Excerpt · Guardian of Khaver
The sound of hurried footsteps from one of the corners pulled him out of his trance. Forel took his hands from the fountain and rose in a single movement, his fingers already closing on the hilt before his conscious mind had made any decision.
From the north corner of the square emerged a hunched figure, wrapped in a tattered gray cloak, who stopped dead on seeing him. He was an old man; his white hair, tousled by the cold wind, fell over a face furrowed with exhaustion. On the chest of his tunic he bore the seal of Khaver, as dull and lifeless as Forel's should have been.
The man fixed his eyes on the bluish glow coming from Forel's chest. Then, slowly, with trembling hands open toward the leaden sky, he fell to his knees on the bloodstained cobblestones.
“There he is,” said a voice in the distance.
The old man looked at Forel with terror in his eyes, begging for his life, but before he could do anything, a sword appeared out of nowhere and cut his throat in a single stroke.
There was no time to react: the man collapsed forward and the cobblestones received his fall with a wet thud.
The seal on his chest pulsed with a more intense bluish light, almost violent, as if Khaver himself were denouncing the crime. Forel clenched his jaw beneath his helmet until his teeth hurt. That man, beheaded without mercy, was the master of Khaver's training ground. His master. And now he lay dead on the cobblestones, his blood still steaming in the cold of the morning.
When he looked up, three figures in black armor with the Eye of Marel engraved on their shoulders were already closing the perimeter of the square, their steps synchronized with the precision of those who have done this before. The one holding the bloodied sword pointed at him unhurriedly, as if he were the last item on a list.
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The story continues in the
starter pack of The Chosen of Khaver
