He looked up at her and smiled, and to Riv it looked like the most natural thing in the world. She smiled back at him.

Hesitantly, she stepped bare-footed onto cool, soft grass and moss.

Then she unfurled her wings – My wings! – a smooth ripple of muscles expanding, and looked at herself. Her wings were spread wide, almost as wide as the woodsman’s hut. They were not gleaming white, like the Ben-Elim, but a soft, dappled grey.

Riv felt a thousand emotions surge through her – amazement, fear, wonder, worry, confusion, a moment of blind terror – all wrapped around the grief of losing her mam, which ran through her like a seam of silver through rock, and then back to wonder again. Because her wings were magnificent. She felt a grin split her face.

And then she saw a strange thing in the glade before her. Rows of stone cairns, but miniature, as if it was a burial ground for small animals, like cats, or hares.

Or . . .

A weight shifted in her stomach, like a snake uncoiling, rippling through her.

‘What is that?’ she said.

‘Those are the cairns of your kind, Riv,’ Fia said behind her. ‘A graveyard of bairns, offspring of the Ben-Elim and mortals. You are the first of your kind to live longer than one day.’

Riv looked from the rows of cairns, so many of them, to the baby in Fia’s arms.

‘And this is the second?’ Riv asked.

‘Aye, he is,’ Fia said, a fierce love in her eyes.

Riv just stood there, all of it washing over her, through her, and her friends gathered close about her.

‘Well, what now?’ a voice said, Vald.

‘Now?’ said Riv. She blinked, thinking of her mam and Aphra, of Israfil and of Kol’s betrayal. How her world had changed immeasurably. She looked at her friends, at Fia and the baby in her arms, felt a fierce protection for him.

‘We make the world right,’ she snarled, an echo of her old anger. ‘But first, I’m going to learn how to use these,’ and with that her wings were beating, swirling forest litter about their feet and she was rising, unsteadily at first, then faster, more confidently. With a shout of joy she burst through the forest canopy, wind ripping tears from her eyes, and she yelled for the sheer joy if it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A TIME OF DREAD

JOHN GWYNNE studied and lectured at Brighton University. He’s been in a rock ’n’ roll band, playing the double bass, travelled the USA and lived in Canada for a time. He is married with four children and lives in Eastbourne, running a small family business rejuvenating vintage furniture. His debut novel, Malice, won the David Gemmell Morningstar Award for Best Debut Fantasy.

BY JOHN GWYNNE

BY JOHN GWYNNE

The Faithfull and the Fallen

MALICE

VALOUR

RUIN

WRATH

Of Blood and Bone

A TIME OF DREAD

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS