Changeling: Prelude to the Chosen Chronicles Read online

  In Praise of Changeling

  “...an amazing read...full of surprises...kept me on the edge of my seat.”

  - Sizzling Hot Books (4 out of 5)

  In Praise of The Chosen Chronicles

  “A dark and gripping tale by a true mistress of supernatural fiction. Karen Dales brings fresh blood to the vampire genre.”

  —Michelle Rowen, National Bestselling Author

  “For readers who adore textured layers in their literary tapestries, rich in colorful emotions, Karen Dales is one writer of vampire fiction they’ll want to read.”

  — Nancy Kilpatrick, Author: The Power of the Blood,

  Editor: Evolve: Vampire Stories of the New Undead

  “...is a must-read for any fans of Twillight or other books in the popular Vampire genre.”

  - Oakville Today.

  “This is a mature book...that makes it easy to enjoy...a story that has multiple layers and depth to it...the book reads fast because Karen never lets it slow down.”

  - Ruth Ann Nordin, Author.

  “...one of the best stories by a new and upcoming writer that I have read.... Very few stories are the equal to this tale.”

  - Siren Book Reviews (5 out of 5)

  "...a poignant and epic tale... a brilliant example of good overcoming and prevailing against evil and prejudice... an emotional ride of literary genius, both heart-warming and heartbreaking at the same time..."

  - Bitten By Books (5 out of 5)

  "a grand tale of eternal life and its many challenges... I greatly enjoyed Angel of Death by Karen Dales and ... recommend it..."

  - Two Lips Reviews (5 out of 5)

  "I would definitely recommend this book to vampire fans.. a good solid read for both Changeling and Angel of Death... I’m definitely looking forward to where Dales goes with this in the future."

  - Once Upon A Bookshelf

  “I was hooked...a good book to read on a cold and stormy day.”

  - Night Owl Reviews (4 out of 5)

  Also by Karen Dales

  THE CHOSEN CHRONICLES

  Changeling

  Angel of Death

  Shadow of Death

  Thanatos (forthcoming)

  Changeling

  Prelude to the Chosen

  by

  Karen Dales

  Dark Dragon Publishing

  Toronto, Ontario, Canada

  Changeling:

  Prelude to the Chosen

  Copyright by Karen Dales © 2009

  eISBN: 978-0-9867633-4-2

  Published by Dark Dragon Publishing at Smashwords

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of Dark Dragon Publishing and Karen Dales, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Cover Art, Design and Author Photo

  © 2010 by Evan Dales

  WAV Design Studios

  www.wavstudios.ca

  Dark Dragon Publishing

  313 Mutual Street

  Toronto, Ontario

  M4Y 1X6

  CANADA

  www.darkdragonpublishing.com

  For more information on the Author,

  Karen Dales and The Chosen Chronicles

  www.karendales.com

  www.thechosenchronicles.com

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  Chapter V

  Chapter VI

  Chapter VII

  Chapter VIII

  Chapter IX

  Chapter X

  Chapter XI

  Chapter XII

  Chapter XIII

  Chapter XIV

  Chapter XV

  Chapter XVI

  Chapter XVII

  About The Author

  For Calista...

  Prologue

  A scream cut through the night, intruding upon the solemn celebration of the first of winter. Villagers, afraid of what the night was bringing, huddled in groups in the larger lodge of their Chief, each trying unsuccessfully to ignore their own increasing terror as they attempted to reassure their crying children. It was not the first shriek to shatter the sacred night - a night when those of the Otherworld rode through the dark taking poor lost souls to the Lord of the Underworld. Noslen was a very poor time to bring forth a child, especially the Chief’s newest grandchild.

  The Chief worried his long grey moustache and stared at the door. There was nothing he could do and trusted his wife to tend to his daughter. It was in the hands of Dôn, the Goddess of All, and if She decided to take his only remaining child it seemed the most appropriate time of the year. But tonight was not a night of the Mother, so he whispered a prayer to the Dark One, the Lord of Death, in hopes that He would ride on past, taking no notice of his daughters screams.

  "Push! I can see the baby's head." The older woman instructed her daughter. "Don't just stand there with your jaw on the floor," she yelled at her daughter’s husband. "Grab a blanket. Your third child will be born very soon."

  She never understood what her daughter saw in Geraint. Then again her own mother had never understood her choice to Handfast to her husband. Esyllt shook her head and sighed.

  Daughters.

  The Mother had sent plenty of those to both she and Enid.

  Let it be a son this time, someone to become Chief after my beloved.

  She bent to see her daughter’s progress.

  Geraint left Esyllt’s side and grabbed the soft birthing blanket his wife had woven. Turning back he was stunned at the sight of his beautiful Enid. Supported by her dark haired cousins and sisters, her mother applied a soothing hand to help guide the crowning head of his child. He had refused to leave even though he knew it was not a man’s place to be at the birth. He needed to see this for himself. The child was early. Too early for a child of the Mai and he knew the risks this posed to his precious wife who hung lank and exhausted between two other women. Her jet black hair plastered her face as she panted with the oncoming pain of a new contraction. Unsuccessfully hiding his worry, Geraint handed the woollen cloth to the old woman. "Will she be all right?" he asked.

  Enid lifted her gaze and saw her husband without seeing him before the crest of the contraction pulled her back into herself. She let out another ear piercing cry.

  "I don't know." Esyllt shook her head, concentrating on the weak young woman. "Her first two children were never this difficult."

  Geraint took a deep breath and moved to take hold of his wife's limp hand, staring at her sweat-beaded face. He ignored the scowls of the other women. He would not leave.

  "Cariad," he whispered. Enid’s black eyes fluttered open to look at him. Her face grimaced in a pain he could never imagine. "Our child needs you to be strong." She tried to nod but another contraction wracked her body, forcing another scream to escape from her lips. The old woman yelled instructions for the writhing woman to push. With the help of the other women Enid tucked and grunted. Before long the old woman leaned back with a smile, holding a purple-faced baby. A new cry cut through the night as small new lungs filled for the first time.

  "You have a healthy son," Esyllt declared to her children as she tended to the little
boy.

  The new father should have been happy, but looking at the little boy, born three months early and properly grown, only told him the truth. Geraint closed his eyes and asked himself if he could accept this child. He honestly did not know until his wife’s cousin gave him the snuffling, swaddled babe, and he realized he was weeping for joy.

  "I don't know what to do." The father of three paced his mother’s small hut. "She just lies there, ignoring the baby and when she looks at him she bursts into tears." He stopped to stare at his seated mother, realizing for the first time how old she appeared.

  Time and hardships had withered the old woman to a frail and shallow husk, but she still had the heart of a dragon and was not afraid to let it show. Glad that her son had stopped his irritating pacing; she rose unsteadily to her feet.

  "Has she paid any care to the other two?" she asked, bending to grab a dry log. She placed it carefully in the hearth so as not to send sparks into the dangerously dry thatch above. The flames enclosed the wood and new heat radiated into the room, warming her arthritic joints. She waived her son over to her.

  He took her outstretched arm and guided her gently back to her seat near the fire. "She will only recognize the existence of the girls. When I remarked that we should name our son she flew into hysterics. The only time I managed to get her to discuss the child, she declared that our son wasn’t human and tried to smother him. She will not nurse him. I have to feed him goat’s milk by soaking it in a rag and letting him suckle off of that. No other women in the village will help. I don't know what to do! Even her parents have turned a blind eye to the situation. Maybe you should come with me to see her. Convince her she needs to care for our son. Please."

  Geraint had a way with those puppy dog brown eyes of his and she sighed heavily. "All right, I will come, but I can't promise that I can change her mind if it is set in her thinking. Hand me my shawl."

  Her son turned and took the woollen piece of clothing down from the peg beside the door, handing the ratty material to the older woman. Gathering her strength, she pushed herself to her feet yet again. She had hoped to have a quiet night by the fire and maybe, if she was lucky, fall asleep in her chair. Lately the pains in her joints were keeping her up at night and no mixture of herbs seemed to help. "Alright, let's go. And you had better make me some hot ale when we get there."

  Taking his mother’s arm to steady her, Geraint smiled at her usual request and opened the door to enter the snow-laden landscape. Snowflakes fell in wet clumps from the thick black sky as they trod through the deep snow to the farmer’s hut. Their warmth stole into the night and allowed the bitter cold to enter; fingers and toes quickly grew numb in the short distance. The constant crunch of snow compressed upon snow under thickly wrapped feet and legs was the only sound accompanying the two. The falling snow seemed to deaden the night even further. Clouds of frozen breath followed closely behind, marking their trail in the air.

  It did not take long to reach Geraint’s small circular hut and with a frozen hand he pushed the thick leather door open. Guiding his wheezing mother into the embracing warmth of his home and closing the door behind him, he let the door flap hang loose before any more frozen night air could steal into his home. He offered to take the old woman's shawl but she waved him away, shuffling stiffly to the hearth for warmth. Shrugging, he took off his extra layers and placed them on the empty hook by the door.

  The roundhouse was small, with the hearth in the centre to provide heat to the whole structure made from wattle and daub. The front of the hut included a table with two benches, one on either side, serving as the dining area and a place to mend broken tools. There was one chair by the fire so that his wife could tend to the cauldron hanging from the tripod over the blaze. On the ground, by the chair, a drop spindle sat untouched, its red wool linking itself to a basket beside the spindle.

  The old woman sat herself down in the chair, arranging her position so that her feet would be the first to warm up, if not catch fire. The back of the house included two beds behind curtains of colourful fabric. In one his two daughters slept, holding onto their dolls made out of corn husks and cloth. In the other bed lay his wife curled up into a ball. Her eyes tightly shut as if waiting for a sword to fall. Beside their shared bed was the cradle his wife's parents had given as a present to celebrate the birth of their first child. In it was his son of two months, sound asleep.

  The farmer moved to sit beside his wife, gently touched her hand, and leaned over to whisper that his mother was here. She opened her eyes in dumb recognition, got up and pulled a thin blanket around her slim shivering form as she walked over to the other bed. Oblivious to the sleeping babe in its cradle, she kissed her little daughters on their brows.

  The elder girl woke. "Mama?"

  "It's all right, Eira. Everything will be all right. Just shut your eyes and go back to sleep."

  The six year old girl yawned and closed her eyes. Her mother walked to meet her husband’s mother as her husband ladled steaming ale from the cauldron into a drinking horn before handing it to the old woman.

  "I know why you have come," she said to the older woman. Enid’s once glossy black hair was dull and streaked with grey, and her brown eyes were red and swollen from crying. "My husband went to you in hopes that you would be able to talk me out of - What did he call it? My craziness? - Regarding that thing lying in that cradle." Her husband visibly winced. The old woman listened unfazed. "I may have given birth to it, but I am not its mother. Its parents are not us. Not human."

  "My son witnessed the birth from your loins, child." The old woman sat quietly. "What more proof do you need? Your husband was there, holding your hand."

  Raising her voice, "It's not my child. It's not my son. You have only to look at it. It doesn't even look human." Glaring, she flung out her arm to point accusingly at the old woman sipping her ale. "It must have been you. You must have changed him!"

  The little girls woke at the rise in volume but stayed under their covers, afraid that their mother’s erratic behaviour might turn onto them, as it had wont to do since their brother was born. The baby began to wail and Geraint picked up his son. The baby instantly quieted, cradled in his father’s arms.

  The old woman looked over the rim of the drinking horn; blowing to cool it off. Steam rose to obscure her face. She chuckled and shook her head. "That is the most inane thing you have ever said to me, child. I did not change your child anymore than I changed my beautiful grand-daughters into boys." Smiling, she gave the little girls a wink, which sent them throwing the covers over their heads to hide further down in their bed. Silently chuckling, the old woman returned to her careful sipping of the liquid.

  "Just look at it." The young mother turned to her husband. "Its eyes are as red as the demons the Christian priests always talk about. And look at its hair. It's white. Now look at your hair and eyes, and mine, and our daughters.” She tugged at her hair making Geraint fear she would rip hers out. “We all have dark hair and eyes. This baby cannot be ours."

  "Then what do you think my grandson is?" asked the old woman.

  The younger blinked, caught off guard. She never thought about what it was. All she knew was what it was not. Then the answer came to her as she stammered, "I-it’s a crimbil. Yes! That is what it must be. Our real child was taken by the Tylwyth Teg and replaced our son with this." She pointed to the bundle in her husband’s arms, his mouth slack with shock at such an accusation.

  "You must be crazy!" he declared, bringing both little girls again to peek carefully over their blankets at the spectacle.

  "Have you no better explanation?"

  Before he could find an appropriate retort his mother spoke up. "Enid!" The younger woman snapped her head around to look at the hag in her chair. "Enid, will you care for this child whether or not it is of your flesh and blood?"

  The young woman drew herself up to her full height. "No. I will not care for any changeling child."

  Geraint made a move towards his wife
. With a gesture from his mother he halted, the fate of his son forever out of his hands. Since his wife would not care for the infant, and the rest of the village would not help, there was nothing more he could do. Going to his mother had been his last hope and now that seemed lost.

  "Then what do you propose we do with this child?" asked his mother.

  Enid thought for a moment, remembering the tales her own mother told to her about crimbil and the fairy folk. "We must leave this changeling where the Tylwyth Teg will find it and hopefully they will return our real son."

  "This is ridiculous! This is my son!" Geraint shouted and tried to hush the crying infant in his arms.

  "But it is not mine! It goes! Tonight!" Enid glared at the child. A look of disgust twisted her once beautiful face.

  "He will die if left out in this winter!"

  His wife turned her back on him, refusing to listen. He looked pleadingly to his mother. She shook her head sadly. It was the decision of the child’s mother whether it lived or died. "Take him," she said sadly. "Leave him where he will die quickly." Her son stared in shock at his mother.

  “No!” He could not believe what he was hearing. His son, the Chieftain’s only grandson, was to be left out in the freezing cold to die all because his wife would not care for it! It had taken little time for Geraint to accept that his wife had been with someone else to conceive this baby, but it also had not taken him long to accept him as his own.

  His mother sighed. This time his sad brown eyes could not save him. She closed her eyes. “Geraint, take the boy away. At least let him have a fast and clean death rather than a slow and painful one because his mother refuses to feed him.”