A Charge of Valor

A GRANT OF ARMS (Book #8)

A SKY OF SPELLS (Book #9)

A SEA OF SHIELDS (Book #10)

A REIGN OF STEEL (Book #11)

A LAND OF FIRE (Book #12)

A RULE OF QUEENS (Book #13)

THE SURVIVAL TRILOGY

ARENA ONE: SLAVERSUNNERS (Book #1)

ARENA TWO (Book #2)

THE VAMPIRE JOURNALS

TURNED (Book #1)

LOVED (Book #2)

BETRAYED (Book #3)

DESTINED (Book #4)

DESIRED (Book #5)

BETROTHED (Book #6)

VOWED (Book #7)

FOUND (Book #8)

RESURRECTED (Book #9)

CRAVED (Book #10)

FATED (Book #11)

Listen to THE SORCERER’S RING series in audio book format!

Now available on:

Amazon

Audible

iTunes

Chapter One

Gwendolyn lay face down in the grass, feeling the cold winter breeze rush over her bare skin, and as her eyes fluttered open, slowly, distantly, the world came back into focus. She had been in some faraway place, in a field radiant with sunlight, flowers, Thor and her father by her side, all of them laughing and happy. Everything had been perfect in the world.

But now, as she peeled open her eyes, the world before her could not have been more different. The ground was hard, cold, and, standing over her, slowly gaining his feet, was not her father, not Thor – but a monster: McCloud. Done with her, he slowly rose, buckled his pants, and gazed down with a satisfied look.

In a rush, it all came back to her. Her surrender to Andronicus. His betrayal. Her being attacked by McCloud. Her cheeks flushed red as she realized how naive she had been.

She lay there, her whole body hurting, her heart breaking, and more than any time in her life, she wanted to die.

Gwendolyn opened her eyes further and saw Andronicus’ army, scores of soldiers, all watching the scene, and her shame deepened. She should never have surrendered to this creature; she wished, instead, she had gone down fighting. She should have listened to Kendrick and the others. Andronicus had played to her sacrificial instincts, and she had fallen for it. She wished she would have met him in battle: even if she had died, at least then she could have gone down with her dignity, her honor, intact.

Gwendolyn knew with certainty, for the first time in her life, that she was about to die. But somehow, that no longer bothered her. She no longer cared about dying – she just cared about dying her way – and she wasn’t ready to go down yet.

As she lay there, face down, Gwendolyn furtively reached out and grasped a clump of dirt in one hand.

“You can get up now, woman,” McCloud ordered gruffly. “I’m through with you. It’s time for others to have a turn.”

Gwen clutched the dirt so hard her knuckles turned white, and prayed that this worked.

In one quick motion she spun around and threw the clump of dirt into McCloud’s eyes.

He had not expected it, and he screamed and stumbled back, raising his hands to try to wipe the dirt out of his eyes.

Gwen took advantage of the moment. Raised in King’s Castle, she had been reared by the King’s warriors, and they had always taught her to attack a second time, before your enemy had a chance to recover. They had also taught her a lesson she had never forgotten: whether she carried a weapon or not, she was always armed. She could always use the enemy’s weapon.

Gwen reached over, extracted the dagger from McCloud’s belt, raised it high, and plunged it between his legs.

McCloud shrieked even louder, removing his hands from his eyes and grabbing his groin. Blood flowed between his legs as he reached down and pulled out the dagger, gasping.

She was thrilled with herself for landing the blow, for getting at least this small revenge. But to her surprise, the wound, which would have downed anyone else, did not slow him. This monster was unstoppable. She had wounded him badly, right where he deserved it, but had not killed him. It had not even made him sink to his knees.

Instead, McCloud extracted the dagger, dripping with blood, and sneered down at her with a look of death. He began to descend for her, clutching the dagger with shaking hands, and Gwendolyn knew her time had come. At least she would die with some small satisfaction.

“Now I’m going to carve out your heart and feed it to you,” he said. “Prepare to learn what real pain means.”

Gwendolyn braced herself for the dagger plunge, prepared to meet a painful death.

A scream rang out, and after a shocked moment, Gwendolyn was surprised to realize the scream was not her own. It was McCloud; he was shrieking in agony.

Gwen lowered her hands and looked up, confused. McCloud had dropped the dagger. She blinked several times, trying to understand the sight before her.

McCloud stood there with an arrow lodged in his eye. He shrieked, blood pouring from the socket as he raised a hand and grabbed at the arrow. She could not understand. He had been shot. But how? By whom?

Gwen turned in the direction from which the arrow had sailed, and her heart soared to see Steffen, standing there, holding a bow, hiding amidst a huge group of soldiers. Before anyone else could figure out what was going on, Steffen fired off six more arrows, and one by one, the six soldiers standing beside McCloud fell, arrows piercing through all of their throats.

Steffen reached back to fire more, but was finally spotted and pounced on by a large group of soldiers, who subdued him and pummeled him down to the ground.