large bowl of steaming water, along with soap and a wash cloth.

  “You smell. I kept your wounds clean so you wouldn’t die, but I am not a bed nurse. I will return.”

  She dropped a couple more pieces of deadfall into the fire-pit sunk into the packed earthen floor before stepping towards the opening in the roots of the massive tree.

  “Wait! The people that attacked me, we have to warn-”

  “They are dead.”

  He shook his head.

  “No, there were more. Upriver, um, to the southeast?”

  She smiled slightly.

  “Close. The river flows from the northwest.” She crossed her arms; “How many?”

  He swallowed, still trying to get past the rasp in his throat, but the memory of his bond-mate dying in front of him suddenly overtook him and he gasped. One hand gripped his stomach at the pain of her loss, and he shed a few tears as the Witch watched him with an indecipherable expression.

  After a moment she sighed.

  “I see. You did smell of mushroom blood. You were bonded to a Truffle?”

  Wordlessly he nodded.

  The fungal girls had a number of useful abilities that made them ideal for working with the ordinance disposal teams in the Aegis. They could hold as perfectly still as a Gnome, and move with such deliberate slowness that even the most unstable of explosives would be undisturbed.

  They were also able to emit a cloud of spores that would knock out any human that inhaled it, but they mainly used it to gum up the workings of dangerous lost-tech machinery with fungal growth so that their human partners could safely dismantle them.

  The Witch shifted her weight to one leg and pointed towards the door.

  “And the ones who killed her are still out there?”

  Her tone wasn’t unkind, simply matter of fact, he didn’t notice though as he remembered the day they were ambushed.

  For a moment it was like he was there again, his heart pounding in his chest as his friends died all around him, as Cheri died right in front of him.

  Finally he nodded as he rubbed at his eyes.

  “There were dozens of them. Armed to the teeth.”

  She pursed her lips.

  “That is unfortunate, now I really need to leave.”

  He glared at her.

  “What, that’s it? Do you even care?” His words were bitter and angry.

  “Yes, but there is a blizzard coming. And before it arrives I must go and inform the Saenga that there was a small army trespassing across their lands. I should have done so days ago, but if I had you would have died.”

  “Oh.” He shifted uncomfortably; “Sorry.”

  She tilted her head as she considered his words, her inscrutable features unsettling him before she finally spoke again.

  “Your apology is unneeded. You are Aegis, and the Witches have not forgotten why you exist.”

  With that she slipped out between the roots, leaving him blushing slightly at the slight rebuke behind her words.

  As he looked to the cleaning supplies he noticed that she had also left some bread and broth for him by the bed. He held the bowl with shaky hands as he gulped it down, his stomach was pinched and knotted from hunger and he felt dizzy from the effort of sitting up, but the warm liquid eased his hunger pangs until the bread eliminated them.

  Once he thought his meal had settled he tried to stand but his wounded leg screamed at him to sit back down and a wave of nausea overtook him.

  Helplessly he slumped back into bed, the thought of bathing appealed to him greatly but he had no energy to do it. His eyes were scratchy and his head hurt from oversleeping but in his weakened state he was unable to keep himself from slipping back into a doze...

  It was as if he blinked and the light level in the hollow tree decreased, a few hours having gone by in dreamless slumber.

  And he was no longer alone: a towering blonde woman with rich blue eyes hovered over him. She was clad in a simple hide skirt and top, the ubiquitous outfit making what she was instantly recognizable.

  He couldn’t help but feel a sense of security as the palpable strength of the Amazon filled the tree.

  “You are Adrian?” She asked gently as her eyes flicked over the name stitched onto his dirty uniform folded next to the bed.

  Only in that moment did he realize that he was stark naked under the blanket.

  Her face was close enough that the sweet warmth of her breath washed over his cheek.

  “Yes, I-”

  He struggled to sit up, surprised when she helped him, but she held her hands on his shoulders to keep him from trying to stand.

  “Stay, Olena-Elda has told me of your ordeal. I am Alcaia, warleader of the Saenga and I am so very sorry.”

  He swallowed the lump in his throat as his eyes burned, but he didn’t want to get distracted.

  “The... the bastards that killed my team, did you find them?”

  A single tear traced down her cheek and her head turned away momentarily.

  “We did worse. We held a feast in their honour.”

  His shock was plain so she hurried to explain.

  “Four days ago one of our hunting parties came upon them, they were dressed in Aegis uniforms.” Her jaw clenched; “We were expecting your arrival and they deceived us. We fed them, we bathed them, and I sent some of my warriors to guide them to the great Sansee.”

  The muscles in her jaw didn’t relax, if anything her teeth came together tighter as she finished.

  “We found their bodies mere hours ago, on the edge of our territory. The cowards killed them with cursed lost-tech.”

  Her hands were still on his shoulders and he felt the strength of her grip, her anger apparent.

  “Forgive me Adrian, but the Saenga have failed you. We are searching now for... the remains of your people. But I fear we may not find them before the snow falls.”

  His throat squeezed tight at the thought of seeing Cheri again.

  She sat down on the bed beside him, and he was somewhat embarrassed when she reached into the forgotten bowl of soapy water, now cool, and began to wash his naked side.

  “We have to catch up to them, we have to-”

  “At this point we will be unable to catch them before they reach the grasslands. That, and I’m afraid of how many of us would return if we did. It is best to battle against lost-tech when we have the cover of the woods on our side, the land to the east is simply too open, they would see us coming for miles.”

  Adrian wiped the tears off his face and gave a grudging nod, unable to fault her logic.

  “They are way too well armed and well informed to be some band of crooks, these people are professionals.”

  “Yes, but they are still humans. They will fall for what they have done. Perhaps not tomorrow, and maybe not even for some time to come, bu
t they will face our vengeance. On the life of my daughter, I swear it.” She finished with his side and wrung the cloth out; “Turn.”

  The water was cold and his clean skin prickled with goose-bumps, though he barely noticed the chill as he flushed at his own helplessness, feeling like a child being bathed by his mother.

  “I c-can’t, my leg.”

  “Of course. My apologies. You deserve far better than cold water from a bowl anyways. Hila?” She called softly towards the entrance, past where Olena stood watching them.

  A moment later another Amazon ducked into the tree from outside.

  “Warleader?”

  “Prepare a litter. We must get him to the village before the storm hits. Olena-Elda, thank you for bringing this to my attention.”

  “Wait, I can-” Adrian began weakly but the other Amazon was already outside again.

  Meanwhile the Witch addressed the warleader.

  “Alcaia, you are stubborn. Ask for my help.”

  The mighty Amazon shook her head with resolve.

  “No, we failed in our pledge to Aegis Holt to safeguard her people, we must make this right ourselves.”

  The dark-haired woman sighed, showing some slight frustration.

  “How many more warriors are you willing to lose?”

  At the Witch’s words Alcaia looked ready to chew iron but Adrian spoke over her.

  “If she won’t ask then I will!”

  The startled monster girls looked to the wounded man, in his annoyance he had managed to get to his feet, though he was more than a little unsteady while struggling to keep the blanket around his waist.

  He looked between the two women.

  “These men are wielding lost-tech weapons, in direct violation of Aegis law! As the only member of the Aegis present, I am hereby invoking the charter.”

  Alcaia blinked.

  The Aegis charter, as agreed to by pretty much every monster girl tribe, stated that whenever someone violated its tenants, the Aegis would be the ultimate authority for dealing with them. Essentially it allowed for them to step in and take command of any organized group of monster girls involved in a given incident.