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

Sylas character image created by Wonder.

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. Or read ahead in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark Reader Community. It’s free to join and follow.

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

Sylas Episode: “Blackhorn”

For sixteen winters, the melodic sound of agony and crunching bone has been my lullaby. I’ve learned to appreciate the earsplitting sound of metal against metal. To distinguish the smell of fear and blood amidst the cacophony of death filling the night, and the battle has only just begun.

As our army descends on Blackhorn’s Soothlund army, my wife’s face is all I can see, and my daughter’s screams in her final moments are all I hear. The scent of their burning bodies fills my nose, and red-hot, all-consuming rage envelops me, enlivening my senses until my entire body is vibrating with unrestrained power.

This is what fuels me, and I welcome nights like this when evil gets retribution and I can bask in the glory of Hel coursing through the runes on my skin. Her essence floods every fiber of my being. Her vengeance hardens my heart. Her endless power fortifies my body, feeding my fury until the monster in me takes control, maiming every enemy in my crosshairs. Even the creatures of the forest, saber tooth and wildfang alike, give us a wide berth.

Bodies collide into bodies as Blackhorn’s soldiers lift their swords across the horde, their reactions sloppy as the night shadows and knowledge that the Darkborn are here play tricks on them.

But try as they might, they will not win. Not this lot, and not tonight. Their poison-tipped arrows and saber tooth spiked axes may slow some of us down, but for every Nordman the southerners have slain, the brotherhood will seek retribution. For the innocent daughters and sons the Soothlunders have taken from us. For the wives and sisters slain—no one with southern blood is safe. Especially not Blackhorn.

“Having fun yet?” Thorne winks at me, blood spattered across his face and matting his red hair into thick ropes that drip crimson. I don’t need the arrow flames to know his eyes are lit with hunger as he lifts his war hammer and cracks it between the eyes of the enemy. “I think Ari has killed more than me.” He grunts with frustration and pulls his hammer back. “But do not fret, brother. I will not let her win. It goes against my every nature.”

Swing. Crack. Grunt. The sound of seeping blood soothes my ears, and the sweat mixing with blood on my skin feels like a homecoming.

“Good,” I say dryly, grunting with another clip of my axe against hardened wildfang hide, nearly thick as steel. “Imagine my concern.” I swing again with a curse, the soldier collapsing to a heap of twitching limbs at my feet.

“Such a waste of warm blood,” Thorne mutters, and I sneer as I continue carving my way through the sea of mindless Torchkeepers who fight for a false, cruel god, toward the General’s circle of defense. Blackhorn swings his battle axe, lodging it between a Nordman’s neck and shoulder, oblivious to his commander’s barking order like frightened pups.

Stay close to the General!

Keep the horde away from the fortress!

Eyes on the heathens!

Through a swing and thwack, I glance in his direction. Blackhorn’s movements are practiced, and each kill is made with a smirk and unnerving ease. And as the breeze carries Blackhorn’s scent to me, I detect no fear.

I growl. Challenge accepted.

The general’s hubris may be the only crack in his armor, but it will be the death of him; tonight, he is my only true target, and he is as human as the rest of them.

Lucian roars a battle cry in the distance.

Moose snarls in the melee behind me as he moves with our northern armies across the snow-covered clearing.

I don’t need to look back to know Moose is no longer a mastiff; the enormous snarling hellhound fights beside the human army, tearing the enemy limb from limb. While Moose was terrifying to the Nordmen at first, his presence gives the warriors courage in battle.

Swing. Crack. Thunk.

Soon, the snow no longer glimmers in the moonlight, stained dark with blood, and while many of our men and women have fallen, Blackhorn’s meager numbers, having gathered at a moment’s notice when we came ashore, litter the ground in masses.

“Tonight, the threads of Fate begin to unravel.” Hel’s words press me faster. Blood rushes through my veins and pounds in my ears, and I swing harder, gaining ground on Blackhorn.

Peering through the flailing limbs and clacking weapons, my gaze sharpens on him. His chest heaves with exhaustion, though his expression gives nothing away. It’s fierce and determined. He stalls where he stands and peers around, his commanders falling back into the cover of the treeline behind them.

As I slay three more of Blackhorn’s men, our eyes connect.

“You!” I roar, pointing my axe at the general. He snarls. I grin. You cannot hide from me, I think as I inhale the night air, stepping closer.

“The General has a hard-on for you,” Thorne jests, and pulls his weapon from a soldier’s side. “I can practically smell it.”

If not for the men calling him to retreat, Blackhorn would meet me here and now. The murderous glint in his eye is bright and eager.

“The diamond! General, think of the north, General!”

Blackhorn’s eyebrow twitches, and grudgingly, he turns for the trees. Yes, yes. Run for your precious treasure.

The instant I feel the vibration of retreating horse hooves over the forest floor, I laugh.

Thorne does the same. “He thinks his horse can outrun us. That he is safe behind his walls.”

“And now we know he plans to claim the north,” I muse. We knew he would come, eventually. But to mention it in the heat of battle means it’s more important to him than I realized. And perhaps closer than I thought.

We glance back at Blackhorn’s decimated army. What’s left of our own warriors catch their breath as the southerners still standing fall back.

“Ari!” I call. “Take the cliffs with Lucian.”

“On it!” she grits out, loosing a flaming arrow. It hisses through the night, lodging into the eye socket of her target, setting his body ablaze.

Thorne and I break into a jog. My body still hums with power, the promise of Blackhorn’s blood fueling my every movement; this is the night I’ve waited four winters for. “Blackhorn would not retreat to the fortress unless he has a plan,” I tell him, barely raising my voice. “Or, he’s desperate.” For the hundredth time, I wonder what treasure he hides behind those walls.

“Oh, I have no doubt,” Thorne replies, and his voice is a familiar rumble to my ears, easily detected despite our chase.

I block out the waning cries of death behind us, ignore the dry blood cracking on my face, and welcome the burn of the runes along my skin, focusing instead on the mare’s heavy breaths in the chilly night air. She senses us, her primal senses know to fear us more than the bite of Blackhorn’s heels in her sides, and the chase only intensifies the bloodlust. Tru’s blood, amplifying my senses, grows faint after hours in battle, and the Darkborn side of me grows thirsty.

Twigs snap under hurried hoofbeats.

Blackhorn’s battle axe clanks against his stirrups and his muffled commands urge the mare onward as the rumble of our army makes its way through the woods behind us. It’s the thrum of frantic bodies within the fortress, however, that makes me smile; my powers may be diminishing, but there will be plenty for us to drink.

“The general!” someone shouts from the turrets.

“Is that . . . Vampires!”

“Over there—the heathen army approaches!”

“The heathens approach! The heathens approach!”

“Ready the battlements!”

“Hold the line!”

Blackhorn barely makes it through the gate before the grate lowers behind him. Thorne and I run harder, my thighs burning as I launch onto the stone wall and scale toward the top.

“Don’t let them reach the top!” An arrow pierces my shoulder, slowing me for a single moment before I gain momentum again. Another lodges in my side, and I hiss in pain as I break it off, but I don’t falter this time.

Despite the arrow in his leg, Thorne grins, as if it is all a game, and our strong, agile fingers and the toes of our boots find purchase in the crevices of the stones visible in the moonlight with ease.

In the distance, the waves crash against the cliff, and I wonder if Arless and Lucian are close. I have little time for that thought and pull an archer on the rampart over the edge the instant he’s within reach, followed by the guard with the long sword who takes his place.

Something . . . foreign catches my nose. Inhaling at the top, I sort through the onslaught of scents within the fortress, searching out my target. Soot tangles with steel and leather, nervous sweat with the coppery tinge of blood. Manure and damp hay. Overly-ripe fruit. And . . . a foreign scent reminiscent of fresh snow or morning dew. Crisp. Pure. It is wholly out of place among the stench of fear and decay.

I shake off the distraction as Thorne vaults over the stone wall, landing catlike on the battlement. He dispatches the guards instantly. They grunt, and their meaty bodies hit the ground with a thud.

I follow a heartbeat later. “Find his diamond,” I tell him. “I’ll hunt for Blackhorn.”

Two more soldiers charge toward us, blades drawn. I surge forward in a blur, dodging their clumsy sword thrusts and swinging axes. My hands latch onto their throats, lifting them off their feet as if they weigh nothing. The guards kick and gurgle, but their struggles are laughably futile. I hand one to Thorne to feed from and when my hand is free, I twist, snapping the neck of the other and tossing his body aside.

Lucian and Ari are here; I feel them like they are my other selves.

A streak of white catches my attention as Lucian moves like lightning, fighting a handful of soldiers below. The creak and groan of the gate opening once more echoes above their cries.

“Could you two be any slower?” Arless drops from the shadows above, landing in a silent crouch, her dark leathers blending with the night. She juts her chin over her shoulder. “The gate is open.”

Lucian lands on the turret beside us with a graceful thud, giant, bloody war axe in hand. His preternatural white hair, though pulled away from his face, is wild and glints in the torchlight. His beard is red, having recently fed, and though we are still stronger than every human here, our strength is dwindling. But I will not feed, not yet.

“Thorne. Lucian. Clear the walls for our army. Leave no one alive. When our warriors arrive, find Blackhorn’s precious diamond.”

Thorne flashes a wolfish grin, teeth gleaming in the torchlight. “With pleasure.”

“Ari,” I say, meeting her gaze. “You’re with me.”

Lucian nods and stalks off without a word, his hulking silhouette vanishing into darkness.

Arless falls into step beside me as we ghost across the ramparts.

Below, soldiers mill about the courtyard in agitated clumps, some armed and armored, others scampering away. They know death has come for them tonight. Fear hangs thick in the air, spiking with each distant scream as Lucian and Thorne butcher their comrades, feeding on those they wish along the way.

“What is that?” Arless asks as that same foreign, somewhat tantalizing scent from before wafts through the miasma of terror, tugging at my senses. It feels like it’s calling to me.

I inhale again, my eyes fluttering shut. Lilacs and honey, new parchment and crisp apples . . .

“Sylas?”

I blink, burying the strange instinct to find the source. When I meet Arless’s gaze, the fire-red shining through her amber irises is all the reminder I need that she feels whatever strange pull the scent has on me. Perhaps on all of us. I clear my throat. “Let’s move.”

We drop into the courtyard, startling a cluster of guards. I draw my axe, winding my wrist as I swing the blade at an advancing soldier. Too close to use her bow, Arless twirls her twin daggers and bares her fangs in a feral smile. We dart between the soldiers like shadows of death. I lose myself to the graceful rhythm of combat, my axe blade flashing crimson as it cleaves through flesh and bone and sinew. Men scream. Blood sprays. Limbs fall like dead leaves in an autumn wind.

And in a few breaths, they are no more.

Our army finally arrives, pouring into the courtyard like a dark tide, consuming everything in its path. Moose lopes in the fortress with them. His eyes find me instantly, and the hellhound trots toward us.

I glimpse Thorne, gore-spattered and grinning, swinging his hammer in mighty arcs. Lucian roars, splitting a man in half from crown to navel with a single blow.

Arless, Moose, and I make our way through the carnage, and I breathe the copper-rich air in deep, searching for Blackhorn. I detect him, but it’s faint compared to the floral yet crisp scent that’s stronger than all the rest. It’s off-putting and intoxicating, and it makes me uneasy when all I want is to find the general.

“He would have retreated to the great hall,” Arless guesses as she cleans her daggers on a dead man’s vest. And that’s when I smell him—putrid and vile and reeking of blood, sweat, and, finally, fear.

“No.” I tilt my head, listening harder. I peer at the cobblestone beneath our feet. “He’s running like a mangy rat.”

“Coward,” Arless spits, eyes narrowed. “Tunnels?”

“There’s only one way to find out.” We stalk toward the scent of old rot and mold, where I assume Blackhorn’s dungeons are located. Into the bowels of the fortress we go, following the growing scent of Blackhorn’s sweat and desperation mixed among that maddening hint of . . .

I growl and stride faster, hyper-focused on Blackhorn’s frantic heartbeat.

Moose lopes beside me, his hellhound form nearly brushing the stone ceiling of the narrow tunnels as we descend.

We emerge into a dimly lit chamber, casks of wine and preserved foodstuffs lining the walls—supplies for a lengthy siege. And there, around the next bend, is Blackhorn. His armor is gore-spattered, his footsteps quick.

“Going somewhere, General?” My voice is deceptively mild, but my body hums at the promise of his blood.

Blackhorn stops in his tracks. He laughs. “You think you have won, heathen?” he seethes, and the general spins, sword rasping from its sheath.

Moose growls. Arless hisses and takes a defensive stance beside me.

In the guttering torchlight, Blackhorn’s eyes are wide and wild above the deep, blood-stained lines in his cheeks and crusted beard. “You have only slowed him down.”

“And killed you,” I reply. “Which was my goal all along.”

“You haven’t killed me yet, heathen.” With a self-satisfied grin, Blackhorn takes a defensive stance, as if he could fend me off.

With a grin of my own, I stalk forward, Moose hanging back with Arless.

Blackhorn swings strong and true despite his exhaustion. I catch his blade with my hand, feeling nothing more than a pinch, and wrench it from his grasp, tossing it aside with a clatter. The general staggers back, pressing himself against the unyielding stone.

“Barron will avenge me,” he gasps out.

“No,” I promise, “he won’t. You’re no more than one of his pawns.” I seize Blackhorn by the throat, lifting him off his feet. “If nothing else, his greatest general’s death will save lives while he regroups.”

Blackhorn’s hands tear ineffectually at my wrist and fingers.

“Tell me about the diamond,” I command, squeezing harder. “The treasure you hold.”

“I’ll tell you . . . nothing, heathen . . . filth.” He bares his teeth in a taunting grin. “And when Barron . . . has it, it will be . . . the end of you.”

My eyes narrow on him.

“Your forces . . . will be nothing to his.”

I tighten my grip, feeling Blackhorn’s throat convulse beneath my fingers. “What is it?” I shake him like a rag doll. “Gold? Weapons?”

Blackhorn, unwaveringly stubborn, tries to laugh. “More valuable . . . ” As he gasps for breath, I know this man would rather die than tell me. So be it, but not before I play with him a bit.

With a roar, I fling him across the room. “Hungy, Ari?” I offer. “I’m happy to share.”

Blackhorn hits the wall, shouting in pain as he crumples to the floor, his limbs askew.

“I thought you’d never a—”

A section of the stone pivots behind Blackhorn’s body with a grinding rasp. A secret door opening. I look at Arless.

“I’ll admit, it’s a good hiding spot,” she says and lifts her shoulder.

Stalking over, I wrench the door fully open, immediately accosted by the unnerving, impossible scent that’s been taunting me since climbing the fortress wall, and I nearly stumble.

Nostrils flaring, I gape into the small chamber. Huddled on a bed in the corner, staring at me with luminous, fearless eyes, is a girl no more than twelve or thirteen years old.

Warmth floods my body, my muscles tightening with need, and my heartbeat quickens. I think of Letty and I stumble back again, terrified and sickened by my body’s reaction to the girl’s scent.

Covering my nose, I look at Arless as she hauls Blackhorn to his feet.

“This is your diamond?” I snap. I don’t know how I know it, but I do.

Blackhorn’s eyes harden on me in warning. “If you take her,” he grits out, wincing as if it hurts to breathe. “Barron will find her. He will tear down the world for her.”

Scowling, my gaze shifts to the girl again. To her braided, light hair pulled away from freckled, sun-kissed cheeks, and her big blue eyes blinking between us. Despite my size and blood-soaked appearance, her gaze betrays no hint of revulsion when she looks at me.

Some long-dormant impulse stirs, fierce and feral, and a maelstrom of confusion, and some unnameable emotion I dare not examine too closely, floods my senses. The need to protect, to possess, to keep this creature safe from Barron. It wars with the ever-present bloodlust and, with my strength waning, there is little I can do to ignore the vile urges pulsing through me.

The monster inside me needs feeding if I’m going to control it.

I wrench my eyes away, fixing Blackhorn with a murderous glare, my restraint tattered.

He laughs. “You’ve already lost, vampire. You just don’t know it yet.”

And with those words, I unleash the monster, practically tearing his windpipe from his throat as I sink my teeth into his neck, reveling in the feel of his viscous blood, fervid against my tongue, and the harmonious sounds of his gargled screams.

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until next week….

xo, Lindsey (and Scarlet)

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. Create a free account and read for free.

The places:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

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

Image created with Wonder (character inspiration)

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. Or read ahead in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark Reader Community. It’s free to join and follow.

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

Sylas Episode: “Tru”

Pulling the tent flap back, I stare inside. Tru sits by the fire, watching its flames as he waits for me. He’s regal and lithe. Not built like a warrior, but something fragile, something beautiful—pure and untouched by this heathenish world. Only, there is nothing further from the truth because, as my vessel, Tru is the fuel that keeps me sated and this war raging between the lands.

Stepping inside, I notice the wine jug on the table beside him is full; I can smell the fermented fruit permeating the air, settled and untouched.

“You have been waiting for so long,” I say quietly, unclasping my cloak. “Yet you do not drink.” The noise from camp is muffled as the tent swishes closed behind me. “You know I wish for you to be comfortable when I feed.” Draping my furs over the seat at my drafting table, I watch him, thoughtful, and remove my leather jerkin next.

I’ve never found a man so enticing, nor one so calming. Then again, I’ve never wanted to sink my teeth into a living being more badly than I do in this moment, either. Nor have I craved the peace I know it will bring me. My body hardens, the bloodlust filling each of my veins with desire and anticipation. Everything about today—about being here in the borderlands—leaves me restless.

Tru peers over his shoulder at me. His long dark lashes descend with a bashful blink, and he offers me a hint of a smile. “I know you dislike the taste of anything in my blood,” he says easily.

Pulling my tunic off so as not to stain it with blood, I drop it where I stand.

Tru’s gaze shifts down my body before he meets my eyes. I see it in his expression and smell it pouring out of him in waves—a potent, unequivocal desire, and it makes my cock rock-hard and my body greedily awaits what it’s about to receive. And that Tru gains some pleasure out of the lonely existence as my vessel gives me a small sense of comfort.

Stepping around Tru, I crouch in front of him, feeling the fire against my bare back. Every muscle in my body is coiled and buzzing with need, but I am slow and gentle because it is Tru, and I would never hurt him. Never break him. And I yearn for that thread of control as much as I need to feed from him, putting everything in an intricate but sustainable balance.

I don’t know what it is about this human, but the softness in his eyes calms the disquiet that has always accompanied feeding time.

His amber-colored eyes shift over my face and a strange sadness furrows his brow ever so slightly. I frown.

Reaching up, I cup the side of his face. Caring this way about a man doesn’t feel like a broken vow because it will never be what it was with Milla. Instead, it is a means for survival. A friendship as deep as I have with the Darkborn, if a bit different, for my vessel and I are forever tied together in the most intimate way.

Tru’s blood runs through my body. It feeds the hungry depths of me, giving me life. His essence is my own, filling all of my senses. So Tru’s desire thrums through me as much as his heartache. “What troubles you this night?” I whisper.

Tru looks away. “You will go to war again.” He peers down at the hem of his tunic. “You say you cannot die,” he continues, “and perhaps that is true, but you feel pain. You always feel pain, and I hate that for you.”

“As do the other Darkborn, yet you do not worry about them? About Thorne?” I tease him, hoping to lift the heavy moment.

Tru scoffs. “It might do Thorne some good to fear for his life once in a while,” he grumbles.

I smile in agreement, but Tru’s features harden and he tugs his tunic off his slender shoulder, and pulls out his arm to feed me. “They will come for you soon,” he says in a clipped tone. “You should feed.”

Was it only a dozen winters ago I was on the brink of madness, unable to sate my hunger? Now, I crouch in front of a man, concerned his feelings for me are too strong after so long together, because they can never be reciprocated the way he wishes them to be, even if I care for him in a way I cannot put into words. What sort of cruel existence is that for him?

“Come to the bed.” Rising to my feet, I take his hand.

“My lord?” Tru peers up at me, confusion wild in his wide gaze since I have never fed from him like that. But tonight feels fragile, like we’re in a delicate balance that needs care and comfort.

“You will need sleep afterward,” I explain. Gently, I tug him to his feet and lead him to my bed. His heartbeat races and the sound of his pulse pounds in my ears like a war drum. “And we have a long journey ahead of us.”

Tru blinks at me as I pull the furs back so he can lie down.

“A journey?”

“Yes. We travel with Lucian to Finfjord after the battle. So, I command you to stay in this bed, Tru,” I say more forcefully. “You will be warmer here. You will be safe. Am I understood?”

Nodding, Tru lays back against the goose down pillow, swallowing thickly as I pull up a stool beside the bed.

Laying his bare arm on the furs, our gazes linger on one another before I clear my throat. “Thank you for your offering.”

“Yes, my lord.” It’s a croak and locking eyes with Tru, I lift his arm toward my mouth.

There is no way around the intimacy of feeding. I have never fed from his neck, nor will I, but the scent of his skin chips away at my resolve. The feel of his warm arm in my chilly hands feels like fire in my palm, awakening every coiled, overwrought inch of my body in need of release. I learned long ago to embrace the euphoria as much as what’s left of my soul will allow. And this is it.

Running my nose along the vein in his arm, I inhale and lick the tender flesh in the crook of his elbow, and suck the soft skin before sinking my fangs into the supple flesh.

Tru moans, and my cock twitches. My heart thuds with power as I drag his blood deeper into my mouth. It coats my tongue and throat as it seeps into my ravenous body. It’s intoxicating and only remotely do I feel Tru’s body shift.

I suck harder, groaning as the warmth of him fills every inch of me. It enlivens every sense and heated velvet wraps around the cold parts of me, making my body hum, flaring a painful vitality that needs release.

With only my hand to sate my sex for so many winters, coming is never enough, and in the throes of bloodlust is no exception. Tru’s arousal coursing through me, thick and tantalizing in his blood and scent.

I need to fuck. But I won’t.

I want to. But I never do.

I never will.

I physically can’t.

“Let go, my lord,” Tru whispers. His hand skims over my knee and down my thigh, and my body pulses, vibrating and begging for release as I thrust my bulging cock into his palm, agitated by this impossible situation I grow tired of navigating.

“I wish you to feel no pain.” He squeezes my cock in my pants, a jolt of pure lust rushing through me. His heated palm and the pressure of his grip make me growl with yearning, and it’s all I can do to refrain from mounting him, claiming him as mine in every possible way.

But I am someone else’s. The thought is assaulting, grating over my skin and blaring painfully in my head, plaguing me as always. Fuck!

I snarl in frustration, grabbing Tru’s hand, still coaxing my cock, and pull it away with bruising pressure. He tries to pull his wrist from my grip, and I growl in warning, taking his blood deeper, sucking harder to sate the growing hunger. My mind swirls with agitation, my thoughts eroded with a need that will never be fulfilled.

“My lord?” Thorne’s voice is low and cautious as it carries in from outside, and the pulsing need to fuck recedes only slightly. I unhinge my mouth from Tru’s arm, gaze locked on his. Whatever my expression, Tru’s eyes widen slightly with terror.

“Sylas—”

“Give me a fucking moment!” I growl. When my nostrils flare, Tru exhales and tugs both his arms from my grasp.

Twigs snap as Thorne steps away from my tent, and I run my hand over my face and down my mouth, wiping the blood away. My body is a tempest over a calm sea—sated and yet vibrating with raw energy I’m desperate to expel.

“Never do that again, Tru,” I grind out as I squeeze my eyes shut. I palm the ache in my pants, willing my body’s impulses away. The lingering need hurts like hell, and with no time for release, I tell myself it is fuel for tonight’s battle.

Forcing my eyes open again, I look at Tru. “Do you understand?” My voice is ragged.

He nods, licking his dry lips nervously. “Apologies, my lord. I only wanted to—”

“Help.” I shake my head. “You mustn’t.”

His chest rises and falls and I know I’ve hurt him, or perhaps frightened him, but I cannot allow that again. “You say you do not want to hurt me,” I explain, softening my voice. “But whatever this curse—” I shake my head. “Breaking my vow physically hurts me, more than any blade in my chest ever could.”

Tru blinks at me.

“Do you understand?”

Again, he nods, and this time, I think he truly does.

Rising to my feet, I adjust my throbbing cock with a groan. My body is so hard with power it hurts.

Ready to kill and maim and wreak havoc on Blackhorn, I take Tru’s arm, lick the blood from his wounds so they will close, and pull the furs that had fallen off him over his body once more. “Stay and sleep. Tonight, I kill Blackhorn and everything he holds dear.”

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until next week….

xo, Lindsey (and Scarlet)

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. Create a free account and read for free.

The places:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

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

Meet Moose (created by Wonder)

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. Or read ahead in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark Reader Community. It’s free to join and follow.

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

Sylas Episode: “Plans”

“What else do we know about Blackhorn?” Imara, commander of the Sage Land shieldmaidens, asks, bracing her fists on her hips.

“That his fortress is cliff side, making it nearly impenetrable from all sides but one,” Arless answers. “And if the rumors are to be believed,” she continues, “Blackhorn possesses something important, a treasure of sorts. Something that could change the tide of this war, and we cannot let him have it.”

Thorne grins from his wide-legged stance by the fire. “Aye, and he needs this win.” Thorne glances around the war table. “I hear some of his troops deserted once they heard we’d arrived. He can’t afford to lose to us, or he’ll have no army left.”

“Or the Butcher King will enslave more of his people to fight for him,” Imara mutters. “All in the name of his god.”

“Forgive me, my lord,” Olaff cuts in, and he meets my gaze. “If you know of Blackhorn’s whereabouts, is it not better to kill him where he sleeps and be done with it?” He twists his dark mustache thoughtfully.

I’m about to answer when Arless snorts. “Where’s the fun in that? Besides,” she leans back against the wall, sounding bored. “If we kill Blackhorn in his sleep, what’s to stop Barron the Butcher from advancing Blackhorn’s soldiers without him?”

“The gods have granted us this mercy,” I add. “It never snows in the southlands. We have the advantage and must use it to weaken their numbers.”

“Especially,” Arless adds, “since the rest of their army continues north.”

“So,” I continue, “We do this tonight. His soldiers are at a disadvantage. We have no idea how long the snow will last, and without it, they know this land far better than we do.”

“Precisely.” Imara grits out. “Respectfully, my lord.” She continues, as if the moniker causes her physical pain. A servant refills the commander’s ale cup. “You forget we are not . . . like the Darkborn.” She peers around the circle of human hersir commanders and Darkborn. “We cannot see in darkness. Not if we are to win.” Her red hair is braided back, away from her face. The scar on her cheek is a constant reminder of the price she has paid to be here, and the only reason the shieldmaiden has offered her warriors and skill to our cause.

“What? Are you frightened?” Thorne taunts, his arms crossed over his chest where he leans against a tent pole. “You can stay close to me, if you like. I’ll keep you safe.” His eyebrows dance and Imara’s glare narrows on him.

“And you forget, Commander,” I tell her carefully, “that we will know the numbers standing against us and where they hide long before they know we are coming.” I nod to the map of the forestlands sprawled south of Glass Harbor. “And,” I say, offering her a compromise. “That is why we attack on a full moon, and why we will use flaming arrows.”

“So they will see us coming a mile away,” she spits.

“Only when it’s too late to do anything about it,” Arless counters, but her mind is clearly elsewhere as she admires the servant girl refilling the rest of the council’s cups.

Imara rests her fists on the table and leans in. “You may be immortal, my lords,” she says pointedly, “but your warriors are mortals who bleed and die. You are risking a great deal by putting your entire army at the same disadvantage as the southerners. Meanwhile, their numbers encroach on our people in the north.”

“I hear you, Imara,” I say patiently, and while I understand her bitterness toward us, it begins to wear thin. “However, day or night, raining or snow-bound, this is war. Men and women will die. It is to your advantage that the four of us—”

“And Moose,” Thorne adds cheekily, flipping a wood pick between his teeth with a cocky grin.

It’s an effort not to roll my eyes every time he goads a reaction from Imara.

“It is to your advantage,” I continue, glaring at him, “that the four of us are as strong as we can be, and that is at night. And that Blackhorn’s men who outnumber us are at the greatest disadvantages possible.”

Imara stares down at the soot-drawn cliffs and fortress on the map.

“When we have slain him,” I say earnestly. “We will head north again and meet the Torchkeepers. They have been fighting for three winters. They are depleted and in need of more men. The Darkborn will waylay them while we wait for our armies, if we must.” While I understand Imara’s concerns, our entire purpose is to crush these armies, and it must start with tearing the viper’s head from the body.

“Then, my lords,” Imara grits out again. “I have preparations to tend to.” She dips her head hastily and turns. “You know where to find me.” Then she strides out of the tent.

“She’s pleasant,” Arless mutters.

I glance at Arless and Lucian, who stare back at me from across the table, then I look at Thorne. He immediately looks away, and I refocus on the rest of our commanders. “Are there any other questions?”

Tatem and Henlock shake their heads, but Olaff, a jarl from the Iklund clans to the north of Frail Valley, eyes the map closely. “We can use the forest cover to our advantage,” he muses. “It’s General Blackhorn’s stronghold I worry about. With two of its walls facing the sea, they have a significant advantage should he make his way behind them.”

I meet Olaff’s gaze. “You leave Blackhorn to us,” I say calmly.

Olaff’s eyebrow raises. “I’m not sure I want to know.” He shakes his head, his eyes flicking to my mouth like he might see my fangs, and nods to the others. “I need rest if we’re to set out at dusk. Commanders.” He nods his farewell and strides away from the table and out of the tent. The other two take their leave and follow. Arless, Thorne, Lucian, and I stand around the table alone.

Arless runs her tongue over her lips as she watches the servant clear the cups from the table, and when the girl catches Arless staring, a shy smile parts her lips.

“Is there anything else, my lord?” the servant asks, and with a sigh, I shake my head. The servant dips in a small curtsey and leaves with her tray in hand.

“I need to fuck and feed,” Arless says with a weighty sigh. “No one bother me for at least an hour.” She strides around me. “Make that two.” Then she disappears out of the tent, hot on the servant’s heels.

Lucian remains silent as he swallows his irritation. At first, Arless said things like that to get a rise out of him. Now, I fear she is moving on, and Lucian remains fixed in the standoff that has existed between them since we were younger.

“When are you two going to pound it out and get on with this thing between you?” Thorne quips. “We’ve literally died and come back to life and you’re exactly where you were a lifetime ago.”

Lucian glares at him, but I feel his surge of loss and longing as he marches around the table.

“I’m serious. What even happened? Neither of you have told me,” Thorne calls after him, and Lucian stalks out of the tent in answer.

I meet Thorne’s gaze.

“Don’t look at me like that. You want to know as badly as I do. They’ve been in love with each other their whole lives, and yet they hate each other more than ever. It makes no damn sense.”

“That is not my concern.”

Thorne rubs Moose’s head as he looks curiously up at us from beside the fire. As a hellhound in a mastiff’s skin, I wonder if the fire makes him feel more at home.

“Well?” Thorne prompts. “Let’s hear it.”

“I know Imara is the only woman in camp who will not lay with you, brother.”

“Not this again—”

“But you push her too far. One day, she will grow tired of your games and pull her shieldmaidens from our army, and that loss to our army would be on you.” I give him a pointed look. “We need them.”

“She won’t leave the Darkborn,” Thorne says haughtily, and he plops into a leatherback chair by the fire. “You know what the Torchkeepers did to her father and sister because they would not convert. She wants justice as much as the rest of us.”

“Not if she hates us more than she hates them,” I warn. “We are a means to an end for her. Imara has no loyalty to us—the sight of us alone makes her sick.” Pain flickers in my brother’s eyes, but it disappears quickly. “If you are not careful, Thorne,” I say quietly, “you will push her even further away.”

I don’t know what it is about Imara that Thorne is drawn to, but I feel his pull to her. It’s visceral and impossible to ignore. And she wants nothing to do with him. A Darkborn—an abomination and another reason the peoples of the Winter Lands are divided. Zealous Torchkeepers or blood-thirsty monsters—we are all the same to Nordmen like her who only want peace. My heart, at least what’s left of it, aches for such a sentiment, because I once felt that way too.

Finally, Thorne nods, and his attention shifts to the fire as I turn to leave. Moose jumps to his feet, loping after me.

“You need to feed,” Thorne whispers.

The thought alone makes my body sing with bloodlust, and I run my hand over my face, exhaling a heavy breath. Not because I am physically tired, but because I am eternally exhausted. “I will,” I promise. “There is something I must do first.” And with that, I pull the tent flap aside and step out into the frozen woods.

Though camp is quieter than usual, the afternoon is bright and confuses my senses. Warriors rest to prepare for what lies ahead. Their death. Their glory. It will be a bloodbath, regardless. Fires burn in pits, warriors sharpening their weapons and murmuring in stilted conversation as heaviness hangs in the air.

My bearskin cape tugs in the wind as I make my way toward my tent, but I am not cold so much as comfortable with the weight of it on my back. One of only a few things that makes me feel like my old self; that makes me feel human. Moose trots alongside me, sniffing the ground and his tail wagging.

Moans of pleasure fill Arless’s tent as we pass. The servant girl’s blood smells like sweet honey scenting the air. It makes me hard and hungry, so I walk faster.

Thorne is right. I need to feed so I will be at my strongest when the sun sinks low, and the sky darkens. I’ve grown used to feeding now, a cursory and necessary act, but even if it helps, I am never entirely sated. We all know why, but I’ve lost so much of myself to the darkness, I refuse to lose what little is left. No matter how many solstices my wife has been gone. No matter how much her memory fades; it’s all I can do to hold on to it. To remember why I am doing any of this at all.

I smell my vessel awaiting me in my tent, and can hear the calm melodic sound of a human heartbeat. Pulling the flap back, I peer inside. Tru’s long black hair and back are to me, tanned skin flickering with the torch light within. “I will return.” Tru’s sharp profile shifts lightly in my direction. “There is something I must do first.”

“Yes, my lord.” His voice is quiet. Patient. Knowing he is there calms me and gives me solace for what I am about to do next.

Swallowing thickly, I pass between Thorne’s tent and my own, heading for the edge of the clearing. “Here,” I say, and Moose sniffs around the snow-dusted ground before he finds an acceptable location. Using his massive paws, he digs. He sniffs and licks his chops, making quick work of the frozen ground.

When Moose deems the hole is large enough, he pauses, looks up at me, and I crouch down beside him. My heart squeezes in my chest as I stare at the unpacked earth. In the silence, I can still hear Letty laughing in the fields back home with Moose as they search for rabbit holes. I can still feel the sun on my face and the sound of my name on Milla’s lips as she calls me into the house for supper after a long day with the plow. I know Moose remembers it too, and no matter how many holes we’ve dug, no matter how many winters have passed, this moment is when I feel most human. When I remember Sylas Von Wolfson, the man. When I can scantly remember what it felt like to be him.

Moose pants with exertion, and sliding my hand inside my cloak, I pull out the pouch of wildflower seeds tucked in my trousers.

Moose sniffs the pouch with a whimper and I hold it over the upturned soil, sprinkling a few seeds into the hole. “For you, hummingbird,” I whisper. I can’t help the crack in my voice, and I don’t care to try. Instead, I allow the pain to fill me. I allow their memory to fuel me for the battle to come. To remember why I do this.

I don’t know how long I stare at the hole, but finally, Moose licks my face, stirring my thoughts. “I know,” I mutter and tuck the pouch back into my pants before covering the hole with the loose earth. “We’re going.”

Rising to my feet, I exhale a final whispered prayer to the memory of my family and turn back to my tent. I’m nearly there when the runes on my body heat and a familiar tingle unfurls through me.

Moose stands stalk-still and I peer into the treeline, knowing she is in there. Whatever her tidings, Hel’s presence is rarely a good thing. Moose whimpers happily as he races ahead of me, disappearing into the trees.

“The Wolf is weak,” Hel muses. “You have not yet fed.” Her voice is a purr as I step through the trees. Hel stands in warrior garb, cast in the muted light filtering through the leafless treetops as she rubs Moose’s head. He stands to her waist, and yet he is only a quarter of his natural size.

Two horses flank each side of her, impervious to the giant mastiff at their feet. All of them are massive—a version of white—and their manes flutter in the breeze as they stand excitedly, snorting and nickering, as if they are waiting for something.

“What is this?” I walk toward the steed, whose gaze is fixed on me. The pink around her nose is freckled and her eyes are a piercing blue. She paws at the forest floor as I draw closer and rest my palm on her neck to soothe her. “You bring us horses?” I say, confounded. “Unless they are hellhounds in horse’s skin, they will not help us win this battle.” I stroke the steed’s neck, the warmth and pulse of her life giving me unexpected comfort.

“They are for what comes after,” Hel offers. “Her name is Sleipnira.”

I can’t help my furrowed brow and utter surprise. “What comes next?” I confirm and look at the four animals again with fresh eyes. “To what end?” Powerful the gods may be, but they do nothing without reason, and their aid comes at a high price indeed.

Hel stares impatiently at me, unanswering. Figures.

Sleipnira nudges my arm, her eyes closing as she leans into me like we’re old friends. I rub my hand over her forelock, her white mane cascading forward as she lowers her head in fealty to me.

“Nira,” I breathe. “I like it.” It’s a bond I feel in my soul, and for the first time in so long, a joyful warmth washes over me.

“She was made for you,” Hel explains. “She is the queen of horses, the fastest and most powerful. And this,” Hel continues as the horse beside Nira lifts his head higher. He’s white with pale gray spots over his face and shoulders. “This is Hati, made for Arless. He is stubborn and determined, just as she is.” My lips curve in a smile as I stroke his face before moving onto the others. “This male,” I say, seeing something different in his eyes, something cunning and curious. “He is for Lucian.” I’m not sure how I know, but somehow, I do.

“He is Hugin. Clever and strong.” The deep gray around his mouth and eyes match the gray streaks in his mane and tail. “And she is Frey. Sneaky but loyal and faster than lightning. She and Thorne will do well together.” Frey lips at my clothes and nudges my cape like she’s looking for treats.

I run my fingers through her mane, shaggy and white, and the longest of all the horses. “If it is food you seek, clever one, you will not find it with me.” Frey looks at me with boredom, and I surprise myself with a chuckle. “And the price we pay for such gifts?” I ask, never forgetting everything comes at a cost.

Hel rubs Hugin’s face, but the goddess’s eyes never stray from me. “When you have won this battle,” she says evenly, “you and Lucian will ride for Finfjord while the others return to Qisp Keep.”

“Why, exactly, are we riding to Finfjord? And without the Darkborn or our army?”

“You will know soon enough,” Hel says. “But you must go alone, so as not to draw attention to yourselves. It is imperative you go, Sylas, if you are to win the battles that lie ahead. Ask for a man called Koldis when you arrive.” Hel nods toward camp. “Now, go.” The horses start a lazy walk away from her. “Feed,” she tells me. “Prepare yourself for battle. It’s uncertain how long this storm might last.” There’s a smile in her voice, though her features give nothing away.

Turning her words over in my mind, I walk shoulder to shoulder with Nira through the trees.

“Tonight, the threads of Fate begin to unravel, Sylas.” Despite my senses, Hel’s voice barely reaches my ears, and I stop short. When I turn to look at her, however, the goddess is already gone.

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until next week….

xo, Lindsey (and Scarlet)

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. Create a free account and read for free.

The places:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. Or read ahead in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark Reader Community. It’s free to join and follow.

Interlude

From the Journal Archives of the Berserker King…

Summer 828

Since those first weeks of unending torment, I have practiced my letters, a skill I need when intercepting correspondence, seeking vessels for feeding, and coordinating armies. And if I am honest with myself, I am uncertain how else to track the days or measure our efforts. As time stretches on, I worry my memories will begin to fade. So it is in these letters and reflections I find a sliver of sanity. I cannot sleep. When I close my eyes, I see my family lit with flames. Food tastes like ash on my tongue. And I have not fed the bloodlust in days. I cannot. I will not if it means desecrating my vow to my wife, even if her words haunt me. I promised to never forget her, to never forget who I am and what I fight for. And I will not, no matter what it costs me in this hellish life.

-S

Summer 828

I killed an innocent man today. It was not my intention, but the thirst was too strong. In witnessing the toll my defiance has taken on the Darkborn, I gave in to the need to feed. Though I tell myself I did it for my friends to release them from my pain and hunger, it was out of weakness and desperation to feel something other than anguish as well. But in allowing the monster to surface, I took a man’s life. A man with a family. A man with a whole life ahead of him, gone in mere moments. No matter how many times Constance has cleaned the stains of blood off the study floor, it’s still there, remnants only I can see, that I cannot take my eyes away from. This cannot be my life. I must find another way.

-S

Winter 828

If the Darkborn could kill me, I think they might. My erratic feeding has taken its toll on the brotherhood. I know I am selfish, for my pain is theirs, and yet, I cannot bring myself to feed and fuck as they do, even if it means innocent life must be sacrificed to sate me. Something prevents it in my very core and as much as I want to give in and put us all out of our misery, I cannot. I have never loathed this life so much as I do now. It is misery. It is pain. And it is never ending.

-S

Winter 828

A caravan of travelers arrived today, one among their party a powerful seer. She has been touched by the gods. I sensed them around her the moment they entered the city. I have only seen her from afar and still her eyes found mine. Her gaze unnerves me to the bone, and she has requested an audience with me alone. I have learned to be wary of those not born of night, and yet, I sense the seer has been brought to Frail Valley for reasons not yet known to me.

-S

Winter 828

I have found a way to endure the hunger, keep my strength, and spare innocent life as well as my conscience. Through her riddles and vagueness—her knowledge of the future she keeps close to her breast—the seer has helped me find balance, and in turn, she has helped all of us find a sense of peace. For I now have a vessel, one I have no wish to fuck, that I can feed from regularly to keep the blood-thirst in check, and spare the others my moods and hunger pains as well. It is a simple solution, one I can see so clearly now above the haze of hunger. And for the first time in many moons, I feel hope.

-S

Summer 829

It has been one winter since we woke as Darkborn. In the first days, we tried to fight the creatures living within us. But as time wore on, and we found ourselves at our worst, we learned to embrace the darkness instead of shun it. We pushed our limits, reveling in how fast we could run, how high we could jump, and how unstoppable we were at the pinnacle of our strength. We discovered Thorne’s primordial tracking skills, his sense of smell the most potent. Arless was easily the fastest, her agility far superior to any of ours. And as for Lucian, of course, he has always been the strongest Nordman I’ve ever known. Though, I’m not sure we could ever be called that again.

Despite the growing pains, it has become easier for us to embrace those parts of us as we find a rhythm in this new heartbeat of life. For the first time in our rebirth, I think we feel as Hel intended, her immortal instruments of fury and death. For seeing what we can achieve together makes the hope of what’s coming more promising as we build an army to have at our backs.

But every ounce of strength comes at a cost. A cost that requires daily replenishing, especially in battle. A cost that weighs on me daily, and through our preternatural connection, my deficiencies weigh on the others as well.

Arless claims my self control is what makes me the leader, but I feel anything but in control. Every part of me teeters on the edge of hunger and self loathing, and it is all I can do to keep myself in check.

For the memory of my family.

For the honorable man I used to be.

If I cannot seek justice in their name, it is I who becomes the monster.

Vampires. Those are the whispers spread throughout Barron the Butcher’s ranks after we raided the Torchkeeper camps months ago. The four of us ambushed three hordes and two scouting parties, preventing them from advancing west toward the Winksyn Woods, where men, women, and children did not seek cleansing, nor a war they were not apt to win. Though we saved some, it is nothing compared to those Barron’s forces have massacred and tortured in pagan sanctuaries and peaceful lands.

Still, our victory did not go unnoticed. A strange turn of events followed, for when we returned to the keep after months of learning the land with our new senses, the village did not stare and whisper with fear, but with a quiet reverence. A respect. I might go so far as to say that word of our victories has turned into loyalty at last. They leave us gifts during a full moon, which they are convinced we are born from, since our strength and victories rise with the moon. Virgins, livestock, jars of blood. No matter what we tell them, the gifts appear, so we have stopped saying anything at all. They place it at the altar of the Darkborn King. Arless insists I accept the moniker and show gratitude.

But I will not, lest she refrains from berating me, insisting I take a vessel the way she does. No matter how necessary she thinks it is for me, I am not ready for that, nor do I think I ever will be.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson

Summer 833

It has taken weeks, not months, for our enemy to whisper about the dark ones roving the land, capturing innocents. They fear us, for we grow stronger by the day, our minds and bodies in tune with one another in a way we never expected. With Hel’s power coursing through our veins, we are connected, and at night, when the runes are their most powerful and the bloodlust the most insatiable, we feel that in each other, too.

Perhaps that was part of Hel’s plan all along, to bind us together in the most fearsome way, so our senses alone would drive us to do her bidding. But with each passing moon, we hone our skills more, wielding our acute senses to our will, becoming unstoppable. We have left battlefields drenched in the enemy’s blood. We have ravaged their land, leaving nothing behind when it suits us. That is the power of the Darkborn. We are the night. We are the vengeance and wrath of those unjustly slain. We are the villagers who cannot fight for themselves and our names are feared throughout the kingdom. Soon, the Torchkeepers will be no more.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

Summer 834

We have amassed an army, greater than anything the North has ever seen. Shieldmaidens and warriors from all over the land come to fight with the Darkborn army. While their instinct is to fear us, their respect and thirst for vengeance outweigh their nature. They want to fight the evil that continues to spread across Nordholm, consuming the weak, the unprotected, and the misguided.

In all of my years in this cause, I finally have hope that it will soon end. Our enemy is torn between disbelief that we exist and curiosity, and both will get them killed.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

Winter 838

The years weigh heavy. This life is unnatural. Some days I don’t know myself. I don’t recognize the man I have become—a creature who lives by day but stalks the night. Who feeds on blood—who would lose my mind in the thirsty haze without it.

The feeling was indescribable at first—addicting and impossible to ignore. The raw power that hums in my body and sings through my veins on the onslaught feels tainted, and yet, I cannot live without it. The others have given in to all of their base needs, and though I have yet to fully embrace the darkness inside of me, I pay the price for it every day. I can feel their hunger, just as I can feel when it’s sated, different from mine. Always different—complete. A purring cat of content. And just as they sense the lack of satisfaction in me. It unsettles them, but bound as the Darkborn or not, I will not be swayed.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

Winter 841

There is no end in sight. For every Krosses army we eradicate, another arrives on our shores, knowing us and understanding our battle tactics more completely. The slaughter continues. Innocent people’s blood stains the snow and anger and resentment stews throughout the North. The Torchkeepers struggle in the harsh Winter Lands, but it is not enough to deter the generals who have only become more hungry for pagan blood than ever. In the wake of our resistance, the Torchkeepers have resorted to torturing those who will not be cleansed as an example of an alternative penance, which the God of Penance and Light requires. Where are our gods in this? How can they allow their people to suffer? The northern lands are vast and Barron the Butcher’s army advances tenfold.

Rage is all that fills me anymore, and I have made it my single mission to find and eradicate the Butcher’s newest general, Blackhorn. It is his armies that are smarter and more equipped to fight and succeed in our lands of late. It is his missionaries who come not only with books, but with swords and arrows. Only, he remains at the border of the Winter and Summer Lands, so we must sail to Swindfell if we are to stop him. Unlike the others, Blackhorn breathes battle. His every move is calculated and strategic. He is a man of patience and a patient man in the throes of war is a dangerous man.

My spies tell me he has studied every account he could find of our kind, studied every battle the Nordmen have ever won, and that converted pagans support him. He uses our strategies against us.

Whether it is my senses warning me, or my instinct, this man will ruin me. But until that day comes, I will make him suffer as our people suffer, and I mean to blot him out before he can do worse. For General Blackhorn has not yet seen all the Darkborn are capable of, though he soon will.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

Winter 845

It is as I feared. Lucian intercepted correspondence today, headed for a ship sailing to the Summer Lands. It was addressed to General Blackhorn, giving away our numbers and locations near the southern borders. Blackhorn has spies everywhere. Some of our own men turned against us. We may be revered by many, but we are hated and feared by others, and Blackhorn has used that to his advantage.

I have patiently waited for him to make a false move, but even now, something feels off. He is clever, and this oversight could be a trap. Nonetheless, he is at a disadvantage too. For now, we know the location of his stronghold and that he holds a treasure he is certain will change the tide of this war, whatever it may be.

Still, the letter sails with the ship for the Glass Shores on the morrow, as if nothing is amiss. Only, we will be right behind it.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

Winter 845

We have found Blackhorn, and while there is no doubt he knows of our arrival after today, he is not ready for the hell the Darkborn will unleash this night. His keep is three hundred strong and while they outnumber us by nearly a hundred men, the rest of his army pushes north where he expects we’d remained. And now the Darkborn army is on his shores.

Tonight, I vow to suck the life from Blackhorn to show the south what the Darkborn army is capable of, lest they forget.

-Sylas Von Wolfsson, General of the Darkborn Army

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until next week….

xo, Lindsey (and Scarlet)

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. Create a free account and read for free.

The places:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

💥 This is a 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 brainstorming.

*Need to catch up? Read here to see what you missed last week. Or read ahead in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark Reader Community. It’s free to join and follow.

🫦 Read with caution. Vikings and spiciness ahead.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

Arless Episode: “Control”

Fresh blood thrums through my body. My heart pounds with a toxic mixture of sated desire and fear, and every nerve ending tingles with fire and energy as my mind spins.

I’m sequestered in my room for a whole ten heartbeats when there’s the lightest knock at the door. I know it isn’t Lucian. He wouldn’t dare come to my room unless it was life or death. And Sylas would know to give me my space.

I nearly laugh at the idea of Constance outside my door. She would never come to our rooms knowing what we are—what we’ve done—and I don’t blame her in the slightest.

“Go away, Thorne,” I growl quietly and pull the covers over my head, though I’m not the slightest bit cold. The weight is comforting. Familiar. And I want to crawl beneath them and hide for as long as the fire and hunger in me will allow, muting the world around me.

Flickering firelight plays over the thin blanket and I watch it dance. A scathing, screeching memory invades my mind.

Thorne’s marriage celebration.

The fire.

Hel’s cool breath and salacious promises that rose from the ashes.

But even more than the incessant hunger and burning need that is never sated, was the screaming.

The muted darkness was all that gave me solace when we tried locking ourselves away in the beginning. Only after two days did we realize wooden doors were pointless. That’s when the night screams filled the corridors and the rumors started. The day our staff disappeared, and the village started to talk. But they aren’t rumors if they’re true.

“Not going to happen, Ari.” Thankfully, Thorne’s words are little more than a whisper, because the mice in the walls are loud enough, and the crackling Birchwood in the hearth is blaring and grating on the last of my nerves. I couldn’t bear his baritone too.

He opens my door and I pull back the covers as he pokes his head in. Thorne’s red braids fall around his face, and the worried look on his rugged features melts my heart, but only slightly.

“You might as well come in at this point,” I grumble. “You’re letting out the heat.”

Quietly, Thorne closes the door behind him, and with careful footsteps, he walks to the fire. “What,” he says, crouching to stoke the flames, “suddenly you get cold again?”

“If only,” I mutter, and sitting up, I pull my legs to my chest, shaking my head. “I never thought I would miss mortal problems like that, but I do.”

He pokes and prods the wood. “Aye. Funny how that works, eh?” Rising to his feet, he comes over to my bed, running his hand down his face as he sits on the creaking bedframe.

If we hadn’t seen each other in excruciating pain and utterly feral, I might feel a modicum of unease, naked with a blanket falling off me. But I don’t. Thorne’s always been more like a brother, and now . . . Now we share a curse that precludes social etiquette and anything remotely normal. There are no boundaries between us. He’s seen me drinking blood from a man’s neck like a rabid animal, after all.

I can practically hear him blinking. “Stop looking at me like that,” I tell him, finally meeting his gaze. I lift an eyebrow. “I won’t break . . . even if I’ve never felt more broken.”

His expression is unchanging, and I wonder where his thoughts go.

Until the change, I never noticed the way Thorne’s heartbeat quickens when he’s worried, or the way his eyes crinkle with concerns, even when he fronts his feelings with a cocky smile. And as the gold flecks illuminate the green in his eyes, I can see why Tilly loved him so much. His ego might bulge bigger than his biceps at times, but his heart is just as big and mushy when it comes to those he loves.

“I know you won’t break—you’ve always had more fortitude than all of us combined. But that doesn’t mean you aren’t in pain, or scared, or angry like the rest of us.”

I shake my head, staring at the flames in the hearth as I concentrate my focus on one image, one noise, instead of the barrage of them overwhelming me with each beat of my heart.

“It’s never been like that before,” I say in Thorne’s silence. “It was amazing and horrible all at once. I thought my head was going to explode.”

He pours me a mug of water from my bedside table and hands it to me. Immediately, I gulp it down. It’s more of a habit than a necessity. But the coolness eases the burn in my throat and makes me feel more normal.

“If feeding strengthens us, it makes sense that feeding during the day, when we’re less in control of our senses, would allow us to harness the overwhelm better. Especially with the sunlight, when the world is so much brighter and louder.”

I feel the furrow in my brow deepen as I think about that, ticking off the list of overpowering sensations that throb like a gaping wound through every inch of me.

We sit in silence as his heartbeat, the flames, the mice and creaking rafters fade to the back of my mind, and then it dawns on me . . .

“Thorne . . . It worked.”

His green eyes shift to me.

“I didn’t kill him. I fucked the hell out of him and fed from him, but I didn’t kill the southerner.” I blink at him. “Did I?”

A rush of ease settles over me, but Thorne shakes his head. “Not at all. The bastard was swaying on his feet a little, but he was very much alive when Sylas paid him.”

Nodding, I bite the inside of my cheek, replaying the consensual gratifying frenzy of flesh and blood in my mind. “There was no feverish compulsion to drain him, only to feel good, unlike the other times I’ve fed. It’s almost as if—” I remember the scent of desire permeating off him and the swelling of his cock. “As if his willingness took the predatory instinct out of it. Like, without the chase, it was more perfunctory, you know? And the desire, I think it gave me something more than hunger to focus on.”

Thorne leans against the post of my bed, rolling a piece of thread between his fingers. “Perhaps that’s the key to it all, then.” His furrowed brow eases a little. “We find willing vessels for feeding and fucking.”

Then he frowns again and we both arrive at the same conclusion at once.

“Sylas,” we whisper.

“If sex and desire are required for balance,” Thorne whispers, his voice sad, “Sylas will be gutted.”

“What about you?” I rasp and my heart hurts for him—for both of them.

It’s only been two weeks since our families were ripped away from us. I didn’t have a wife or children, and my struggle has been wretched. But Thorne and Sylas did, and there is no way they are ready for something like this. Even if their lives depend on it. And Sylas . . . I know him as well as I know myself, and he would rather starve than cheat on the memory of his wife, and that’s exactly what it would feel like to him.

“We might not have a choice,” Thorne croaks, and while I know he misses his beloved Tilly, losing his sister devastated him differently, perhaps even more. “We already know what happens when we wait too long and deny ourselves.”

“There’s always the option of not giving a fuck,” I say wryly. “We could simply let ourselves loose in the world. We’d be unstoppable. Strong. We’d have each other.”

Thorne smirks. “And in a hundred years’ time we’d be miserable, alone, and have lost all of our honor.” Thorne shrugs. “Sure, why not?”

“It would be easier,” I admit.

“Aye, and we would hate ourselves more than we already do.”

“All we can do is try,” I remind him. “But that’s easy for me to say.” I give him a sad smile and rest my cheek on my knee.

“Lucian might be an issue as well.” Thorne shakes his head and runs his fingers through his beard. “He was in a state when you ran out of the room.”

I don’t have the energy to think of Lucian’s reaction to this—to me and the southerner. Not when I’m trying to grasp hold of a shred of control in a never-ending future. And not when I will need to feed again soon if I’m to keep the desperation at bay.

“The southerner.” My eyes widen. “Is he still here?”

Thorne shakes his head. “I heard the door close when I was coming up the stairs. Though, if the connection was as good between you as it sounded—” He clicks his tongue. “Something tells me he’ll have no qualms coming back.”

Leaning back against my pillows, I stare at the fire, a tightly wound knot of uncertainty. “Feeding isn’t our only problem and Hel’s too busy sitting on her jagged black throne, watching us massacre our people while we figure this out for ourselves.”

Thorne leans his head back, dipping his chin ever so slightly. “Aye. We need an army if all that we’ve done wasn’t for nothing.” His timbre is calm, his thoughts distant. “We need to get ourselves straight first. There is time to figure the rest out.”

“Thorne, our people are dying,” I say, though after what we’ve learned today, I don’t feel as helpless as I did when the day started.

His eyes meet mine in earnest. “It will all get sorted.” He swallows thickly. “It has to.”

“Sylas?” I whisper. Having felt his desperate hunger, I know our fearless leader is in pain and has denied his need to feed for far too long.

Thorne dips his chin and runs his fingers over his braided red beard. “He hasn’t slept or fed.”

“And we know he won’t fuck,” I finish for him.

Thorne cringes at the words as if they physically hurt him, because they do. Everything about all of this affects us all, and while we’ve always been tied together in some way, this is different.

Now that I’ve fed, I can feel the entire house even hungrier than before, craving what I have. Every compulsive swallow each of them takes is a breath of wanting that stirs inside me. It’s building—nudging me like a depraved, ravenous sickness.

Then, low and deep somewhere in the castle, a growl rumbles through the corridor. It thrums with warning and sharpens with desperation, and when a crash follows, Thorne and I rush for the door.

There’s more Darkborn coming next week!

Until next week….

xo, Lindsey (and Scarlet)

P.S. If you want to read ahead in the Darkborn’s story, you can find more chapters in my Scarlet Hearts After Dark reader community. Create a free account and read for free.

💥 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.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

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:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

💥 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.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

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:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

💥 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.

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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.

💀 💀 💀 💀 💀

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:

💋Learn more about Scarlet St. James

💋Join the Scarlet Hearts After Dark Community

Alter Ego:

❤️‍🔥Learn more about Lindsey Pogue

❤️‍🔥Join Lindsey’s Rogue Reader Community

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

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. :)