A Cloak of Red Read online

  Contents

  Copyright

  The Books of Underrealm

  Dedication

  Map

  Get More

  A Cloak of Red PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  Keep Reading

  Acknowledgements

  Connect Online

  The Books of Underrealm

  About the Author

  EPILOGUE

  A CLOAK OF RED

  Brenna Gawain

  Copyright © 2020 by Legacy Books. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events or locales is purely coincidental. Reproduction in whole or part of this publication without express written consent is strictly prohibited.

  Please leave a review for this book wherever you purchased it. Reviews are one of the most powerful ways readers can help their favorite authors. But on average, only 1% of readers will review a book they’ve read. Your review would mean the world to the author.

  THE BOOKS OF UNDERREALM

  To see all novels in the world of Underrealm, visit:

  Underrealm.net/books

  THE NIGHTBLADE EPIC

  NIGHTBLADE

  MYSTIC

  DARKFIRE

  SHADEBORN

  WEREMAGE

  YERRIN

  THE ACADEMY JOURNALS

  THE ALCHEMIST’S TOUCH

  THE MINDMAGE’S WRATH

  THE FIREMAGE’S VENGEANCE

  TALES OF THE WANDERER

  BLOOD LUST

  STONE HEART

  HELL SKIN

  THE TENTH KINGDOM

  A CLOAK OF RED

  CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

  NIGHTBLADE

  MYSTIC

  DARKFIRE

  SHADEBORN

  BLOOD LUST

  THE ALCHEMIST’S TOUCH

  THE MINDMAGE’S WRATH

  WEREMAGE

  STONE HEART

  THE FIREMAGE’S VENGEANCE

  HELL SKIN

  YERRIN

  A CLOAK OF RED

  THE CHRONICLES OF UNDERREALM

  SHORT STORIES YOU WON’T FIND ANYWHERE ELSE

  TAVERN CROSSINGS

  THE NIGHT OF TWO KINGS

  A NIGHT ON THE SEAT

  THE MAN AND THE SATYR

  THE BEAST WITHIN

  CHASING MOONSLIGHT

  BLOOD ON THE SNOW

  THE HAMMER OF THE KING

  THE TIDES OF WAR

  THE LEGEND OF CABRUS

  THE SUNMANE PASS

  To my cousin Dean, who gave me my first ever fantasy book to read

  To all the cats who sat on me while I honed my craft

  To the family and friends that are the reason I’m here today

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  The magestones glittered under the torchlight like twinkling stars in the night sky, but Armod of the family Kallis found them ultimately unsatisfying, and not worthy of their reputation. He had been expecting something more. Something magical, mayhap, like colors for which no one had a name, or an unnatural chill against the balmy summer air. Instead, he saw only a long, thin sliver of what looked like rutilated glass. He picked one up, examining it curiously between his be-ringed fingers, and then tossed it into the air, unimpressed.

  “Are you sure these are genuine?”

  It was late at night upon the High King’s Seat, so late as to be nearly blending into early morning—the perfect time for such business affairs, since anyone awake would be too weary to be suspicious. Many merchants conducted less-than-honest dealings at an hour such as this, particularly around this time of year, when even the nighttime was swelteringly hot. Not many were undertaking deals quite so unscrupulous as he, however.

  Armod was no stranger to this underhanded kind of practice. A lifetime of handling his family’s affairs on the High King’s Seat under the noses of some of the most diligent constables in the nine lands had honed his sense for trouble to a knife’s edge. This plain wooden chest full of stones did not seem nearly remarkable enough to be worth such a fuss, and he would be a horse’s ass before he would let these Yerrins cheat him. If they expected him to be cowed by the strength of their family’s reputation, then they would be disappointed.

  He heard the creaking of leather behind him as his guard-captain, Norrik, shifted slightly, no doubt set on edge by the suspicious undertone in his question. Armod made no move to tell the guard-captain to subside, but left his gaze fixed upon the seller of the forbidden wares, a tall, black-skinned man in customary Yerrin green. The merchant drew in a sharp breath, also noticing Norrik’s movement, and Armod was gratified enough by the concern in the Yerrin man’s eyes to smile thinly.

  It was long since Armod had paid a visit to his family’s homeland of Dulmun, as he could not abide the abysmal climate, but lately having a bodyguard who hailed from the region had been a real boon to Armod’s business. Norrik was already as tall as a bear and as broad as an ox, but it was his distinctly Dulmish lamellar armor that drew the most nervous glances here in the south.

  “You need only wave one before the nose of a wizard, and you will know it as genuine,” the Yerrin replied, coolly, though his eyes still darted between the two men. “But that would rather give the game away, would it not?”

  “Do not take offense, my friend,” Armod cajoled him, setting the chest of magestones down and strolling casually over to the edge of the balcony. “I work in the trade of jewels and pearls, and every other deal contains at least one counterfeit. But the family Kallis prides itself on … honest business.”

  “As does the family Yerrin,” the man countered, but he bowed. “A guarantee, then. We will honor a reversal of the trade freely, if you should decide you have been cheated. But I think that neither you nor your illustrious relatives will be disappointed.”

  Satisfied more by the capitulation than the guarantee itself, Armod waved magnanimously towards the lockboxes full of gold weights and black pearls that he had prepared as payment. One of the merchant’s clerks began examining the contents of each of them thoroughly, while Armod turned his attention to the view of the Seat below. They were in the rooftop garden of the Kallis family’s manor, surrounded by the waving boughs of flowering trees and marble pillars all entwined with leafy vines, and he drank in the comfort and familiarity of the setting, knowing that he would soon have to travel and leave it all behind.

  The clerk finished her inspection of Armod’s goods and nodded quickly
to the merchant, who in turn inclined his head politely in Armod’s direction and began making preparations to leave. Several manservants staidly collected the stacked lockboxes, and soon the Yerrins were gone into the night, as quietly as they had arrived. Sighing, Armod turned away from his perch overlooking the city and wandered over towards the pavilion, where his castellan waited for him along with his current dalliance.

  She was plump and pretty, and made a fine model for his jewelry whenever his customers wished to see what his goods would look like when worn, but their relationship was strictly casual. She was not privy to much of the Kallis family’s shadier business, and Armod certainly did not intend to tell her about this current act of high treason. His castellan, Hargrim, had no doubt told her that the Yerrin family were here selling fabrics (or some other such lie) while she waited for Armod to finish with the deal.

  “I fear you may as well return to your apartments, Onila,” he told her, in not entirely feigned disappointment. “I will likely be preoccupied with planning for our journey for the rest of the night.”

  She sighed wistfully, and then kissed him on the cheek, smelling of sea salt and cedar. “Very well … but be sure to make time for me before you leave!”

  He promised her that he would, and then, once she was gone, signaled for Norrik to hand the small chest full of treasures over to Hargrim, who had the most experience with this particular commodity.

  “Excellent,” the castellan said, his dark blue eyes glinting fiercely as he inspected the stones. “This is slightly more than I expected for the price.”

  “Tell me again: how did you come to know so much about these stones?” Armod asked him, dropping heavily onto a nearby bench. “You are no mage, unless you have hidden it quite well.”

  Hargrim shrugged, closing the chest with a snap. “I did not always work for the esteemed family Kallis, sir. Before your mother’s time, I once dealt briefly with those among the Mystic order who trade in information about such things. The Yerrins would wish you to believe that it is they alone who facilitate the transport of their stones across the nine kingdoms, but truly, without a sympathetic redcloak, they would get nowhere. An old friend of mine in the Mystics spoke to me often about the stones, and about ensuring they were not stopped at borders.”

  “Let us hope your knowledge in that regard will not be needed,” Armod replied, sighing. “I would be happier to make the trip without encountering either Yerrins or Mystics, if we can help it.”

  “Have you decided when we shall sail, sir?” Hargrim asked, and Armod shrugged.

  “Within a day or two. It is quite easy to secure sea passage to Selvan, so we need not worry overmuch about a specific day.”

  Norrik stirred slightly again, the deep, gravelly rumbling in his throat betraying his concern. “With respect, master, would it not be wiser to sail directly for Dulmun? Surely, the longer the stones are in our possession, the more risky the journey will be.”

  Armod grunted sourly, wishing it were that simple. “We could sail for Dulmun only if we wanted our every item of cargo turned upside-down and inspected four or more times by the trade officials here before leaving. And that will not do. No, I must take my pearls and fine jewels to the shores of Selvan to pawn off on Garsec noblemen, as I have done countless times in the past. This way there will be no need for them to be suspicious of me—at least, not until I have ridden north into Feldemar, beyond the High King’s reach. The journey may take some months, but I expect we will also make some fine coin along the way, so it will be more than worth it.”

  “I will begin making preparations for the trip immediately, sir,” Hargrim said smoothly.

  Armod waved him away to his work, uninterested in the finer details. “Yes, yes. Make sure to remember to pack winter clothing. The colder months in Dulmun are frightful, or so I have heard.”

  “Guard that chest with your life,” Norrik told Hargrim gravely, as the castellan turned to leave. “Its contents will change the course of our war against the High King!”

  Privately, Armod had much less interest in what King Bodil might plan to do with the magestones, preferring to think instead on the coin she would no doubt pay for them. His family was constantly preoccupied with the pastime of trying to win her favor, but it was an unending errand, for she was largely uninterested in the jewelry and other fine metalwork that made up most of their trade. Like her famously utilitarian father before her, Bodil did not even wear a crown.

  But now, with battlefields across the north soaked in blood and the king’s raiders harrying the coastlines of Feldemar and Selvan, Armod could see an opportunity that had opened up. Any merchant of sufficient cunning and boldness to bring her such a potent weapon for her war as the forbidden magestones would find themself in the unique position of having not only her attention, but likely also her gratitude. And given what the power of this weapon could win Dulmun, King Bodil would surely be in a position to be quite generous indeed, once the smoke had cleared.

  Some might have called it war profiteering, but Armod simply called it business.

  The sound of children’s screams interrupted the humdrum bustle of the midmorning marketplace, piercing equally through barriers of curtain, stone wall, and sleep. Before Theren could even register what was going on, she tumbled out of bed, snapping alert with the speed of a guard suddenly under inspection, her arms up and ready to defend herself. Her heart thundered in her chest, and her gaze jerked around the room, searching every corner and evaluating every object before her for a threat.

  Her empty apartment seemed unimpressed with the display.

  The fire of the instincts that had carried her to her feet was doused unceremoniously by the mundaneness of reality, like a cold bucket of rainwater to the face. The sounds floating up to her window from the markets beneath were banal; the jingling of coins and loud barking of merchants carried none of the panic or hush that would accompany some terrible event. She wondered, dully, if she had imagined the screams entirely. Even as she stood listening, though, another rang out—but this time she also heard the smaller nuances in the sound that her sleeping brain had glossed over: the splashing of water, and the giggling of children, and the notes of delight rather than fear in the shrieking.

  She sighed wearily and then rubbed at her eyes with her hands, frustrated that she could work herself up into such a state over nothing more than a few children playing in a fountain. She remained there for a moment, directionless, not knowing what to do, while her heartbeat gradually calmed and the tension left her limbs. Of course, now that her brain no longer thrummed with misplaced alarm, it had apparently decided to remember that she had drunk far too much wine last night and proceeded to chastise her by causing her head to ache tremendously.

  Groaning, she resolved to remedy that with more wine, but then remembered hazily that she was supposed to be meeting Lilith that afternoon.

  A wave of embarrassment swept over Theren as she imagined what Lilith would say if she were here now. The elusive part of Theren’s mind that still knew how to be gentle with herself told her that Lilith of all people would understand, but she pushed it aside, ashamed. She did not care if her other friends saw her like this, wretchedly in need of a drink and miserable, but Lilith … Lilith was different. Lilith was almost the only reason that Theren could manage to crawl out of bed these days.

  Stirred finally, she made to trudge over to her pantry in search of food but stopped as an empty bottle clinked against her booted foot. The thick, smoked glass was just dark enough to show a glimpse of her reflection as she set it on the shelf beside all the others, her own scowling eyes staring back at her in accusation. She ignored them, as she always did; at this point there was nothing left to say to herself. What was done was done, and she would have to live the rest of her life with that, for good or for ill.

  A year ago, she would have been waking up in her dormitory at the Academy, the foremost institution for magical education in all of the nine kingdoms, preparing for what wo
uld likely have been an ordinary, boring day of schooling. Back then she had longed for adventure, itching every day to escape from the cloying routine of lessons and study sessions, old dusty instructors who had neither time nor patience for her, and older dustier books in which she had little interest. But when adventure had found her at last, it had been less glorious than she had always hoped. The Seat being invaded by an army of traitors to the High King had been perilous enough, but it was the series of grisly murders that had plagued her school that had truly changed her mind about the lure of what she would once have called “excitement.”

  She still had nightmares, sometimes. Still felt her heart stop every time she heard a scream. Stories of the heroes of old never spoke of this kind of lingering fear, so Theren wondered if it was a sign that she was unsuited for a life of anything more strenuous than sorting books and performing parlor tricks.

  Her mouth twisted sourly at the thought. Her childhood had been spent sleeping in gutters, orphaned and penniless, with nothing to her name but the clothes on her back. She had only been able to attend the Academy thanks to the sponsorship of a wealthy patron from her hometown of Cabrus—but that sponsorship had come with a price. Her patron, Imara, had stipulated that once Theren’s training was complete, she would return and enter Imara’s service, no doubt to perform magical tricks for amusement and be paraded around at parties like a particularly well-bred hound.

  No matter how difficult a life of adventure had already proven to be, Theren would still have rather died than accept the alternative that awaited her.

  And therein lay the problem. Up until the mess that was the murders and the eventual capture of the culprit, Isra, Theren had been very successful about delaying her graduation and staving off her eventual vacuous fate. But everything had swiftly gone wrong, and despite the pointed meddling of the Mystic order and her instructors, it had taken the efforts of Theren’s friends to solve the mystery, while she herself had suffered under the Mystic’s knives.