Assassin of Curses: (The Coren Hart Chronicles Book 3) Read online

  Copyright © 2021 by Jessie D. Eaker

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission.

  Jessie D. Eaker

  jessieeaker.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Cover art by Daniel Eaker

  Book Layout © 2017 BookDesignTemplates.com

  Assassin of Curses/ Jessie D. Eaker — First edition

  ISBN 978-1-7341293-5-9

  To Becki and Daniel...

  For keeping me sane.

  Contents

  An Unexpected Guest

  Interrupted Meal

  Fumiko’s Charm

  Presents from Friends

  Forced Hand

  A Hidden Talent

  Interrogation

  Homeward Bound

  A Lesson Shared

  Family

  Hidden Ruins

  Unpleasant Visions

  Goats and Cats

  First Portal, Second Memory

  Cabrina’s Gift

  Hard Stop

  An Old Friend

  In Plain Sight

  Reunion

  Love and Death

  Gates of The Empire

  The Butterfly

  Deception

  Opening The Vault

  Unlocking The Forbidden

  Jiaying’s Lesson

  Last Wish

  Back Home

  The Promise

  Acknowledgments

  About The Author

  CHAPTER ONE

  An Unexpected

  Guest

  Edlingreen Castle was quite the change from my old home. Looking up from my journal to stare at the rafters over my head, I couldn’t help but marvel at the wood’s beautiful stain and highly polished finish. Not to mention being entirely devoid of cobwebs and dust. The brightly lit room smelled pleasantly of spice, and the gently glowing fire provided ample warmth against the frigid morning.

  I looked down at the paper in front of me. Despite the improvement in my surroundings, it was unfortunately blank.

  The nearby window was open, yet through some trick of myst, only allowed in the light and none of the cold outside air. Very different from what I was used to, where the spiders living in the rafters would frequently drop down and offer to correct my spelling.

  Could that be the reason the words were coming so slowly this morning? Could it be I missed the dust, the cobwebs, and even the old musty smell of my previous home, Revenhill Keep?

  I brushed the end of the quill against my lips. My spelling had indeed been a little off lately.

  I sighed. No. It was just that I was distracted. Too many thoughts—too much had happened in too short a time. I shook my head. A world-renowned knight and explorer had to be better than this. Knights were focused. Their arms were as strong as trees—their minds as sharp as their blades. And of course, their thoughts were so highly organized, and their observations so revealing any reader would gasp in awe.

  I looked back down at the blank page. Well, maybe crafting a complete tomb of all my wisdom was a bit too optimistic. At this point, I would settle for getting my thoughts down accurately without too much embellishment.

  The minstrels certainly didn’t mind stretching the truth. While I had established contact with the mysterious keepers, uncovered the Mirror of Bygone Tears, and saved the princess from an evil myst user—not to mention helped restore her to the throne—it wasn’t like it was this huge thing. I had only done what needed to be done—and of course, I had lots of help from some very good friends. But to hear the minstrels tell it, I, Coren Hart, had saved the world or something. I shuddered. A new ballad, ‘The Cursed Knight,’ was gaining popularity, and I was tempted to have the princess execute whoever had written it.

  Unfortunately, the historians weren’t any better. They had already proclaimed me one of the great explorers of this generation and were busily scribbling their scholarly essays arguing over my motivation for this or that. Why had I not forced Wynn’s hand earlier? Why did I allow the princess to be captured? Why did I wait until the last moment to save her life? I sighed. Believe me, if I’d been half the hero they made me out to be, I wouldn’t have done it that way either!

  If I had any hope of having an accurate account, I was left with no other option but to write it myself. Which was why my notes were scattered over the table around me. I looked them over, the undisputed king of my jumbled mess. I had to somehow bring all of it into a coherent whole. I shook my head. But all that was for another time.

  Today, I was trying to come up with some tiny pearl of wisdom to include in my journal. Or at least a few striking observations that would help the kingdom—and prove to someone very important to me—that I was a little bit useful.

  A slumbering sigh made me glance over to the room’s other occupant, Princess Zophia Olwenna Xernow. While actually the kingdom’s queen, she had decided against giving up her princess title until her coronation, which was still a couple months away—if even then.

  She rested, fast asleep, slumped over her desk—her head cradled on her left arm—while her right hand still loosely held her writing quill. She had finally succumbed to exhaustion, something I had been predicting for the last few hours. She had worked late into the night writing letters to the kings and queens of the surrounding kingdoms, warning of the Dark Avenyts invasion and asking for their help. Unfortunately, this was the second round of letters. None of them believed her. The Dark Avenyts were the stuff of stories told to frighten children, not something to be taken seriously. They had been banished from the world a thousand years ago. So none of them offered her help. And worse yet, all refused to send supplies.

  I wanted to help her so badly. But I was beginning to think only the Creator himself could help her now. Her kingdom was in trouble.

  The deep kind.

  It was not her fault. Her brother Wynn had murdered their father, blamed it on her, put a curse on her, and then took the kingdom for himself. The irony of it was that it hadn’t actually been Wynn, but one of the Dark Avenyts controlling him. Or at least that was our current theory. Unfortunately, Wynn escaped our last battle and was still at large. I was confident we had not seen the last of him.

  Wynn wasn’t the only casualty of the Dark Avenyts possessions. Zofie’s cousin Risten Brightmare, who had been her closest friend, had been captured and turned into one of their puppets. Like Wynn, Risten had also gone missing.

  Our intelligence indicated Wynn had dispatched Risten to parts unknown right before we managed to retake the throne. It was apparently some sort of special mission. But whatever it was, we were sure the Dark Avenyts inside Risten would use her deadly sword-master skills to succeed.

  That is where I come in. I am this generation’s Thief of Curses. Using my Abhulengulus curse, I not only helped Zofie regain her throne, but I was also able to take control of, or steal, the curse Wynn had placed on her. While she still bore it, I was at least able to mitigate the worst of its effects.

  Abhulengulus, or Abe as I generally called him, was quite the unique curse. He possessed his own intelligence. A most disagreeable one, I might add. And not only could he steal other curses, he could also influence my luck. Which usually turned out bad.

  I couldn’t help but glance at the curse ancho
r on my left wrist—a most unusual placement I had been told. Most people bearing a curse would also have a symbol high on their chest where the curse attached to their body. It generally resembled a round coin-sized tattoo. But mine, being such a unique curse, was located on my wrist and oddly shaped. It took the form of an almost flowing triangle with a single eye in its center. And when the eye opened, Abe would talk to me in my head, so only I could hear him. He would even answer my questions.

  If he felt like it.

  Zofie groaned in her sleep and frowned. Having an unpleasant dream, no doubt. Not that I was surprised. There hadn’t been a lot lately to have a good dream about. Except perhaps our engagement. But any wedding was going to have to wait until after the kingdom had enough food to make it acceptable to have the celebration.

  The possessed Wynn had set out to destroy the kingdom so that it posed no threat to the Dark Avenyts’s advance. He did a pretty good job of it too. The royal granaries were empty, and all the coin in the treasury had been spent. Not to mention, about half of the kingdom’s precious myst users had been spirited away to parts unknown—or killed outright.

  As I looked at Zofie’s sleeping face, I couldn’t help but smile at the line of drool escaping her lips. She seemed so innocent in slumber, but inside that head of hers was a sharp intellect finely tuned to the art of statecraft. She was a born leader. I had assumed she had gotten it from her father, but as we had recently discovered, her mother had also been the leader of a secretive people called the Keepers. And much to Zofie’s surprise, she had also inherited the role of their Guardian.

  Unfortunately, they had tried to force Zofie to forsake her kingdom and immediately assume the role. But with the help of my curse and a rather large crab, we managed to make them understand Zofie’s fate lay in a different direction. They had ultimately agreed to wait until Zofie had dealt with her kingdom first.

  I sighed and brought myself back to the present. Looking down at my paper, I stroked my lips in contemplation. What to write? What wondrous observation could I make? What pearl of wisdom would be useful to Zofie and the kingdom? I had to move this along. I was under a bit of a deadline.

  It was almost time for lunch, and I, for one, had resolved not to miss this meal. Well, actually, I tried not to miss any meal. But for this one, Zofie had invited me to a picnic. When I asked where, she told me I would be surprised, but otherwise, kept her plans secret. It was cold outside today, as one would expect in mid-winter, so I couldn’t help but wonder where it would be. I was sure the meal would be nothing special. Zofie had decreed that with the food shortage, we would eat as the people did. But even with all those challenges, I was looking forward to it. We had been so busy lately, a chance for a little recreation would be most welcome.

  I looked back down at my paper. I was almost out of time. As they say, it was now or never. I looked up into the rafters one last moment as I constructed the exact wording in my head. Then I carefully dipped my quill in my ink bottle and boldly wrote: “We won’t give up.”

  I nodded in satisfaction. Simple and straight forward, yet from the heart. It was surely my best work.

  A knock sounded on the thick door. I started at the unexpected sound and placed a hand over my pounding heart. Zofie jerked upright and looked around in momentary panic. Her eyes locked on mine, and she visibly relaxed. While we both had been expecting the interruption, we were on edge. Things were just too quiet.

  True, winter made news travel slowly. But based on past history, Wynn would not be sitting idle. He was likely plotting his next move to dismantle our defenses. This suspicion was supported by our reports from Mount Eternal. There was quite a bit of activity, but none of them left the mountain. They instead stayed close to their otherworldly portal. Indeed, they seemed to be waiting for something. We could only pray they waited long enough for us to get our defenses together.

  Zofie rubbed her eyes. “Enter,” she called.

  The door slowly opened, and a young woman stepped inside, clutching a giant ledger to her chest. I almost laughed every time I saw this. Fumiko was barely larger than the ledger itself.

  Fumiko was Zofie’s personal secretary. She was of slender build and had black hair just long enough to frame her delicate face. But it was her ethnicity that intrigued people, evident from her eyes and the shape of her face—she came from lands far to the east.

  As usual, she wore a simple beige dress with a modest neckline and cut from rough-spun cloth. An earth-colored shawl was draped across her shoulders, likely due to the morning chill. To my utter surprise, she wore plain brown stockings on her feet. She usually went barefoot.

  Her manner of dress had earned quite a few whispers from those attending court. Zofie had offered her better clothes, but Fumiko had declined, simply saying she was not worthy and preferred it this way.

  Despite her plain clothes and unkempt hair, I could tell she had the potential to be quite the beauty if she so desired. She carried herself with such grace and poise, one would easily think her a dancer. But I knew different.

  While traveling to find the Mirror of Bygone Tears, I had been captured by bandits, and Fumiko had single-handedly defeated three armed men. Immediately after, she had sworn me to secrecy, asking I never reveal what she had done. True, she had been under the influence of the curse possessing her at that time. But still—what had been the curse and what had been Fumiko? Even if it was something in the middle, the mysterious lady from the east had at one time received some serious training in personal combat. It was also something she absolutely refused to speak about.

  She had also betrayed us.

  Or at least, the Dark Avenits possessing her had, using her to steal the mirror. I broke that curse using a charm from the nymph, Lady Autumn, and set her free. It was a debt the young woman took very seriously, and one she fully intended to repay with a life of service.

  Fumiko cleared her throat and bowed. “Pardon the intrusion, your highness,” she said, her unusually accented voice calm and controlled. Unless you knew her, you might even think it cold.

  She continued. “It is time for your picnic. The cook has everything you requested prepared. And watch out, Spraggel....”

  But before she could complete the warning, the man himself came barreling through the door behind her. “I know what they’re after!” His eyes were bright with excitement, and he wore a smug smile. He moved to the room’s center, and in his exuberance, began to bounce up and down on the balls of his feet. Hardly the display of respect one might expect from someone barging in on their ruler.

  Spraggel was my elderly master. Or perhaps had been was more accurate, although I still considered him such. He was a scribe and a scholar of history, as well as Zofie’s senior advisor. He wore his usual gray robe, which was adorned with blotches of ink, and I couldn’t be sure, but maybe even some of last night’s meal. Although entirely bald, his white beard was starting to get long again. But not nearly as long as it had been before he shaved it off to pretend to be a priest of Dali.

  I sighed. “Spraggel, what in the Creator’s name are you talking about?”

  He smiled brightly. “The Dark Avenyts, of course!”

  I shook my head. “But we already know that. They want hosts for their curses.”

  He paused his bouncing and looked up at me in irritation. “Not that. No, I was talking about why they’ve been so quiet lately.”

  We all stayed silent as Spraggel smiled and rocked back and forth on his heels. He was waiting for us to ask the question. Why have they been so quiet? All of us had been debating that topic all week—with no answers. None of us wanted to sit through yet another lecture.

  His smile began to fade, realizing we were not going to fall for his trap. “Well,” he said, disappointed. “It is more a guess than anything right now. I need more information to turn it into a working hypothesis.” He stepped up to Fumiko and patted her on the shoulder. “Which is why I need to borrow your assistant for a bit. I think the answer lies in the
research of Fumiko’s old master, Hennion Tormaigh. She knows his work better than anyone. And if I’m right, you’ll definitely be interested.”

  Fumiko hefted her ledger. “I can’t. I need to work on the accounts. Zofie needs an accurate count of what the kingdom has and how it’s being used.”

  Zofie put her hands on her hips. “I really do need those completed.”

  I brightened. “I could do the accounts.”

  Fumiko grimaced. “Your highness, with all due respect, please don’t let Sir Coren near the ledgers. It took me weeks to straighten them out from the last time.”

  I sprang to my defense. “I didn’t do that bad. It was a busy week.”

  All three of them regarded me in silence.

  Zofie took pity and came to my defense. “Dearest,” she smiled sweetly. “You were valent to try, but numbers are just not what you’re best at.”

  Fumiko took in a deep breath. “Instead, I could possibly work with Master Spraggel for two hours today. That should not throw me too far behind.”

  Zofie nodded. “That sounds like a reasonable compromise, but...” She grinned. “After lunch.”

  Fumiko bowed deeply. “As you command.”

  Zofie rolled her eyes. “Will you stop with the formality? You’re driving me crazy.”

  Before she could catch herself, Fumiko gave a shallow bow to Zofie and blushed. The Fumiko that was with us right now was not the possessed Fumiko we had come to know at first. The real Fumiko was more formal in her mannerisms and a little more conservative. Zofie thought that part of her timidness was due to the side effects of her possession. Fumiko frequently had nightmares of the curse once again controlling her.

  Zofie looked up at Spraggel. “Won’t you join us too?”

  Spraggel shook his head. “Thank you for the invitation, Princess, but not this afternoon. I’ve already been sampling the fare in the kitchen.” He smiled. “I think Madam Hindenlye likes me.” He winked.

  I sighed. My master surprised me yet again. Madam Hindenlye vigorously defended the kitchen’s food, throwing out any ‘poachers’ as she called them. Rumors were, she slept in the storeroom. The fact she was allowing Spraggel to sample, spoke volumes.