Knightfall

By Sarah Hawke

For the last six months, Ranger-General Serrane Starwind has lived a double life. During the day, she is the relentless leader of the Duskwatch Rangers and a member of the Highwind Council. After dark, however, she dons the mantle of “Faewyn,” a sex-crazed elven seductress who giddily spends her nights on her back or on her knees.

But war has come to Highwind, and Serrane now finds herself struggling to defend the beleaguered fortress of Icewatch against a barbarian horde. Her only reliable ally is a handsome Knight of the Silver Fist who “Faewyn” knows all too well. While Serrane struggles to keep her scandalous secret from her new partner, she quickly realizes she has an even bigger problem: she might be falling in love with him.

The Ranger-General’s Submission: Knightfall is an action-packed erotic fantasy (24,500 words).

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jade Fantasy
• Release date: Jun 10, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463209806

Sarah Hawke

Sarah Hawke is the author of dozens of science fiction and fantasy novels and novellas, including WINGS OF THE SERAPH and THE AMAZON'S PLEDGE. In her spare time, she is an avid tabletop gamer and RPG player.If you would like early access to her books - including the ability to vote on erotic scenes! - consider supporting her on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/hawkenovels

Book preview

The Ranger-General’s Submission: Knightfall

An erotic fantasy novella

Published by Jade Fantasy

Copyright © 2018 Sarah Hawke

Cover Art by Reinbach

Map created with Inkarnate software

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or used fictitiously.

All rights reserved.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook 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 this author.

Dedication

I want to offer a special thanks to all my wonderful supporters on Patreon, especially Andreas, Jimmie, Timothy, David, Kallnar, Kevin, Haethos, Griffon, Michael M., Alan, Jonathan, Douglas, Michael B., John, Sam, and Brandon. Thanks to your support, all of my books will finally have unique covers!

A Note to my Readers

As some of you have undoubtedly realized, many of my fantasy books take place in the same shared Highwind Universe. I generally try to keep the storylines independent from one another so that folks can enjoy them on their own, but some characters obviously cross over between them.

On that note, this story takes place between the fifth and sixth THE AMAZON’S PLEDGE books Legacy of Winter and Wrath of the Inquisitrix. Reading them is probably not essential, though it will obviously add context.

If you are interested, I have included a timeline in the back of this book (and all future Highwind Universe books) that shows the order in which the stories take place and offers my opinion on whether or not they are essential reading, kind of like my own curated Marvel movies list. I hope you find it useful!

Enjoy!

-Sarah

Content Warning

This erotic novella contains explicit sexual content. If you are offended by adult language or rough sex you probably shouldn’t be reading this! Consider yourself warned!

And perhaps intrigued…

The Northern Reaches

Chapter One

The North burned. Two days had passed since the Roskarim horde had broken upon the walls of Icewatch, but the barbarian army still hadn’t scattered the way I’d hoped. Some of the tribes had begun fighting one another over who should take the blame for their failure, and a few had dispersed into the mountains. But there were still thousands of armed, angry men out in here in the White Ridge, and I had no doubt in my mind that sooner or later they would muster the courage to attack once again.

And when they did, every single man, woman, and child in Icewatch was going to die.

I grimaced as I slowly nocked an arrow and peered down at the Roskarim wolf rider beneath my cliffside perch. I held my breath as I took aim, knowing full well that the other five barbarian warriors around my target would charge my position the instant I fired. I mentally mapped out my plan of attack: I would take the two on the right first, and with luck I would be able to draw my sword before the rest could maneuver up the ridge…

I was a split second from taking the shot when Aluriel placed a hand on my arm and gestured further down the path with her chin. Four more Roskarim had emerged from the snow-covered trees, and one of them was wearing the bone mask of a shaman.

I bit my lip and lowered my bow. If the two of us had any sense, we would have already been sprinting back across the cliff towards Icewatch. We were only ten miles out from the fortress, and with the aid of a camouflage spell I was confident we could lose any pursuers with relative ease. The problem was that I didn’t want to run—I wanted to fight. We needed to keep the Roskarim off-balance, and the only way to do that was to harass their outlying patrols and convince them that our forces were stronger than they actually were.

I will take the shaman, I whispered in Elven. You take the rider.

Aluriel nodded dutifully, though I could see the concern in her almond-shaped green eyes. We were already outnumbered four to one, and for all we knew there could have been fifty more Roskarim hiding in the frozen forest nearby. But thankfully she understood the stakes of our mission, and she wasn’t the type to back down from a challenge. I never would have taken her as my lover otherwise.

Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and reached out to the Aether. The ancient runes etched into the limbs of my bow flared to life, and they helped me channel additional power. I didn’t even need to draw from my quiver when I pulled back the string—a glowing Aetheric arrow materialized at my fingertips, and I leaned back over the cliffside and took aim at the shaman. I could sense the faint shimmer of his protective barrier; he was cagey enough to keep his defenses up just in case enemy scouts were on the field. But while the protective spell would have saved him from Aluriel, it wouldn’t save him from me.

"Naur!"

We fired. My shimmering arrow pierced the shaman’s barrier and seared through his chest like a tiny stroke of lightning. He was almost certainly dead before his skull mask shattered on the ground, and I quickly shifted my aim to his companions. A second one died before he realized what was happening, but the third managed to lift his shield and drop to a knee, unaware that my Aetheric arrows could burn through metal as easily as magic. His corpse convulsed on the ground for several seconds as the lingering electrical current crackled though his iron armor.

Aluriel was just as efficient: her first shot struck the wolf rider cleanly in his throat, knocking him from his saddle and causing his mount to bolt off into the forest. She killed two more in rapid succession as the rest dove for cover behind nearby rocks and trees.

Under normal circumstances, I would have gladly held my ground and waited for them to make their move; we had the clear advantage in elevation, weaponry, and skill. But given how many other Roskarim were in the area—and given how far voices could carry through the trees and across the tundra—we simply couldn’t afford to wait.

Cover me, I said, sweeping my legs over the edge of the cliff.

Serrane, you can’t—

I didn’t bother waiting for her reply. With the Aether still coursing through me, I conjured a stiff gust of wind to slow my thirty yard fall from our perch. I still rolled when I landed, mostly to keep a small profile, and one of the Roskarim was stupid enough to peek out from behind his cover with a throwing axe in hand. My arrow—a normal wooden one this time—pierced his forearm and sent him flopping to the