Gifts from the Stars and Night Creatures
A happy Halloween from me and a deliciously haunting excerpt from my favorite dark fairy tale.
Happy Halloween, Book Monsters!! 🖤💜🧡
It’s a busy kind of day for many of you, I know, but I just wanted to share this scene from what I consider my most “spooky romantic” book. Plus, I wanted to pop in and say hello after a long period of not posting here in the lair. As you might have noticed, I’ve been a little off the grid lately… more on that later. For now, I’m doing a double duty posting and sending this out as a spooky feels offering, as well as a Thorny Thursday post. I’m not sure if that theme is going today or not, but there’s always room for romance, I say. ;)
If you’re looking for great fiction, check out
, the host of the Thorny Thursday and who is always connecting readers to writers. She’s even put together an amazing compilation of writings for Team Halloween, which you can find on her page.Now, my amazing book loving Monsters, please enjoy a small bit of this haunting, dark fairy tale romance - Odile, Legend of the Black Swan.
~Excerpt from Odile, Legend of the Black Swan~
Through a winding hall, she went until she stood in the same spot she had with Azarus. A great window she hadn’t noticed then looked out onto a gloomy morning. These mountains, it seemed, surrounded her at every turn, their cloak of mist ever present. She’d witnessed the sun burn through them a few times since she’d been here, but if the mighty black peaks ever welcomed a cheery day, she had yet to see it.
She liked that though. Not being a child of day, she found comfort in the dim setting, even if it added further to the dark enchantment of this place. It kept it seductive and hidden only revealing certain mysteries one by one, just like its master. Her heartbeat picked up as she thought of the man behind the door. He was the same as those mountains, a wonder to behold swathed in mystery.
In the view beyond the window, she searched the fog for her falcon again. The sight of her night hunter might calm her before this meeting, but she knew she wouldn’t see it. It was day no matter how gloomy.
As if she’d conjured some sinister magic by even thinking of him, the heavy plank door eased open with a gust from out of nowhere. Odile shivered in the breeze.
“There you are, mistress!”
Berthe appeared at the other end of the hall.
“I’ve been searching high and low for you. The master wishes for you to join him at the table this morn.”
“I thought…” Odile looked back at the open doorway.
Azarus’s words last night, ‘make a study of these walls,’ had intrigued her. She’d meant to examine them today. She shook her head.
“… never mind. Of course, I’ll come. Lead the way, Berthe.”
The girl wasted no more time, turning back the way she’d come. Odile followed her down the same stairs she’d left by the night before, then through the main hall to a large dining area.
A cracked wooden table with raw edges stood in yet another grim space. One thing could be said for the dining room, at least there were windows to let in the light. Never mind they also brought a draft. A fire roared at one side of the room, behind the master of this bleak estate, its glow framing him like some kind of demon lord. Azarus’s eyes fell on her the instant she entered the room.
His elbows rested on the table. Those markings along his cheekbone stood out against his tan skin and the stark white of his shirt. The loose fabric did nothing to soften his appearance. She doubted anything ever could. Even in knightly garb, he was too raw, too heathen. The markings and his eyes cast a powerful spell about him.
“Welcome, my lady,” he dipped his head, keeping his eyes locked on hers. “Thank you for joining me for this morning’s humble repast.”
“I am grateful for the invitation, my lord.”
His hands came apart and he gestured for her to take the chair at the other end of the long table. Once she was seated, Berthe entered with a cart and served them bread, cheese, sausages and wine. They ate in silence, Odile steeling glances of him the whole time.
Questions whirled around in her head like a storm. Why did he not mention that she’d tried to leave? Why wasn’t he angry? Her thoughts went back to the tapestry room… and the kiss. That alone brought up a hundred questions. Finally, she could contain them no longer.
“I thought you wished for me to go back to the other room, my lord, to… study the walls, as you said.”
He looked at her as he used his napkin. Finally, he dropped the linen on the table and smiled.
“Eager to be helpful now are you, Swan?”
Odile shrugged.
“I like the weaving there.” She offered, but no more.
He’d told her very little about it. That it depicted the history of his lineage brought her curiosity of it to the forefront of her imagination.
He nodded.
“Do you know that kind of magic, Swan?”
She didn’t know what he meant.
“The telling of the stars, the ways of the Magi—did The Owl teach you this?”
Her eyes lifted to the tattoos on his cheek. Stars. Of course, they were.
“Rothebart kept his mysteries to himself,” she said. “Most of what I know of sorcery, I learned by observing.”
It was not an untrue statement. Anything she knew about her shortcomings she had learned partly from the wizard’s railing at her, but also by watching him. She would admit to a fascination and a yearning for his abilities, if only for the feeling of accomplishment it would have brought. That alone was most likely enough to damn her for all time. Though she hated Rothebart, the motherless girl she’d been would have secretly delighted in any small amount of approval. If that made her wicked, so be it.
“I’m certain anything I know pales in comparison to your knowledge, my lord.”
He gave a slight bow of his head at that. In the low light of the fire, he could have been the devil himself.
“Indeed, I am sure of it,” he agreed, chuckling. “But I came by my tricks the hard way, through trial and error, with no one to observe. The grace of the swan was never bestowed on me.”
“No one taught you, my lord? What of your tribe by the sea?”
“Yes, what of them?” His tone grew strange. He sounded angry, making her regret she’d spoken at all. But then he looked at her and his hardness eased. “Your eyes, Lady Odile, they are different in the daylight. Green gems.” He smiled. “And you told me your star was dead.”
He confused her with his sudden change of topic and demeanor, but his comment stirred a warmth inside her not unlike his kiss.
“Maybe you’re right, though, sorceress. Maybe it isn’t the stars that light you but a fire.” Odile’s lips opened in surprise, but he continued. “There’s a mountain out of legend in the old lands that does the same. It glows.”
“Glows, my lord?”
He nodded.
“From a fire deep within that has raged for a thousand years.”
Odile felt hot despite the drafty room. All of these ways he exuded power over her so subtly—making her feel things, want things—it rattled her unlike anything she’d ever known. She had to put a stop it.
“Your tribe, my lord?” She changed the subject.
“The Swan wishes to hear a different story.”
“You claim you have heard my stories, sir.”
“I have.”
“Then I think it only fair.”
He leaned back in his chair, observing her as if she required contemplation. His position was relaxed, sensual. Knife held in his hand, he rolled it idly between his fingers. She watched his hand move above his languid pose. Before long, her eyes became fixed on the knife, seeing nothing else. A dreamlike quality came into the air, or maybe she imagined it.
“Long ago,” he said, startling her from her mesmerized state, “the Caspari Magi were fooled by a powerful wizard by the name of Ok’ai. It was their great misfortune to be discovered by one such as him. That Wizard of Tombs worked his spells on the Casparis, trapping their mortal spirits in a talisman—the Casparian Diamond. Ok’ai stole the stone then spelled it against them.”
He grasped the knife by the hilt, placing the point to the tip of his forefinger.
“In a fierce battle for the diamond, the leaders of the Caspari died. Their women and children were all that remained of the star casters’ tribe. The last son of the Caspari, on the brink of manhood at the age of fourteen, was left to lead, to protect his tribe and to break the Ok’ai’s curse.”
“Break the curse how?” Odile asked, rapt by the tale already. He waited a moment, then went on.
“Alone, at the very age the curse took effect, the young Caspari sought the wizard in the desert. He had to get the Casparian back and crush it to end the curse. The last of his line, he was the only one able to defend his people, to turn back the terrible thing that had been done. And so he traveled to the sands.”
Azarus sat forward, letting the knife drop from his hand. As soon as it fell to the table, it changed from a blade to a shiny, black scorpion. Odile gasped. The venomous insect rose up, glinting like obsidian, ready to strike. Unfazed, Azarus went on.
“The curse of the Ok’ai caused certain changes in those afflicted. The boy started learning to master these changes. He would eventually wield great power, but that night he was still clumsy. Despite that, he found the Ok’ai’s tent and crept inside.”
Odile eyed the insect on the table then Azarus.
“The wind blew, covering any sound the boy might have made as he found his way to where the wizard slept.”
The scorpion walked down the middle of the table, coming quickly toward her. Odile froze, not daring to move, her stare fixed on the creature. When it got halfway to her, Azarus brought the side of his fist down on the table with a clang, making her jump in her seat. The insect flew up high in the air. It flipped backward toward him. With perfect timing, he caught it in his hand just as it turned back into a knife.
Odile let out a breath at the display. She caught herself. She’d seen tricks before. Lord Caspari was very deft with his hands, though. As she watched them, she remembered his touch. Smoothing her features to reveal nothing, she brought her eyes up to his.
“What happened to the boy?” She asked, emphasizing the last two words.
He bowed his head slightly to her in the tiniest of concessions, obviously amused by her. They both knew well that the boy he spoke of was him. He stood, then strode down the length of the room toward her, holding the knife by the hilt. As he did so, a whisper of salt from a bowl that had spilled when he’d jostled the table blew in a swirl, following alongside him. The sound of his voice and all the magic he employed took Odile to a different place. In her mind she could see the setting and the boy he’d been perfectly.
“Dagger in hand,” he went on with his story, “he crept to the Ok’ai’s bed. So intent on what he must do, he did not question his instincts. Like the scorpion in the sand, he stood poised to stab the wizard through the heart. In the dark, he reached out for the Ok’ai’s chest, where the Casparian lay, and made to grab for the diamond. His fingers slid together in slippery wetness as they closed over the Ok’ai’s robe.”
The scene he described swirled in Odile’s mind like the salt on the table.
“Pulling,” he continued, “with force enough to snap the stone off the golden chain the Ok’ai wore it on, he was thrown off balance when his hand met no resistance. He fumbled to the ground. The old wizard lay lifeless. The boy raised his hand that should have held the Casparian to find it empty and wet with blood.”
Odile let out a breath. In her listening, she’d forgotten to breath.
“Who took it?”
Azarus shrugged. He stood close now, facing her as he leaned against her end of the table
“Night raiders hunting treasures from the tombs, perhaps. The diamond was lost to thieves, but I travelled with my people in search of it. The boys of the Caspari were all beset with the Ok’ai’s curse at the age of fourteen, as I had been. For reasons only the stars know, none of them were strong enough to withstand it. Without the Casparian’s power kept close, they perished.”
“You are the last remaining then.” Odile stated. He nodded, his eyes on her as he stuck the tip of his knife in the table right to the side of her hand. Unblinking, she held herself perfectly still.
“The tribe of the Caspari scattered to the winds, but still I hunt the diamond. I have every reason to believe that Von Rothebart has it. When I heard travelers telling tales of a wizard with the power to change maidens into swans and whose own daughter shifted forms,” Odile dropped her gaze to the table, “I knew I had to come see for myself if this might be where the stone that had been cursed by the Ok’ai resided.”
Thank you so much for reading!
Feel free to share with others who love reading dark fairy tales.
I wish you a wonderfully fun and safe time out there today, my friends. Till next time…
Stay in the magic!
Amanda V Shane