The brutal slaying of a mother by a dreaded vampire during medieval Europe’s bloody Crusades sends a young Bulgarian nobleman on a deadly quest for revenge. The senseless torture of a lord by the fearsome Ottoman enemy encourages a Greek squire to join Vlad Dracula’s secretive and chivalric Order of the Dragon in search of answers. And again, vengeance.
Their preordained lives fighting Ottoman invaders will be changed forever. But are they ready to sacrifice those they care most about? To risk everything? With a trail of death getting closer and loved ones under threat, their searches lead them both down into the fire of the abyss. But survival is never assured, and the price of retribution can be more than one is willing to pay. And when their paths collide, there’s sure to be bloodshed.
Or worse—damnation!
This was a fairly enjoyable and likable genre effort. The multilayered story offers up quite a lot to like, bringing together a pair of leads we get to follow that are easy to follow along with, and can compare each against the other since they both manage to follow along with a similar plotline. Given that each one is trying to fight and atone for something as a symbolic gesture of growing up, with one looking to settle the score against the vampire that attacked and killed his relative and the other guy looking to follow his dreams of becoming a warrior knight which would bring vengeance to his parents, there’s a fun parallel that comes about here with each one trying to come to terms with themselves as well as the growing vampire threat among them.
That interplay and power-dynamics within each other make the book far more interesting over time as they each find that revenge might not be as important as they initially thought. There’s a fun interplay at work as the work of the vampire, moving around the countryside and getting to feed on the locals he encounters in the random confrontations with peasant locals or the attack on the castle that has a lot to like about it, draws this kind of dynamic to the forefront out in fun form with the ability to make them question their motives. It’s quite impressive how this comes together with an astounding amount of period detail involving how individuals lived and worked before getting involved in the confrontation with the main guys as the circles come complete.
That all becomes fun and engaging, which does come at the expense of the overt genre content on display. The main tone evoked on display is more medieval fantasy, especially with the character-building that goes on here, offering a build-up of how they’re both driven by revenge and how each of their chances at fulfilling that brings about their depth and intrigue. This focus on the relationship matters or the fantastic nature of the vampire actions makes for a somewhat lessened sense of fear against the main vampires, even though they still carry out the same type of traditional behavior, which does leave this one feeling rather overwhelming at times with the verbose, flowing writing style enhancing that or making it not be an issue for readers as it sets up the next part of the story.
4.5/5
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