Heritage: Book One of the Gairden Chronicles by David L. Craddock Page B

reared, considering him, laughing. Then it lunged, streaming into his mouth and down his throat, gagging him. He tried to raise a hand to pry it away. He couldn’t budge it. The shadow was light as air, solid as steel. It pinned his arms to the ground and surged into his nose. He was choking, suffocating...
    And then it was gone. His chest heaved, pulling air into his lungs in sharp gasps. His eyes watered, his throat and nostrils burned, and the sweat covering him chilled his bones. His clothes were drenched, leaving him a sopping, shuddering mess. But he was alive.
    Footsteps nearby, hard boots biting into the stone, bouncing echoes off the walls. As the footfalls drew to a halt, his father appeared, standing over him, somehow perfectly visible in the darkness as if the Lady illuminated him and only him. Edmund cocked his head, considering his prone son, and the relief Aidan had felt at the other man’s appearance leaked away.
    Edmund’s face was contorting, skin warping like shifting sand and bones snapping like dry twigs until the face became plain and expressionless. His eyes, flat and lifeless, rolled back and sank into his skull. The king grinned; dirt and grime caked gaps where teeth should have been. Vertical strips of flesh ran from his top lip to his bottom, like fleshy cell bars.
    “You are a failure to me,” he said, voice thick with earth. The fleshy strips vibrated like taut strings as he spoke, and clumps of dirt spilled from his lips like crumbs. “Your mother and I gave you opportunity, provided you with everything a man could need, everything he could want. But it wasn’t enough for you. You are not fit to lead Torel’s Ward, Aidan. You are not fit to take your mother’s throne.”
    The terrible face leaned in closer, its rotting mouth hovering inches from Aidan’s ear. He spoke in a whisper, but the words boomed through the room like thunder.
    “I disown you. You are not my son.”
    Edmund vanished. Annalyn stepped forward. Aidan stared up at her, tears streaming down his face.
    “Mother,” he said, struggling to control his voice. “Mother, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to fail. I did everything I could! But Heritage— it did not accept me. It wasn’t my fault!”
    Annalyn leered down at him. Like her husband’s, her eyes were dead and glassy. Emotionless, as if she felt nothing. Nothing for him.
    “You,” she began, then shook her head. “What did I do, Aidan?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “It has to be something I did. Did I not love you enough? Did I not teach you faith? Or pride in our family?”
    “No!” he said, reaching for her hand. She reared back as if he were a snake.
    “Mother, please. You did everything right. It... It was me. I just wasn’t ready.”
    “I know that now, Aidan. There was nothing I could have done differently.” Her eyes sank back into her head. Four vertical bars of flesh appeared, sewing lip to lip. “I did everything a mother should. I tried to raise you with a sense of honor and responsibility. I tried to show you the pride of being born a Gairden.
    “None of it was good enough for you, was it, Aidan? Be silent!” she screamed at him when he opened his mouth. “Do not speak to me.” A worm wriggled from one of her empty sockets and through the other, vanishing inside her skull.
    “Do not ever speak to me again, Aidan. You are nothing but a disappointment.” She leaned in closer still, just as his father had, but she did not whisper as he had.
    “You are weak, Aidan. You are not a Gairden. You are not my son! ”
    She disappeared then, leaving him in darkness and with the echo of words that pierced him deeper than the shadowy cold that had almost drowned him.
    A failure. A disappointment.
    Why? Why did this have to happen to me?
    He closed his eyes, letting pity overtake him.
    A soft hum echoed above him. He opened his eyes to see Heritage suspended in midair, floating point down and twirling like a carefree girl. Rising to his feet, he