Image Image

The Darkborn Saga: New Episode

đź’Ą This is rough draft and is unedited. Each word is battle-born. Read at your own risk, be kind, and enjoy.

*A Wonder image I generated during character brainstorming.

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. 

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€

Arless Episode: “Urges”

Our groans mix in the morning air as I sink my teeth into the Southerner’s neck. His blood is warm and salty on my tongue, awakening my cursed senses that are dulled by day, making me sluggish. But his blood, warm between my teeth, makes me feel lighter, like I’m floating in a tepid saline pool, and each pull of blood down my throat hits like a drug.

I take another deep dredge of sweet, warm, intoxicating blood and my hands, powerful and impatient, tear his pants to shreds until the hot flesh of his full cock presses against me.

That’s all the invitation my southerner needs before he’s pulling at my jerkin, tugging my tunic from my trousers, and shoving his hands inside as I drain the blood from his neck.

I tell myself I have to stop, if only for a moment, so I can feel him in all parts of me, but as his fingers cup my sex and delve deep inside of me, I cry against his skin with pleasure. It’s been far too long since I fucked someone, and with some of my bloodlust sated, the feel of him wins out.

I unhinge my mouth from his neck and shove him onto the settee, pulling my shirt over my head and dropping my pants until I am completely bare.

In a daze, the southerner stares at me, his eyes skimming over my sex, my breast, but lingering on the faded markings covering my arms. I make quick work of his clothes until he is completely bare, leaving nothing between us but skin as I climb onto him.

The tip of his cock is smooth and swollen, glistening in the daylight, sneaking through the window. I straddle his lap, lowering myself over him without preamble. “You will fuck me, southerner, if you know what’s good for you.” The need in my body thrums so loud, I barely hear myself.

The southerner sits up, groans into my mouth, biting my lip hard enough to draw blood. It sends me into a frenzy, and my thighs work me up and down, his cock filling me to the point of pain—until he can’t go any deeper, and I barrel down on him again. Over and over.

My mouth finds his neck once more, and as his hands press into my back and grab my ass, holding on for dear life, and his blood coats my throat, his length filling me so full I am bursting at the seams, I nearly implode. It’s fast, it’s rough, and the pain feels so good. I fuck him until I have no choice but to unlatch my bite from his throat as I scream.

I see colors and hear a rainbow of sounds. I feel light and airy, and for the first time in days, I feel so powerful—so alive . . . I am happy.

The southerner’s cries of pleasure fill the room immediately after, his come coating my insides, and utterly, completely sated, I laugh in my euphoria and lean my forehead against his shoulder.

“That was unreal,” he rasps, his hands sticky against my sweat-dampened skin. Languidly, I lick the smearing of blood from his skin, humming with satisfaction like a milk-sated cat.

In a sudden rush of warmth and acute pain, my entire body stings with what feels like tiny embers of fire. The muted light is so bright it burns my eyes, the sound of the horses in the barn pounding in my head. It’s too loud. Too close. Too grating.

I spring off from the settee to catch my breath. My thoughts swirl, and my body is pulsing with fire and ice. I have felt the hellfire-singe of Hel’s runes in my skin and the heady warmth of someone else’s blood filling my veins. But this is different. This is terrifying. It is too much at once and overwhelming.

“Are you—” The moment the southerner touches me, I spin around, my entire body vibrating with power.

“Don’t!” I shove him away, scared of what I might do if he comes any closer. A wingback chair scrapes the wood floor as he falls into it.

Squinting against the light, I rush for the door, fling it open, only to run completely nude and untethered into Lucian, whose eyes blaze with anger in the threshold. He’s looking at the southerner in deathly silence.

I push Lucian out of my way and run for my room. For darkness. Whatever just happened was the best moment of my life, and also my undoing. I want to know this feeling, but Hel would not answer our calls when we needed her most, and I know she will not come to me now, the bitch.

Ayyyyeeee...

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until then….

xo, Scarlet

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters here in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. 

The places:

đź’‹Learn more about Scarlet St. James

đź’‹Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

Image Image

The Darkborn Saga: New Episode

💥 This is rough draft and is unedited. Each word is battle-born. Read at your own risk, be kind, and enjoy. You may have read this already, so feel free to jump into the shared drive to catchup on the lastest chapters, but I'm posting them here as well with a little behind-the-scenes look. 

P.S. You can read the Darkborn Origin Story here. Be sure to click on the tabs on left-hand side to access each "chapter" section. 

*Author’s Note: I was originally going to write book one from only Sylas’s POV, but my brain would not let it happen. The story simply would not be told the way most people would say it “should” be. But that’s not what writing is about, right? I wanted to write what felt “right” and this format is it. Ari wanted a voice, so I gave her one. Then Thorne didn’t want to be left out, and so on. So, yeah. You get all the Darkborn POVs. Each Episode is a different character POV and within each Episode are a handful of “chapters.”

*A Wonder image I generated last year for character inspo.*

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€

Arless Episode: “Breakfast”

We are monsters, and though we have tried to rid the world of ourselves, we cannot. Blood is all we crave. It is what we need, what drives us beyond the point of control. Spilling blood, drinking blood, and, of course, sex.

-Arless, Huntress of the Darkborn

Their screams fill my head. The scent of burning flesh. The fear in their eyes. Every suffocating memory clings to me, unable to shake.

I fling a dagger at the knot in the rafter, and the wood splinters as the blade lodges on the mark.

Desperation is still too close to the surface, like it was only yesterday I watched my loved ones burned alive and there was nothing I could do to save them. Nothing any of us could do.

I toss another dagger, and my aim is true, perfectly centered above the last.

Stoneware scrapes across the table as Thorne growls. “Tastes like ash.” I glance at his mutton stew, the bowl still full. Lucian stares at his spoon, his eyes glazed over as he watches the slop drip back into the bowl before dropping his spoon altogether.

In the empty silence between crackling fire flames and heavy sighs, I can almost hear the unnerving silence when I woke in Hel’s underworld. The nothingness surrounding me. “You are the Darkborn. The only of your kind. You will thrive by night and become the shadows our enemies fear.”

I shake off the echo of heat searing its way from my insides out—from the middle of my chest and over my arms, ingraining themselves in my skin like fire burns. The runes, glowing like enlivened embers, painting the lengths of my arms from shoulder to each finger. Even now, it burns and the barely restrained power vibrates through me as I pull my daggers from the wood beam.

“Ari,” Sylas says gruffly from his statue-like position at the study window. Moose lifts his mastiff head from where his large, black body is curled by the hearth. Drool drips from his lips and I nearly laugh. “How is it you are less drooly as a hellhound?” I mutter. His doggy eyebrows lift and then we all look at Sylas.

He hasn’t left his wide-legged stance since he took up sentry duty after returning from the village at sunup. Had it been any of us venturing into human territory at the peak of our hunger, we would not have withstood the thirst. But Sylas . . . He clings to his humanity more desperately than we do—than we can comprehend, I think—because the memories of Milla and Letty will allow nothing less. Even if the thirst eats away at him. He looks stronger than ever and well-honed for battle, but I feel his thirst as if it was my own starvation, one of the many attributes of our heightened senses. But Sylas wouldn’t be “the Wolf” without his annoying capability to be the steadfast, strong one. The leader of our pack . . . even if it slowly kills him inside.

“Your guest has arrived.” I ignore Lucian’s eyes on me and stare at Sylas. His arms cross over his chest and body, acutely more pensive as he peers into the courtyard of the stone castle we’re hiding in. That’s what it feels like, a fortress in Frail Valley, like a cage with thick stone walls and dark corridors to provide reprieve from the scents and sounds. This is where we woke, a small gift from Hel, but a curse to the villagers who live here.

This place is foreign to us with its woven tapestries and silk linens. Even the air smells musty and less open, like it did back home. Everything is too confined—makes me itch. Just like the skin that no longer feels my own.

We don’t know what happened to the Jarl of the castle, but he is gone now, whatever his fate, and the villagers blame us for his disappearance.

Draugr. That’s what they whisper. Unearthly, undead spirits of death. And though they spit the word with fear and vehemence—the very people we protect—they are not wrong. I have never felt more alive, and yet, my soul feels ashen, a part of me empty.

Even now, as the hunger thrums through my body, my throat swallowing compulsively, every inch of me humming with anticipation, I worry I won’t be able to control the beast that’s awake and waiting inside of me.

When I don’t answer Sylas, he finally turns and meets my gaze. He’s as nervous about this as I am because we need this experiment of his to work. “I would say be careful,” he continues, “but—”

“But you know I don’t need the reminder.”

Sylas’s eyes are sad and dark and filled with regret. If we ever want our own people to fight with us, to follow us and defend these lands alongside us, we need their trust. And if they are to trust us, we must trust ourselves first. Until we can get our feedings under control, we’re useless to our own cause.

With a nod, I inhale deeply, uncertain how long I can hold my breath around the human. I’m not sure I technically need air to breathe anymore, but I grasp hold of the small, human habit all the same, not ready to admit I no longer know myself at all.

There are voices down the hall and Lucian stands, waves of hunger and sexual need flooding off him. My entire body perks to attention. Fuck. My body suddenly aches with the same need, just as it does every time I’m around him as a Darkborn. I don’t know if it’s because of the change or the history we have, but I don’t feel this way around Thorne or Sylas, only Lucian, and I hate it.

Glaring at the brute, I storm from the room. “Let’s get this over with.”

Lucian might be a man of very few words, but he’s been the bane of my existence for as long as I’ve known him. I may trust him with my life, but I don’t have to like him. And I refuse to give in to any pull I have toward him. Ever again.

“Wish me luck,” I mutter, glancing back at Thorne and Sylas, then I step into the corridor and head downstairs to the parlor where my breakfast is waiting for me.

“Is she as monstrous as people say?” A male voice, whispering three halls away, meets my ears.

“It’s not for me to comment on the mistress,” Constance offers, our one and only servant brave enough to work for us. “But I can offer you wine—or mead, perhaps— to take the edge off?” Though Constance is high in her years and moves painfully slowly, she’s a clever thing and wise to give us all a wide berth, if she can help it.

“Hmm. A veiled and vague reply,” the man murmurs. “She must be worse than I thought. Good thing I’m being paid handsomely. Have you nothing stronger to drink than wine then?” There’s a wryness I would not expect in the tone of someone who has come to the lion’s den to be fed upon, and it gives me pause. “Never mind, I’ll take whatever you have,” he amends.

I lean against the doorway, observing the two of them. Constance is slightly hunched with age, but her face is beautiful, or rather, it once was. Her green eyes are dull now, and deep wrinkles etch her cheeks. Though I never thought I would think such a thing, I envy the weathered lines of her features and the markings of fortitude she can wear with pride, for I will never look different than I do in this moment. Ever.

Constance’s gray hair is braided long down her back, silver against her black woolen dress. She looks like she’s in mourning, really, and I can’t say I blame her. This is her life now, stuck with the likes of us until she parishes in his realm.

Our visitor leaves his perch by the window and meanders across the room toward her. His curly black hair hangs around his bright blue eyes, and his face doesn’t boast a groomed beard as much as a square jaw that is a few days unshaven.

He reaches for the crystal goblet Constance offers him. “Best to have a mead-doused mind if I’m about to lose my life.”

“I’d prefer you didn’t,” I say, and both Constance and my guest look at me.

Constance has the decency to seem chagrined. My breakfast, on the other hand, looks pleasantly surprised as his gaze drifts over my braided hair to booted toe. His heartbeat ticks higher, and the scent of his arousal inundates me, which I try like hell to pretend I don’t notice. I, too, give him a once over. But try as I might, my body heats with need and the hunger to feed.

“I like my breakfast fresh,” I explain, none too subtly licking my lips. “Since we’re paying you handsomely and all.” I wave my hand absently, as if we’re only talking about a meal at the table together. I can’t help but play with my food just a little.

The bastard grins at me, and my pulse quickens. Constance glances between us.

“That’s all for now, Constance. Thank you.”

She averts her gaze and hurries out the opposite door, closing it behind her.

“I’m sorry,” I say and walk over to the cabinet that holds a jug of wine. Alcohol doesn’t affect me like it used to—trust me, I’ve tried to drown my misery since the change—but I can’t resist a nice pour for old time’s sake. I take a big, thick swallow, my guest watching my every move.

“I thought,” he says, tilting his head. The smirk on his face never falters despite the monster he shares a room with. “That we weren’t drinking before breakfast.” His eyebrows raise, and I take a few steps closer to him. It’s all I can do not to lift my nose to the air and let my eyes roll back into my head as I inhale the cloying richness of his blood.

“I can have as much wine as I wish.” I take two more gulps, my eyes never leaving the man’s dark blue ones. And when I get as close as I dare, my body thrumming with a need that enlivens every fiber of my being and grips me from my very core, I stop a few paces away.

“You don’t look like a monster,” he says bemusedly.

“And you don’t look like the village idiot, yet here you stand, knowing full well you may be dead in moments.” Taking another sip from my glass, I look away. That my words are true still sickens me when I allow myself to think about them too deeply.

But as the frenzied memories of days past resurface and that feeling of desperation returns, I know this is better than any other outcome, and I set my glass down with a click on the table beside us.

“You don’t cower or shy away,” I think aloud. “Which means you are not from around here.” My eyes flick to his beaded belt and the crusted sand on his boots. He smells like a virile male, the wind, and the sea. His skin is tanned, and the lines around his eyes are a welcome sight, a sign of laughter when all I’ve known for weeks is people’s misery, terror, and fear.

“I am from a temple in Soothlund—originally, anyway.”

My eyes narrow on him. “You are not only a southerner, but one of the most staunch believers of Krosses?” I chuckle heartily. Why, Sylas, you do have a sense of humor.

The southerner’s head tilts slightly. “A southerner by birth,” he concedes. “I was sent to live at the temple as an orphan until my fourteenth winter, when I ran away.” He shakes his head. “Why do you laugh?”

I shrug. “I understand why Sylas picked you.”

“Oh?”

I nod. “You need money, or you would not be here. That much is obvious. And as my enemy and the very reason for my existence—” He tilts his head at this, but I continue, “I will not feel the slightest bit of guilt when I kill you.”

He holds up his calloused finger. “If you kill me,” he volleys.

I grin, offering what’s left of my glass to him. “You will need it.”

The southerner watches me over the brim of the crystal and takes a hearty gulp.

“So tell me, stranger,” I start, and needing distance from him, I walk to the window, eyes closed as I inhale the scents outside to clear my head. The manure and horsehair and the rotting foliage that litters the ground in the apple orchard. “What have you heard about us? And what makes you so desperate for gold that Sylas could convince you to come?”

“Well,” he says, inhaling a breath. I hear his footsteps behind me. He must know well enough to keep away from me, at least for now. He stops at the globe and gives it a spin. It creaks and groans as if it hasn’t moved in years. “I won’t bother lying to you. I have a feeling you’ll know if I do. I sailed north five years ago when my home burned to the ground during a raid. By your people, actually.”

Closing my eyes, I listen to the cadence of his timbre. The promise of his blood stirs the need hotter inside me. And the daringness of this man only adds to the anticipation of the thrill I know will come.

“If it was my people, you would be dead,” I counter. His heartbeat is loud in my ears, a juxtaposition to the languid thud of my own. “And you would not be brazen enough to come into our home, especially not alone. Unless—” I glance over my shoulder. “Unless you mean to kill us. Is that what you’re here to do, southerner? Kill the monsters of Qisp Keep? I hear we have quite the reputation.”

“Cries that fill the air from these halls during the night,” he confesses. “Bloodied trails left on the streets. Screams in the woods. Innocent people who have crossed your path in the moonlight, never to be seen again.”

I tilt my head. “Only partially true.”

“And to answer your question, I need the money because my crew ousted me and left with my ship. There was a traitor among us, and I’ve been traveling the north shore for two months now, doing what I can to secure another boat to return to my travels.”

“And that includes whoring your body to a Darkborn,” I breathe, and though it’s a pithy reply, I feel sadness I can’t ignore.

“I have seen monsters, mistress.”

I scoff. “I doubt that.”

“I have seen men and women drawn and quartered.” His words are grave and give me pause. “I’ve seen children stoned and villages burned by Nordmen and southerners alike. There is little you could do to me I have not seen before or that I might not deserve. So it is a chance I’m willing to take.”

I meet the southerner’s gaze and my brow furrows. “You were a soldier in the Summer Lands, too?”

He doesn’t have to answer. I smell his sorrow, thick and full of regret.

“You should know,” I tell him, voice harder than before. “I made a deal with Hel to kill the southerners who threaten our homes and kill our people—who have murdered my people. Men just like you.”

“And I vowed to protect my king and all of Soothlund—that I would fight for Krosses,” he says just as bitterly. “And yet, here I am, on your shores, having fled my own kingdom. So as you see, mistress, things change.”

His eyes hold mine, and I see a loneliness in them. But when his gaze shifts to my throat and then lingers on my lips, I know what thoughts fill his mind, and it isn’t his god or his king. He’s looking for marks. For fangs. A sign that I am more than a mere woman standing in front of him so that, like me, he might hold on to the hate in his heart.

“Can I ask you something?” he finally says.

I lift an eyebrow in answer.

“If there are four of you who are indeed unnatural,” he says carefully, “am I here for your pleasure alone or for theirs as well?”

“What did Sylas tell you?”

“That you were beautiful, if a bit rough around the edges. But that would be no hardship for me . . . Should I live.”

I can’t help but grin and try to find fear in his gaze, but there is only curiosity and a frustrated determination. “You are an experiment,” I confess. “And while there are four of us, as you say, it is only I who he has brought you here for. Sylas thought I would be more appealing and less terrifying.” The corner of my mouth quirks of its own accord. “Was he correct?”

The southerner shakes his head. “You are wholly terrifying,” he admits, swallowing thickly. “I think the villagers might be right—you are otherworldly in more ways than one. Disarmingly beautiful and perhaps even a witch because I find it difficult to care that I might lose my life before this is over.” His eyes shift over me again, lingering on my curves and exposed skin.

He crosses his arms over his chest defiantly, and his throat bobs as he swallows. I smell his arousal mixed with his fear, and my body tightens with need. My fangs ache and my core pulses violently with the need for release.

I don’t want to wait any longer. The sexual pull I have to him and the need to lick his skin and drink his blood is overpowering—release and ecstasy are all I anticipate.

“You are right to be terrified,” I say, stepping so close the silver strands of hair mixed with the dark curls at his temple shimmer in the daylight. “I make no promises, only that I will try not to bleed you dry and take only what I need.” I lick my upper lip, exposing one of my fangs.

His lips part, his warm breath feathering against my cold skin. He smells of sweet wine. “What are you really?” he rasps.

“Darkborn. Birthed from the shadows of Helheim itself.”

“Your gods are not real,” he rasps, but I know he doesn’t believe that. I hear the awe in his voice and his racing heartbeat.

“Whatever makes you feel better,” I rasp and trail my nose up the column of his neck and along his jaw, inhaling deeply, letting the scent of his arousal and desire adhere to every fiber of my being.

I’ve never felt the need to fuck and feed so badly at once. Until now, it’s been animalistic and uncontrollable, but without the chase, it’s easier to control the frenzied emotions. Instead, I await the moment that I might actually savor the heady feeling, knowing at any moment, I can take my fill.

I don’t know which is stronger, the ravenous desire to fuck or the hunger to feed, and the pulsing, all-consuming monster inside me is purring and wet to the core.

My tongue traces the vein on his neck, and the southerner exhales, rough and uneven. “Do you want to know the name of the man you are about to kill?” He asks wryly.

I shake my head. “Having not fed in three moons, my ability to restrain myself is not in your favor. I do not want your name to plague me afterward.”

“And if you kill me, I think I might die a happier man than I was before I arrived. Besides,” he lets out a ragged breath, and when I look up, his eyes are closed as if he welcomes his fate. “Your man told me your cravings are worse at night, so at least I have that going for me.”

Listening to the southerner’s heartbeat is the most tantalizing and torturous melody. The sound engorges my fangs, making them full and achy, and I have never wanted a cock inside of me more than I do in this deliciously painful moment.

“I will not be gentle,” I croak.

“I don’t think—” He gasps as I draw my fang along his pulsing throat. “I want you to be.”

I smile against his neck, nipping at him to sate myself. “You will regret saying that, Southerner.” And as I imagine him so deep inside me, it hurts. The monster takes control.

______

Well? Do we like Ari so far? She and Thorne are the most accessible in my head. Their voices feel the most natural to write out of the four. Just wait until you see where this story is going!

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until then….

xo, Scarlet

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters here in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. 

The places:

đź’‹Learn more about Scarlet St. James

đź’‹Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

Image Image

Darkborn Origins: New Episode

💥 This is rough draft and is unedited. Each word is battle-born. Read at your own risk, be kind, and enjoy. You may have read this already, so feel free to jump into the shared drive to catchup on the lastest chapters, but I'm posting them here as well with a little behind-the-scenes look. 

P.S. You can read the Darkborn Origin Story here. Be sure to click on the tabs on left-hand side to access each "chapter" section. 

*A Wonder generated image of the Darkborn, created for writing inspo.

đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€

Pain. Gut-roiling, skin-singeing pain lances through me. The heat is magma in my veins, ash in my mouth, and the melting of skin from my bones.

Milla. Letty.

Thoughts of them feel like the carving out of my heart, torn from my breast, yet distant and drowned away in the torturous, suffocating heat of Hel’s flames.

Death. That is what this is. But not a warrior’s death. There are no gods at my side, welcoming me to the afterlife. There is no axe in my hand.

Darkness consumes the white specks I drift toward in my mind, each jolt of agony so acute all I can do is silently scream. Head-splitting images flash through my mind, and a deluge of agony with it.

Milla. Letty. Again, their faces flash, but it is their cries, so loud it feels like my mind is splitting, that fill my thoughts.“No.” It’s a guttural sound, and I’m unsure if it is real. This is not the end. It can’t be.

The world spins as I pry my eyes open to find myself in utter darkness. But as the air stirs and a cool breeze envelops me, sending painful chills over my burned flesh, I’m keenly aware I am not alone.

On aching legs, I climb to my feet.

The dark world shifts to shadows and outlines until, soon, the pitch of a roof comes into focus. The acrid scent of burned flesh fills my nose, but there are no flames on the horizon. There are no echoing screams or smoke in the air. No ashes fall from the sky.

As I study the intricate onyx carvings of a threshold, another painful chill scores through me. It is not a pitched roof at all but the gates of Helheim. The entrance to the afterlife. I feel it in every tenuous coil of my body that hums with trepidation. I am in the underworld. A place of unrest and foreboding that plagued my nightmares as a child.

A whimper meets my ears, and the heavy thud of footsteps stirs my thoughts. Two red dots glow in the shadows, and a massive, four-legged form steps toward me—a huge black hound with blood-red eyes and saliva-drenched fangs.

I hold my breath as the hellhound moves closer, its snout nearly reaching my shoulder. To my surprise, it whimpers again and lowers its head. As its hot breath assaults my face, I lean away, and almost instantly, the beast transforms into the slobbery mastiff that showed up at our farm one day and never left.

My voice lodges in my throat. “Moose?” With a croak, I drop to my knees in elated confusion. “Is this a trick?”

As he licks my face, my fingers stroke his ears, far too relieved to see the damn mutt to be wary of how and why or what the hell is going on.

“So . . .” A familiar voice grumbles behind me, and Moose and I snap around.

“Thorne?” I use Moose’s massive body to climb to my feet, too shocked not to stagger.

Thorne stumbles on the hard, rocky earth, cursing under his breath as he meets my gaze. “How much did I drink?” he quips, and I mean to embrace him, but I’m too stunned. Thorne peers around. “Is this place what I think it is?” he utters, though it’s barely audible.

“I—” I swallow thickly, and while a twisted sense of elation fills me at the sight of my best friend, a wave of anguish replaces it just as quickly.

“Hel’s kingdom of death,” he rasps. Thorne’s eyebrows lower, and he runs his hand over his face. “If we are here, that means—”

”We are dead.” My voice breaks. “And Letty and Milla . . .” I peer around, squinting as another human form appears in the shadows, moving closer. It’s not my family, but a man with broad shoulders and silver-braided hair steps into the patch of dull light ensconcing the kingdom’s gates.

Lucian glowers as I rasp his name, holding the unconscious body in his arms closer. Arless.

“What the hell is this?” I bite out. My worst fears lodge in my throat as I try to comprehend why my best friends stand beside me in the underworld while my wife and daughter are nowhere to be seen.

“Milla!” I shout, stepping toward the shadows. “Letty—”

The cold wind whips through the air in answer, stirring up loose gravel and dead leaves that wind their way toward the gated entrance that suddenly—silently—opens.

I blink at the lithe figure standing there. “You have been called upon,” says a silky female voice. A woman in silver armor with pitch-black hair steps through the doorway, her dark gaze hard as stone and as cold as ice.

“Hel?” Lucian breathes a curse.

The goddess of death, queen of the underworld, dips her chin and peers at the four of us. When she notices Arless unconscious in Lucian’s arms, Hel snaps her fingers. Immediately, Arless wakes. “Much better.”

Arless startles when she realizes she’s in Lucian’s arms, and he helps her plant her feet on the ground as she gains her bearings.

I glare at Hel, wondering what game she is playing with us. “What have you done?” I take an angry step toward the goddess. “Where are our families?”

A dark, delicate eyebrow lifts as she slowly descends the stone steps. “They are gone, just as your past lives no longer exist.”

“But you saved his stray dog?” Arless utters, staring at Moose, incredulous.

Hel smirks, and Moose looks up at her. “Garm is no stray dog,” she says as he trots to her side. Her long black fingernails scratch the top of his head. “He is my eyes above when I cannot be.”

I frown. “And you sent him to live with my family? Why?”

She drops her hand at her side, her fingernails clicking as they tap her silver armor. “I needed to ensure you were who and what you were supposed to be.”

“You took my wife on our wedding night,” Thorne whispers. The pain in his voice only deepens my sadness.

Hel’s brow lifts slightly, and her sharp gaze narrows on us. “I took nothing from you,” she says coolly. “That was your enemy who you let into your village. The same enemy who has been killing pagans for decades and tearing our world to shreds.” She stops so close to me I see the red rimming the darkness in her eyes and smell jasmine clinging to her skin.

Her silver crown glistens in the gray atmosphere around us. “The same enemy,” she continues, “who is eradicating our people from existence. And,” she continues, her eyes resting on each of us, “I will no longer stand for it.”

“What do you mean?” Arless asks, more tentative than I feel as my thoughts reel in a vicious circle.

“I did not take your lives,” Hel repeats, “but I am offering them back to you.”

“I don’t want it,” I spit out. “If my family is dead, I—”

“That life was not your fate, Sylas Von Wolfsson,” Hel’s voice booms over us. Each word cuts through me, making my eyes burn and hatred harden inside me.

“Not my fate?” I grit out. “I had a wife and daughter. An unborn babe.” My chin trembles, and as I feel my knees weaken, I clench my jaw to the point of pain.

You were meant for more than this life. That’s what Milla had told me. Did she know it would come to this? Did she see me standing at Hel’s gate?

“Your time has come,” Hel proclaims, just as Milla did when she’d said those exact words to me in the fire, and a searing dread trickles down my spine.

“For all of you,” I finish for her.

The goddess stares at me. “Ah, yes. Your wife was a seer,” she muses.

I gulp. Was. My hands clench into fists as my nostrils flare, breathing out the pain.

“What would you have us do?” Arless asks, her voice still raspy from the smoke. “All we’ve known is fighting and war, and it was all for nothing.”

“Not for nothing,” Hel counters. “And now you must take back what was stolen from you. Only together can you stop the spread of conversion and reclaim this land for your people.”

Thorne takes a step closer, his jaw tight. “All we have ever done is fight for our people.”

Hel looks directly at him. “Perhaps. But you have not had my help. Until now.”

“With respect, Goddess,” I bite out, “we have lost the only people in our lives worth living for.” Each word burns like acid in my throat, and I have to clear the ache away. “What makes you think we give a goddamn about anything else now?”

Hel smirks. “Revenge, of course.” Her lip twitches. “Hatred. Justice that must be served. For your families, for your people. What happened to you is nothing that hasn’t happened a thousand times over to other innocents. If given the chance,” she continues, weaving her way between us. “Would you not put an end to the wars and the death? Would you not take back the land and provide a safe place for your people, with no threat of death to any of you in the process?”

“You would make that possible?” Lucian says, his skepticism a bellow in the strangely still air.

She dips her chin again, and my eyes trail each of her movements. “With my help, the four of you will be invincible.” A cruel smile lifts her cheek. “When I am finished, our enemies will not only fear you, but the world will forever bear your mark.” Arless and I exchange a confused look, though I see the intrigue shining in her eyes and the thirst for vengeance.

“They will write ballads and spread stories about your armies for eons to come,” Hel continues. “You will not only have glory. You will not only have justice, but, in the end, you will have peace. You will become legend.”

Every Nordman seeks eternal glory, to be remembered and celebrated for their deeds in this life. While I was content to farm the land and lead a village, even my ego swells at the promise that I might actually make a difference to our people.

The four of us stand in silence, but the unshakable truth is louder than a bullhorn because my reality remains: I am dead. My family is gone, and as the weight of everything barrels down on me, I fall to my knees. The love of my life was not killed honorably, but murdered. My daughter and unborn babe will never draw breath. They did not grow old or die peacefully in their sleep. Milla and Letty’s final moments were riddled with terror and insurmountable pain. Nothing I do changes any of that. And the memories—no matter what Hel promises—will haunt me forever.

Promise me you won’t forget us.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I wail into my hands. Weariness riddles my bones, and I wish for nothing else than to sleep. To let the darkness envelop me so I never have to feel such misery again.

“This, Sylas Von Wolfsson, is your destiny. You will lead the dark army, and you will right the wrongs of those who have come before you. All of you. Together.”

I peer up at her. “And if I do not wish to lead your dark army,” I say, anger seeping through the hurt.

“Then,” the goddess replies coolly, “you will never reunite with your soulmate.”

My body stiffens. “Milla?”

Hel blinks at me, which isn’t exactly an answer, but she does not deny it either.

“If we do this,” Thorne edges, “all of us will be reunited with our families?”

Hel studies him for a moment, her head canting to the right ever so slightly. “It’s far more possible than if you don’t. Would you not agree?”

I frown at her vague, emotionless reply. “This is not a game!” I shout.

A harsh wind prickles over my skin. “No, it is not,” she seethes, and her voice seems to echo everywhere all at once. “I must keep balance, and I cannot do that when my people are being slaughtered in their sleep or burned without honor—the more pagans converted to Krosses, the more danger our people are in. Even now, Barron the Butcher’s Torchkeepers arrive on our shores, Krosses armies in tow. So, will you do your part and help me, or will you let their power continue to grow and consume us all?” She glares at all of us. “You have my word. You will have all you desire when the time comes.”

I don’t trust Hel. And yet, she has chosen us for her dark army. Even if her twisted words only mean she will give me death in the end, I would gladly end our enemy before eternal sleep.

“Why are you asking us to lead your army?” Thorne asks, and my eyes snap to her, watching the goddess closely. “Surely, you have the power to force our hand in this.”

“I considered it,” Hel admits, but when her gaze drifts to me, I see something curious in her eyes. Something . . . amused, perhaps. “But I have faith in you, even if you do not yet trust in me.”

Her word games are tiresome, but the gods are known for their riddles, and I am too exhausted to consider what else I could possibly have to lose at this point.

When I look at the others, I find them already staring at me. “If there is even a chance I might see my sister again,” Thorne states, walking over to me. “That I might hold my wife, I would do anything for it,” he says, his voice breaking. I can feel his anger and agony coiling through him like it’s my own. “I would burn all of Soothlund to the ground. I would show them we will not perish without taking them with us.”

Arless steps forward as well, and though the sadness in her eyes is anything but certain, I already know what she will say. “I have never known a life without the three of you. I will not abandon us now.”

She looks at brooding, silent Lucian expectantly, and he nods.

Inhaling a deep breath, I steel myself before turning to meet Hel’s gaze again. “If we do this,” I clarify. “You will—”

“I will give you precisely what you wish for when the time comes.” Her brow lifts impatiently. But I have one last question before handing my afterlife to the goddess of death.

“Ask what plagues you,” she commands, and if I’m not mistaken, there is another amused glint in her eyes, as if she already knows what I will say.

“Why me—of the four of us? Why do you want me to lead your army?”

Hel smiles fully at that, baring unnaturally white teeth. “Because,” she says with far too much satisfaction, and the hair raises on the back of my arms and neck in warning.

“Because why?” Arless prompts.

Hel glances at her, then at Thorne and Lucian before her gaze steadies on me. “You, Sylas Von Wolfsson, have the most to fight for.”

I don’t know what she means by that, exactly, but it’s only a matter of time before Hel grows weary of our questions and indentures us instead.

Grunting, I shake my head. “We will regret this,” I mutter.

Thorne grips my shoulder in earnest. “Then we regret it together.”

Arless and Lucian both nod at me, the four of us resigned to our fates.

“As it will be,” Hel says, and before I can look at her, a burning sensation tingles my skin. The others curse and gasp around me, but all I can focus on is the way the heat curls its way from the middle of my chest and over my arms, along my biceps, swirling and etching in what feels like fire.

“You are the Darkborn,” Hel intones, though her voice sounds caverns away. “The only of your kind. You will thrive by night and become the shadows our enemies fear.”

Tugging my shirt over my head like it might burst into flames, I watch runes, glowing like enlivened embers, appear on my skin, painting the lengths of both of my arms from shoulder to each of my fingers. My head pounds, and a searing pain shoots through my chest. Every muscle hardens and expands, my entire body beating with the barely restrained power vibrating through me.

As my senses explode—sight, smell, touch—my jaw tightens, and my teeth feel as if they are being wrenched from my mouth. I taste blood. Air feels like ash on my tongue, and amid the pain, I cry out along with the others.

Red fills my vision and in my agony, I lament whatever we’ve just agreed to.

“It is done,” is the last thing Hel says, and her appreciative grin is the last thing I see before the world implodes around me.

đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€ đź’€

I know, I know - I’ve done it AGAIN! What will the Darkborn be like? What will the Darkborn do? What is this story even ABOUT?

But fear not, darkling!

I’ve got a new “chapter” scheduled each Friday, so be sure to subscribe if you want it sent directly to your inbox!

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until then….

xo, Scarlet

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters here in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. 

The places:

đź’‹Learn more about Scarlet St. James

đź’‹Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

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More DARKBORN scenes are LIVE!

I'm slightly behind in posting scenes, but oh boy, have I been writing these crazy guys A LOT the past month. I'm LOVING this project. I can't wait to share more with you soon. For now, the battle has only just begun. 

The Darkborn Saga continues - see what trouble Sylas, Ari, Lucian, and Thorne are getting into now. 

 You can read old and new scenes here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1iqiaicXlmEdzDujDYCCiX8cR4VSUDYvI?usp=sharing

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A New Darkborn Chapter is LIVE!

In case you missed it, you can catch up on the Darkborn Saga (or, what I've written so far) here.

Here is the first "chapter" in Episode 3

As much as I love building the world and setting up the characters, I really wish we could jump to where I see all of this going. That's one of the hardest aspects about writing. I always want to "skip to the good stuff," but it wouldn't be the "good stuff" without the context and build-up, right?

Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

Let me know what you think so far in the comments. :)

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Viking Vampires for your reading pleasure...

Okay, so if you're new to the world of my Viking Vampires, here's what you need to know:

You can read the first episodes here.

EARLY ACCESS FILE: HERE

Includes Episode 0, Episode 1, and Episode 2 (so far)

ABOUT THE SERIES:

Viking lore meets vampire legend in this dark, gritty, and seductive saga.

Pagans are being wiped from history by southern invaders. Desperate to save her life and people, Hel, goddess of the Underworld, creates an immortal army of warriors unlike anything the legends have ever seen.

Sylas, Arless, Lucian, and Thorne lost everything the night of the fire, including their honor, and they will stop at nothing to right the wrongs done to them and their families. Even if that means they must thrive in the darkness, no longer human, sacrificing their very humanity for their cause.

But as the Darkborn rise from the ash and shadows of their land, wreaking havoc on those who have wronged them, they find immortality comes at a cost. 

Each of them must fight their inner demons amidst the chaos of bloodshed, passion, and the wreckage borne of their vengeance.

Eventually, the chapters will be for paid members only, but for now, they are open for all to read. I'm still exploring the world, so you're welcome to join me. :)

Currently, I'm offering Episode 0 as an origin story for early readers when they sign up for my newsletter (and in here for Followers). So, if you see this cover, that's what it is:

Greetings and Welcome to our new spot!

Greetings and welcome to my After-Dark Readers Merch shop and memberships! My name is Scarlet and I write all the things my alter ego dares not write in the light of day.

As an avid romance reader with a master's in history and culture, my stories cross genres and push boundaries, weaving together facts, fantasy, and romance of epic proportions.

When I'm not writing romance, I'm crafting romantic, weather-ravaged adventures as Lindsey Pogue.

This community is where I post behind-the-scenes content, character sheets, rough chapters, character art, and more.

My stuff is epic for all the deliciously right reasons. It's spicy, steamy, gritty, but at the heart of it all is an epic love story that will give you all the feels.

So, buckle up, buttercup! Let's do this!

My current project: The Darkborn Saga; Viking Vampires in a fantasy world inspirsed by Norse mythology. I'll post new content each month, so be sure to create your free account and join the fun!

Be sure to read The Darkborn Origins prequel here to get caught up!

READ The Darkborn Origins NOW.

For more information about me, click here. www.authorscarletstjames.com