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Draycott Everlasting

The Wolf of Navarre, the defender of Acre and the Crusade's most vicious fighter, stepped onto the abbey's roof, into the strangeness of the twenty-first century. Without fear, he stood straight and pulled the darkness around him like a cloak while he surveyed the abbey's distant moat. He faced the clean sweep of the wind, rich with roses, frowning.

"My first smell in seven hundred years." He drew a long, savoring breath. "I should have known you would have your roses close by." A smile twisted his lips, as hard as the scar that marked his eyebrow from the final siege at Acre.

1291.

A year of rare courage and madness. Nights of brotherhood. But days that ran red with too much blood, Adrian remembered grimly.

Something dug at his neck. Moonlight glinted on cold Damascus steel where the point of the great broadsword traced his skin.

The warrior spoke harshly. "Do not move, betrayer. Not by nerve or muscle."

And it was so.

"Do not magick. Do nothing save listen and then obey."

Adrian tried to move, but to his horror he was frozen. "Pie Jesu, how can you—"

"Silence! How long have I waited for this sweet revenge." The black-clad knight turned slowly. "This night your great abbey will fall, stone by stone. Nothing will be left save ash and gravel. Not even dreams will remain to warm you." The first limestone merlon quivered on the roof and then tore free. A gray parapet crumbled.

“When I'm done," the knight hissed, "no memories will remain for you, nor any soul to enjoy them with, for I'll have your soul, too."

MOONRISE © Copyright Christina Skye 2009

Revisit Draycott Abbey!

My novellas, What Dreams May Come and Season of Wishes, Bridge of Dreams and Enchantment, have been reprinted. You can listen to an excerpt from Enchantment here.

Excerpt One | Excerpt Two | Excerpt Three | Excerpt Four