Beastborne Read online

  Beastborne: Exiled Lands

  Beastborne Chronicles, Book 2

  James T. Callum

  Copyright © 2020 by James T. Callum

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Also by James T. Callum

  Pyresouls Apocalypse Series

  Pyresouls Apocalypse: Rewind

  Beastborne Chronicles Series

  Beastborne: Mark of the Founder (Book 1)

  Beastborne: Exiled Lands (Book 2)

  Newsletter

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  Dedication

  This is for those of us who could use a safe harbor in these utterly ridiculous times. I hope the world of Aldim can provide shelter from the storm that continues to rage around us, and can offer you, dear reader, at least a moment’s respite.

  And, as always, for my loving wife. Without whom none of these books would have ever seen the light of day.

  Lastly, for my awesome Patrons who continue to support me and make sure I keep writing for years to come.

  Foreword

  Beastborne was originally written as a web serial. For those uninitiated into the wonderful world of web serials, they are often written long-form but with numerous chapters. It is not uncommon to see many serials reach hundreds of chapters per volume.

  As a result, you may find some of the chapters are a bit different from what you might be used to.

  Additionally, if you find any typos or errors feel free to drop me an email citing what chapter they’re in at: [email protected]. I update the manuscript whenever an error is found, so make sure you allow your reading device to update your ebooks! That way you will always have the best version.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Chapter 103

  Chapter 104

  Chapter 105

  Chapter 106

  Chapter 107

  Chapter 108

  Chapter 109

  Chapter 110

  Chapter 111

  Chapter 112

  Chapter 113

  Chapter 114

  Chapter 115

  Chapter 116

  Chapter 117

  Chapter 118

  Chapter 119

  Chapter 120

  Chapter 121

  Chapter 122

  Chapter 123

  Chapter 124

  Chapter 125

  Chapter 126

  Chapter 127

  Chapter 128

  Chapter 129

  Chapter 130

  Chapter 131

  Chapter 132

  Chapter 133

  Chapter 134

  Chapter 135

  Chapter 136

  Chapter 137

  Chapter 138

  Chapter 139

  Chapter 140

  Chapter 141

  Chapter 142

  Chapter 143

  Chapter 144

  Chapter 145

  Chapter 146

  Chapter 147

  Chapter 148

  Chapter 149

  Chapter 150

  Chapter 151

  Chapter 152

  Chapter 153

  Chapter 154

  Chapter 155

  Chapter 156

  Chapter 157

  Chapter 158

  Chapter 159

  Chapter 160

  Chapter 161

  Chapter 162

  Chapter 163

  Chapter 164

  Chapter 165

  Chapter 166

  Chapter 167

  Chapter 168

  Chapter 169

  Chapter 170

  Chapter 171

  Chapter 172

  Chapter 173

  Chapter 174

  Chapter 175

  Chapter 176

  Afterword

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  Newsletter

  Hal’s Final Stats

  Hal’s Skill List

  Hal’s Spells & Abilities

  Pyresouls Preview Chapters

  Pyresouls Chapter 01

  Pyresouls Chapter 02

  Pyresouls Chapter 03

  Pyresouls Chapter 04

  Prologue

  Aldim was ruled by its 13 Founders. Men and women who were blessed with Founder Marks and all the innate, godly magic they provided. Technically, they now numbered 14, with Hal’s disturbing capacity to wield his Founder Mark launchi
ng him among their ranks.

  Rinbast had everything going for him. As the Founder of Fallmark, he ruled without challenge, and soon, all of Aldim would be saved by his hands alone. Every soul-darkening deed was in service to Aldim’s survival. Once the others witnessed him defeating the threat to this star, they would understand.

  His family would understand.

  Opening his eyes, Rinbast was unsurprised to find himself in the middle of a dark expanse littered with towering piles of square iridescent black stone.

  After such a fit of rage, his momentary lapse in concentration would have invited an attack by his Beast.

  Standing opposite Rinbast in the dark arena was a humanoid being of pure white light with two black pits for eyes that let out thick oily streams of black smoke. That smoke only doubled when a black grin creased his otherwise featureless face.

  “Henser.” Rinbast spat his name like a curse. “I really don’t have the time for this. My rage is not aimed at you. But if you insist, I will gladly vent my frustrations over Hirash’s failure on you.”

  Henser prowled like a caged animal - which, as Rinbast’s Beast, he was - looking for any sign of weakness.

  Rinbast would give him none. He had lapsed momentarily in his protections. The anger at Hal’s continued evasion and the knowledge that the man had broken into his innermost bastion as if it were child’s play, had opened him up to Henser’s attack.

  “If you but release me,” Henser began, claws of hardened light forming on his outstretched fingers, “we could subjugate this entire star and all those beyond. With your knowledge and my power? The Kindred themselves would cower before us!”

  Rinbast snapped out a night-black sword, [Mancer’s Fear], that drank in the light coming off of Henser’s body. “I have an Archmage to punish, must we do this now?” His voice was calm but Rinbast knew better than to underestimate Henser. Though he put on an air of nonchalance, he was ready for the Beast.

  Henser spread his arms out wide, and Rinbast had his answer. He wasn’t going to back down. One would think the Beast almost liked being beaten.

  “Very well,” Rinbast said, drawing one arm across his armored chest and casting Occultation.

  Swirling, shifting watery shadows spun around him. The effect vanished a second later for Rinbast, but for anybody looking at the Founder, his image would shift and waver like looking through a pool of water reflected by half a dozen funhouse mirrors.

  Henser came at him in a rush, black oil dripping out of his slavering mouth. “Such tawdry tricks!” the Beast said.

  “Perhaps,” Rinbast allowed, sidestepping Henser’s slashing claws. They were aimed directly at one of the many shifting forms that moved around Rinbast making him almost impossible to hit. A watery shadow was shredded by the attack and whisked away, but many more remained.

  The Founder outstretched an arm and cast Hurricane Wing.

  The towering phantasmic form of a Black Dragon reared where Rinbast stood and flapped its colossal wings. The Beast was caught out and blown away like a leaf in a gust. The razor-sharp wind cut deeply into his brilliant form.

  Every cut made the Beast leak black oily ichor.

  But Rinbast wasn’t done. Before Henser could even get his feet beneath him, he cast Tenebral Crush.

  Shadows gathered around the struggling Beast and collapsed upon him, clinging to his form of hardened white light. Even Henser’s luminosity dimmed considerably under that crushing assault.

  The Beast fell to one knee, then another as the weight of the Beast Magic spell fell upon him.

  It would be like Henser was suddenly plunged into the very bottom of the Mariana Trench. The weight would be utterly immense. Rinbast waited and watched, but to his surprise, Henser was not giving up.

  Rinbast took three steps closer to his struggling Beast, the other half of his soul. As a Beastborne, he was intrinsically tied to this creature. He had to keep Henser’s murderous strength in check, lest they turn into an eldritch abomination.

  Covered in black crushing shadows, Henser collapsed to his hands and knees, struggling to stay upright. The fight was lost. Henser knew it. Rinbast knew it.

  But this wasn’t just about winning the fight. Rinbast could have turned and walked away, back to the waking world where time would have all but stopped as this little farce played out.

  This was about sending a message.

  “You have to know I will never let you turn me into something like that,” Rinbast said almost tenderly. There was a hint of sorrow in his voice that the two could never see eye-to-eye. It was always a battle of wills for control, and it always would be.

  No matter how much Rinbast grew used to the unique Strain inflicted upon him from casting Beast Magic, he could never fully quell Henser’s desires to usurp control.

  “I do this for your own good,” Rinbast said, standing above the dark form on his hands and knees. Extending a hand over Henser’s body, Rinbast cast Railspike. A thick black railroad spike dropped out of his palm and hung in the air.

  Rinbast twisted on the balls of his feet, bringing all his strength to bear as he curled his hand into a fist and slammed it down on the flat of the spike. There was a moment where physics refused to recognize the act, and then the spike moved so fast it seemed to teleport into Henser’s spine.

  Henser’s strength gave out and he collapsed to the floor with a bone-rattling crash.

  The glassy black flooring of the arena cracked and split apart. The twisting, spreading fissure grew to join the countless others. Rinbast’s soul was scarred with such fighting and marked with the lessons he imparted to Henser.

  His Beast groaned pitifully, held in place by that most painful spell. Rinbast turned, dismissing Occultation and opened his eyes to the waking world.

  Archmage Hirash stood before him on the tips of his posh velvet slippers, trying not to be strangled by Rinbast’s iron-hard grip around his neck.

  They had discussed Hirash’s failures at length. It took more effort than Rinbast would have liked for the Archmage to see the error of his ways. He professed his desire to make amends, but when Hirash saw the door Rinbast had brought him to, a [Nightwood] door of repeating geometric designs like his Founder’s Mark, the Archmage balked.

  That fear had shown the truth of the man. And seeing that weakness and his stammering excuses had finally let Rinbast’s anger slip free of its leash. And then, right on cue, Henser took advantage to try and seize control.

  Well, Rinbast thought smugly. That didn’t work out so well for you, did it Henser?

  He knew the Beast could hear him, and the grin that spread on Rinbast’s face nearly made Hirash faint. It would have been a simple affair - pathetically so - to snap the mage’s neck.

  But he wasn’t about to do something so base or barbaric.

  No, Hirash’s punishment was going to be much worse.

  Rinbast fell into himself and activated his Founder’s Mark. As a Founder, he was marked with a geometric sigil branded onto his flesh. The very same sigil he knew Hal had. After all, they were the same man, if from a different timeline.

  Resembling a golden 20-sided die that had been flattened like some papercraft project, Rinbast’s mark glowed with strength and vitality. It slid along his armored forearm to the back of his left hand as it always did when he summoned its strength.

  Through the Founder’s Mark, he could cast any number of Sigils, magical spells of a sort that rivaled Beast Magic for savagery and strength. The only difference was, Founder Sigils consumed EXP instead of MP.