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This tome was my life’s work and my lifeblood all in one. My greatest achievement and most effective weapon. And this tome had brought the downfall of my entire country on the heels of a greedy prince who wanted it for himself. He thought killing my family would break me enough to give it up. Ettion Werren paid for that with the existence of his country as he knew it. Now it seemed history had come full circle, with his distant relative trying to kill me in a dingy alley in Gilamorst. This time, I would make sure to eradicate the entire fucking bloodline.

I laid my hand across my body’s chest and bowed my head to the tome, focusing all my energy to flow through the tome and out of my hand as a closed system, amplified by the blood and innate magic held in the pages.

“P’talin ge fulroth mes Wira het mislama. Tul inirish h’nem il verek ga Genma, ed retaniek gil turon gal metcha’tak. Halen tiv culramat val Morrette Wirannev Hilj, et manesh yil vinam’ashekt.”

May Wira hold my soul in her hands. May she find me worthy to enter Genma, when my work in this world is done. In life and death, I am Morrette Wirannev Hilj, and no man can take that from me.

The incantation was short, but its effects were immediate. Two voids formed on my chest, in this body and the body beneath my right hand, the skin giving way to allow my fingers to pass through. Instead, I reached into the hole in this chest until my fingertips brushed something cold and thrumming. Blood smeared across my palms acted as an oil of sorts to let my hand slip through the space easier. My soul numbed my fingertips with its energy as I wrapped them tightly around it, and slowly began to extract it from this borrowed body.

As soon as it cleared my chest, I could feel the chill of death creep in. There wasn't much time to transfer my soul before this body failed me.

My tome thudded heavily on the floor, too heavy to hold now. I stumbled against the coffin and leaned against it for support to gently lower my hand to the void in my chest. It pulsed with an unnatural light and crackled with indigo energy that arched out and danced across the skin of my original body as if trying to escape. My hand sunk to the wrist, holding onto the beating core of my soul until it settled in place. It was home.

Iwas home.

The edges of my visions faded to black. My knees buckled, arms slipping from the edge of the coffin, and the dead weight of this body pulled its hand from my chest as it fell to the floor. And with that loss of connection, the old body returned to its state of a lifeless, soulless corpse once again.

Air wheezed through my throat and my eyes snapped open, my lungs burning and starved for air not given in a hundred years. It was like breathing in dust and sent me gracelessly hacking as I weakly pulled myself up with the lip of the stone coffin. The Julran fangs shifted and fell off the top of my body, sliding into the space between my hip and the edge of the small space. No matter how many times I did this—even when coming back to my own body—it was a disorienting experience, basically ripping my soul out of its old carrier and setting it in a new one, like a gem in a jewelry mount. A low groan left my chest, and I closed my eyes against the violent swirling and harsh colors bombarding my eyes in their adjustment. I had to rest my head on my arm draped over the lip of the coffin and just let myself settle in this body again.

Finally—when it didn’t feel like my head was going to burst from pressure or have my chest collapse from lack of air—I lifted my head and pulled myself further out of the coffin. Heavy blackhair trailed along behind me, even when I swung my feet over and half-rolled out. An odd side effect of my possession, so be sure, and not one I was expecting to deal with right out of the crypt. I had gone to rest with a practical shoulder-length cut, just long enough to tie back in a fight yet short enough to push out of my face and call it styled. Now it pooled in the bottom of the coffin a good length and a half of my body, and I was by no means a short person.

“How inconvenient.” The sound of my voice was grating and dry from disuse. “How is it I still have to deal with haircuts after escaping death for a hundred years?”

I reached back inside and pulled one of the pair of swords out, and gripped the bulk of my hair to drape over one shoulder and pull tight. The sword had dulled with a hundred years of disuse, making sawing through the chunk of hair troublesome and leading to a choppy and uneven cut. I would cut it shorter, but with how jerky and stilted my movements were, I was just as likely to stab myself in the throat as cut my hair.

At this point, looks were the least of my worries.

On shaky legs, I bent low and ripped a strip of cloth from the man’s shirt. It was a trick I’d learned on the battlefield—winding a cloth tightly enough to create a makeshift twine, sturdy enough to bind a wound or tie back unruly hair when needed. Clumsy fingers made it more of a process than it had to be, but eventually I was able to knot the fabric tight enough to hold the thick black hair back.

My eyes fell to the dull blade held in my shaking hand. It would be more practical to just take the man’s short sword to fight with… but I’d be damned if I left my beloved fangs here to rot any longer. The metal was still good, likely affected with close proximity to the magic that preserved my body. It was just the edges that needed sharpening.

“This is going to be a bitch to do,” I muttered to myself and reached in for the other sword to its mate. Then with a groan, I bent down to grip my tome by the thick spine. Even that weight made my muscles burn with the strain. “Here’s to not slicing off a finger in the body I just returned to.”

From above, another shudder rocked through the Clifftombs signaling another assault to the walls. I leaned back against the coffin and let my head fall back, already feeling the drain of performing so many gods-damned miracles today. "Gods help me," I whispered, hoping that one of them would hear me and take pity. Then, with another heavy sigh, I pushed myself up and stumbled toward the steps up to the main level.

I had to ready myself for one last war.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Irin

It has been 30 years since the fall of Julra, and still I find myself no closer to learning everything I wanted to know

about the mysterious country. For all the tragic accounts I have heard, I cannot regret that the death of a country

brought me Sinna Val Toric, now Sinna Wend, and my beautiful daughter Janna. My wish is for this book to one day

help rebuild this wonderful culture. For now, I consider this book complete, until further information comes forth

regarding Julra and its people.

-"The Tragic History of Julra," by High Scholar Yuret Wend, Year 69 of Ber's First Reign

There were no amount of private sword lessons, no amount of magic tutoring, no kind of experience that I could ever garner in my short life that could have prepared me for the sight that lay before us. The hill our troops crested gave us an excellent view of the absolute carnage taking place in the valley below. From my back, the rattling of armor and gasps of shock were interspersed with retching from the front row of the cavalry. These were seasoned men, trained and raised by the sword and hardly strangers to battle.

But this sight… it was like hell had broken open and spat out its prisoners.

Most of the corpses still had Julran colors, stained pieces of dark blue gambesons barely clinging to their bones through the missing pieces of tarnished armor. Some I could even see the blows that had killed them, from dents in helmets and jagged holes pierced through, along with several missing limbs. Others didn’t even have their heads, but still swung their halberds and scythes with shocking accuracy. Arrows flew from the walls of the looming castle across the valley, easily picking off the Hollows tribesmen as the undead archers kept a heavy barrage from atop the Clifftombs' walls. It didn’t matter where the arrows landed, really. The reanimated army didn’t even react to friendly fire.