S. A. Swann - Wolfs Cross

This may be the werewolf book of the year a fresh, page-turning take on werewolf tropes that is not to be missed.

Booklist

Lilly lives in a world so strange that even werewolves have to fight for survival, and I found myself rooting for her from the very start. Before long, I was falling for her, too! Wolfbreed is a thrilling yet deeply moving journey that I never wanted to end.

R OBERT M ASELLO , author of Blood and Ice

A mesmerizing story that entertained me thoroughly and moved me deeply. Wolfbreed is an exciting nonstop action adventure involving the supernatural. More than that, though, it demonstrates how the human spirit, even when in a not-entirely-human body, can be transformed and redeemed by the power of love. I adored this book.

M ARY B ALOGH , New York Times bestselling author of A Secret Affair

S. A. Swann has written a spellbinding fantasy of the Teutonic knights and the great Northern Crusade, set in a little-known period of history amidst the gloomy forests of Prussia and Lithuania. Vivid and visceral, dark and delicious, this one kept me turning pages from start to finish.

G EORGE R.R. M ARTIN , New York Times bestselling author of A Feast for Crows

Swann turns opposing viewpoints into sympathetic perspectives, clearly painting the complex political and religious dynamics of the time.

Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Swann does an excellent job of worldbuilding, and the setting of medieval Prussia is an interesting choice, adding its own unique flavor to the tale. Its blessed with a good story and interesting premise.

RT Book Reviews

Wolfbreed is definitely up there for my surprise find of the year. If youre after an engrossing slice of historical fantasy, or if you just like werewolves, then I dont think youll go wrong with this one.

Graemes Fantasy Book Review

Swann has given readers an empathetic, remarkably drawn character in Lilly. In Wolfbreed, hes given readers engaging characters, a plausible conceit, and a greatly-paced story.

SFFWorld.com

Also by S. A. Swann

Wolfbreed

This book is dedicated to
Lynn and Lucy, for getting me started.

Anno Domini 1353

B rother Josef had thought he had seen Hell itself. He had seen it in the black swellings that plagued his father and mother, sisters and brother. He had seen it in the doctors who fled at the sight of him coming from an infected house. He had seen it in the faces of those who still dared walk the streets of Nrnberg, carrying smoldering bundles of aromatic herbs to chase the infection away, or at least mask the omnipresent smell of death. He had seen it in the piles of bodies left to rot for lack of men to bury them. And he had seen it in the blackened face of a woman he loved, abandoned to die alone in her familys house.

However, upon joining the Order, he had learned that Hell took many forms.

It was the will of God, and his superiors, that he serve his probation under the command of Komtur Heinrich, who headed a convent of warrior monks within the still barely tamed wilds of Prussia. Komtur Heinrich held a peculiar place in the Order, and his men bore a name within the Order that Josef had not heard before: Wolfjgers.

Even the device they bore had a difference from that of the wider Order: a severed wolfs head occupied the upper left quadrant of the Teutonic Knights black cross.

The weapons borne by the Wolfjgers were different in character, as well. The smaller items, daggers and arrowheads, were cast of pure silver. Swords and axes were of more typical steel, but with edges clad in silver.

It was not his place to question his role, and it was not until he saw the first signs of what the wolf hunters actually hunted that he understood.

He knew that their foe was some sort of demon, but he was worldly enough to expect that the demons they sought would resemble men. In the depths of his self-doubt, he feared they might resemble Jews. He knew that Jews were not responsible for the pestilence that had scoured the land. During the worst of it, the synagogue at Nrnberg had stood as empty of life as the cathedrals.

But that hadnt stopped riots in the countryside, as panicked villagers burned Jews like the city folk burned incense, in a pathetic attempt to keep the death at bay. Even decrees by Pope Clement VI hadnt been able to halt the slaughter.

Josef didnt believe that the men of the Order, devoted to Christ and the pope, would be so readily deceived. But when Heinrich talked of demons who walked like men, it so much resembled the rhetoric Josef had heard during the worst of the death that he wonderedand chided himself for the doubts. His faith had led him to this point, and he did not believe his service to God would be so subverted.

Soon enough, God and his Komtur saw fit to give him evidence of the demons the Wolfjgers hunted, and they were not menChristian or Jew.

He was unprepared when Komtur Heinrich stopped them outside an unnamed village whose fields had gone wild and unharvested. At first, Josef thought they had come across an outbreak of the pestilence finding a northern foothold. But Heinrich announced, For those of you new to this service, observe well what we find here. We are close on the trail of the demon.

They rode forward in silence, and unlike the plague villages Josef had seen when he had finally departed his familys estate at Nrnberg, the first bodies he saw were those of animals. The corpses of sheep and oxen dotted an overgrown field, their bodies black with flies. Despite the decay, Josef could tell that the beasts had died by violence, not from illness. Parts of the corpses were scattered, so that an accurate census of the dead wasnt possible.

They stopped at a house with a splintered door. Blood splattered the threshold as if in mockery of the angel of death. Inside was chaosblood, fragments of furniture, and a broken scythe whose blade was spotted with gore and tufts of blond fur.

There were no bodies.

It has been here, Komtur Heinrich said, drawing attention to bloody prints in the dirt floor of the cottage, where the weather had not washed the marks away.

Pressed into the gore was the pawprint of a wolf, but a wolf that would have to be the most monstrous animal Josef had ever heard of. The gauntleted hand of a large man could barely spread wide enough to cover it.

What manner of wolf made these prints? Josef asked.

Wolfbreed, Heinrich answered. The spawn of Hell itself. The beast has the aspect of a wolf, but standsand thinksas a man. It can cloak itself in human skin as it wishes, and it will ignore all wounds but the instantly mortal from all but a silver weapon. Heinrich lifted the scythe and turned to Josef, and for a moment, in the darkness, he had the aspect of the angel of death himself. This was a futile weapon, useless unless it took off the head of the beast with the first stroke.

But where are the bodies? Josef asked, afraid of the answer.

H e had his unwelcome answer at the villages church.

At first, as they approached the small building, Josef thought that the window ledges, the roof, and the cross set in front had all been draped black in mourning. It wasnt until they got closer that he saw that the black moved.