Dignified (Beginning's End Series, #11), page 1
Dignified
Beginning's End Series, Volume 11
W.J. May
Published by Dark Shadow Publishing, 2023.
This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.
DIGNIFIED
First edition. December 15, 2023.
Copyright © 2023 W.J. May.
ISBN: 979-8223350132
Written by W.J. May.
@Copyright 2023 by W. J. May
THIS E-BOOK OR PRINT is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book/paperback may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual person, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
All rights reserved.
Copyright 2023 by W.J. May
Dignified, Book 11 of the Beginning’s End Series
Cover design by: Book Cover by Design
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Have You Read the C.o.K Series?
The Chronicles of Kerrigan
Book I - Rae of Hope is FREE!
BOOK TRAILER:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gILAwXxx8MU
How hard do you have to shake the family tree to find the truth about the past?
Fifteen year-old Rae Kerrigan never really knew her family's history. Her mother and father died when she was young and it is only when she accepts a scholarship to the prestigious Guilder Boarding School in England that a mysterious family secret is revealed.
Will the sins of the father be the sins of the daughter?
As Rae struggles with new friends, a new school and a star-struck forbidden love, she must also face the ultimate challenge: receive a tattoo on her sixteenth birthday with specific powers that may bind her to an unspeakable darkness. It's up to Rae to undo the dark evil in her family's past and have a ray of hope for her future.
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Dignified Blurb
USA TODAY BESTSELLING author, W.J. May, continues the highly anticipated bestselling YA/NA series about love, betrayal, magic and fantasy.
Learn to fight—it is the only option...
An arrow flies over the water...and two lives hang in the balance.
After delivering their warning in the ivory citadel, the friends think their part of the story is over. Little do they realize, the adventure has only begun. While fleeing the island, a shocking act of violence brings heavy casualties. But every disaster has a silver lining, and the fellowship finds itself stronger than ever before. Stronger, but different. War is coming, and not everyone stands on the same side.
The immortal army is gathering its forces, but the battle has already started on the other side of the sea. Darkness has struck, and the realm is bleeding. A thousand rising voices, and a thousand ready swords. Is there anything that can unite them? Is there anything that can cross the immortal divide?
Or have some wounds struck too deep?
Be careful who you trust. Even the devil was once an angel.
Beginning’s End Series
Beginnings
Curiosity
Scrutiny
Foresight
Disavow
Trickery
Wisdom
Decree
Influence
Prevail
Dignified
Honored
The Queen’s Alpha Series
Eternal
Everlasting
Unceasing
Evermore
Forever
Boundless
Prophecy
Protected
Foretelling
Revelation
Betrayal
Resolved
The Omega Queen Series
Discipline
Bravery
Courage
Conquer
Strength
Validation
Approval
Blessing
Balance
Grievance
Enchanted
Gratified
Contents
Have You Read the C.o.K Series?
Find W.J. May
Dignified Blurb
Beginning’s End Series
The Queen’s Alpha Series
The Omega Queen Series
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Honored Blurb
Beginning’s End Series
The Queen’s Alpha Series
The Omega Queen Series
Find W.J. May
More books by W.J. May
Chapter 1
For a single drop of time, the arrow hung over the water.
There were those who said it felt much longer. To hear the bards tell it, entire generations passed. There was time enough for prose and shouting, time enough for verses to spring to life.
At the very least, there was enough for a poetic introspection.
Ah, that is how they kill you. You say this wisely to yourself, becoming increasingly aware it will probably be the last thing. I understand it now—so sharp and fast. Nothing could survive it.
On that point alone, men and poets agreed.
There wasn’t a single person on board who didn’t see the angle of that shot—puncturing towards the ship like a needle. There wasn’t a single person on board who didn’t know exactly what it meant. And in truth, it did seem to hover for a while, melting into the shimmering haze castoff from the water. There were times, it seemed almost to vanish—flickering in and out of sight.
A small eternity, but it was a mere fraction of a second. The only surprise came at the end, when the arrow did the impossible. When it managed to strike not one man, but two.
After that, there was nothing but blood.
“Evander!”
Eden was screaming himself hoarse, lying inside an impenetrable circle of his brethren. The wooden planks beneath him were soaking wet, and despite the long shaft of an arrow still jutting from the center of his chest, he kept trying to scramble to his feet—fighting everyone in his way.
“Let me see him!” he cried in desperation, clawing to make a space in the crowd. The picture was already darkening around the edges, but he was thrashing like a wild animal, trying to lift off the deck. No less than a dozen immortal hands pressed him back. “Lissiana—let me see him right now!”
The enchanting fae had been across the ship, when an arrow defied the laws of nature and flew over the railing. It had been such a paralyzing shock, she could do nothing but stand there and watch, arms limp at her sides, as it spiraled towards the heart of one of her childhood friends.
She’d felt the impact through the floorboards. And now she couldn’t stop the bleeding.
“I’m sure he’s all right,” she said for the hundredth time, forcing him down and motioning discreetly for one of her crewmen. He knelt immediately beside them, pinning Eden’s cloak beneath his knees. “You need to stop moving—”
“Let me see him!”
“I—” She threw a quick glance over her shoulder, unable to make out anything past the swarming crowd. “I’m not sure where he is.” Her bright eyes lifted higher, scanning the deck for a different face. “Eden, you must keep still. The healer is coming—”
“Evander!”
He made another frantic attempt to rise, but collapsed almost immediately with a heart-wrenching cry, curling around the arrow like a wounded bird. His breath came in short bursts, and his forehead pressed against the deck. Lissiana took advantage of his distraction to roll him gently onto his back, her slender fingers pressed against the base of the arrow.
No matter how many times she rearranged them, she couldn’t stop the blood.
“I swear to the gods,” she muttered under her breath, “if that man finally broke you, I’m going to turn this ship around and murder him myself.” Her eyes flashed once more around the deck, blazing with anger and sharp as any blade. “Where the seven hells is my healer?!”
Kiera blinked in astonishment, feeling like someone had torn a page from her book.
One moment, she’d been standing on deck with the rest of them, watching as Sindriel made a rather passive-aggressive gesture with his bow. He was too far away to use it—too far for it to be anything more than symbolic. But for a fraction of a second, she could have sworn he actually tried.
The air went still, and there was a great rushing in her ears.
Then all at once—
“Evander!”
She had been standing beside the vampire when it happened, but it happened too fast for mortal eyes to see. She could measure only in the aftermath, the reactions. The look on Evander’s face as the arrow passed in and out of his body, painting the sails on both sides. His quiet exhale of breath, and the flicker of surprise as he saw the crimson stain blossoming over his tunic, stunned that any arrow could travel so far. He stood there a moment, like he hadn’t yet realized he should start to fall.
Then his eyes flew up with a second impact, as that same arrow buried into his lover’s flesh.
“Eden—”
He was already turning when it happened. He was already starting to fall.
Jesse lunged but failed to catch him, and he landed hard on both knees—striking the boards with a sharp crack. An involuntary cry burst from his lips and a hand flew to the delicate hollow of his shoulder, those pale fingers seeping over with torrents of bright, gushing blood.
Seven hells!
The others froze in mindless horror, unable to reconcile the image, unable to imagine what could be done. There was a hole, torn straight into him. Large enough, they could see sunlight from the other side. It seemed impossible he was still conscious, impossible he was still kneeling.
Then he let out the softest whimper, and they scrambled to orient on either side.
“It’s all right,” Kiera gasped, reaching both hands to steady him. “It’s all right, just breathe!”
It was not all right. She didn’t know why she’d said that. She didn’t know how anything would be all right again. The ship was roiling beneath them, the vampire had been spitted like a holiday bird, and the arrow that had done it was mysteriously absent. Her eyes darted around the deck, searching.
It went through him, didn’t it? But wasn’t Eden standing right behind?
“What can we do?” Jesse was steadying him as well—scared out of his mind, but trying his level best to remain calm. “I’ve never seen a wound like this before, Evan. But I’m sure that you have. What do you need?” he repeated with a touch of desperation. “Tell us what to do.”
Evander opened his mouth to answer, then bowed his head as a rush of sensation crashed over him. He knelt there a moment, unable to speak with the pain. A thousand times, they had seen him hurt, but it was nothing close to this. His eyes were squeezed shut and his lips fluttered.
Offering reassurance? A silent prayer?
“Eden is hurt,” he finally answered, barely able to push the words past his teeth. A violent tremor shook through him, and his lovely face went rigid with pain. “Can you see him?”
Jesse’s head whipped around in surprise; he hadn’t yet realized the fae was missing. But even his sharp eyes were unable to see anything past the tangle of cloaks and legs. The healer had arrived, but it had done little to soothe the general chaos. If anything, it had made things arguably worse.
“Get your hands off me!”
No, they couldn’t see Eden. But they could hear him just fine.
Despite the torrent of shouting on the other side of the ship, one voice had risen loud and clear above the rest. It echoed across the salt-slicked boards like it had been made for nothing but screaming. Even at such a painful distance, they were able to make out every word.
Most had been violent threats, but the fae had proceeded to bargaining.
“You must let me see him first!” he demanded, struggling against those restraining hands. A man knelt over him with salves, calm, despite his thrashing. “Let me see him first—or I will take nothing from those vials!” He kicked out desperately, trying to break them. “Let me go!”
There was a violent tussle, followed by a muffled cry.
“Your vampire is all right, Eden!” Lissiana cried in exasperation, using the weight of her entire body just to keep him on the deck. Her sailors were on the verge of knocking him unconscious; a few others were eyeing a coil of rope. “You are tearing the—”
“Bring me to him.” He seized abruptly onto the front of her cloak, clinging like a child. “If that is the truth, then bring me to him. Please, Lissie, I can’t—” He broke off with a fractured gasp, touching his fingertips to the arrow. “I can’t breathe until I know for sure.”
She froze a few inches above him, shattering at the look on his face. “Cio, I’m sure he’s fine. He’s a vampire, you know how they—”
“He’s not fine—he is dead!” he wailed, sobbing wildly into his free hand. “He is dead, or else he would come to me!” Another attempt to rise, blood and tears. “Evander!”
The vampire went utterly still, kneeling on the other side of the ship.
It was not just words to him, not just echoes and shouts. He was able to feel each cresting emotion, as if they were his own. The shocks of pain, the rising panic. And beneath it all, a quiet dread—cold and unavoidable. After so many centuries, Eden trusted his father’s hands.
“Someone must tell him,” Evander panted, clenching his teeth against the pain. “Someone must tell him I’m all right. He won’t know it otherwise. He doesn’t have—”
But at that moment, everything seemed to change.
It happened gradually, then all at once—like sunlight breaking over water. Even as he said the words, believing them to share a single tether, something else crept into the vampire’s awareness, hovering just beyond his immediate recognition, like the distant call of a friend. For the space of a heartbeat, he forgot the grisly wound and looked around, like he might find it. A touch of confusion settled over him, questions and clouds, before everything went suddenly, unmistakably clear.
His face went still, then. He pushed to his feet.
What is happening now?
Eden came to the knowledge only a few seconds after, all his screams falling silent and his struggles going abruptly still. His eyes lifted slowly, wide and brimming, and an expression came over him unlike anything his immortal companions had ever seen. They no longer mattered. His attention had narrowed to a single person. A dark-haired man, standing at the back of the crowd.
Their eyes met for a suspended moment, and the rest of the world fell away.
Then the vampire backed slowly into the railing...and toppled right over the side.
Chapter 2
Drip...drip...drip...
The fae and the vampire sat at opposite sides of the cabin, motionless as twin statues, staring in perfect silence across the divide. There were many parts of the image that might have been called strange. The blood-soaked bandage wrapped around Eden’s chest. The drips of saltwater pooling beneath Evander’s chair. But perhaps more than anything else was the inherent stillness. It was the kind of stillness no mortal could ever achieve, having the same quality as a held breath. It was a room in suspension, a line of sight that couldn’t be broken. There was just one, and the other. And that silent gaze. It would have been strange enough to have lasted beyond a few moments.
They had been sitting for the better part of an hour.
Their friends were leaning against the wall in between them, so deeply curious and wildly uncomfortable, they had quite forgotten how to leave. In the beginning, they’d kept waiting for something to happen. A break in the quiet, a single spoken word. They’d long ago given up any hope of that. There was nothing to punctuate the stillness, save for that single incessant sound.
