Ballad of the Door, excerpt
“With ancient feuds forgotten, and minds with ballads filled,
Two worlds long torn asunder will find the door again.
Pure of heart and human, a Chosen warrior comes,
The barrier shall be broken, two worlds unite as one.”
Irvu’s Lullaby, excerpt
Born of power, born of flame,
The one has come her throne to claim
The child of light our hearts will tame,
Daughter of earth with heaven’s name.
At first glance the figures gliding down through the trees seemed non-threatening, almost human. They wore leather jackets that hung low and had ragged holes worn in elbows and tail. As their feet touched the ground, my skin began to crawl. Three pairs of red eyes stared out of bloodless faces. One of them focused its gaze upon me, a smile snaking across its face to reveal the tips of sharp yellow teeth. His head slowly tilted to one side then the other as he moved with sinuous grace in a semi-circle around me. A finger tipped with a long, cracked nail traced a line up my arm, setting my hairs on end and sending a shudder through my entire frame. The finger traced its way around the back of my neck, and I could feel its breath in my hair, its scent oddly metallic, but I could not will my feet to move away.
“Enough!” Dagda’s voice cut through the fog beginning to fill my mind, carrying a sharp anger I would never have associated with the gentle Dagda of Earth legend. The creature sucked in a breath and stepped away, turning attention to him.
“Your Majesty,” he hissed, making the words an insult rather than an honor. He bowed low, sweeping an arm wide as greasy tendrils of hair trailed across the grass. I shrank in disgust to the protection of Balhon’s great side as I realized that everywhere a part of the creature’s body touched the grass turned brown and yellow, as if the land itself sickened upon contact with him.
“What brings you to Tylwyth, Grigore?” Dagda demanded, his voice icy. “This valley is far from Upir, and I don’t recall granting you safe passage.”
“Dracul rages against your enforced borders,” the creature sneered. “We starve in the dead lands; we need blood.”
“You are provided with blood in plenty,” Dagda responded coldly. “Live game is driven through your borders daily upon which your people sate themselves with disgusting abandon.”
“Animal blood!” Grigore spat. He eyed me with his tongue caressing the fangs revealed in his sudden feral grin. “What kind of life can be eked from blood with so little power? Dracul craves the blood of intelligent beings.”
With my first full-length novel tentatively releasing this summer, I will be sharing a teaser from the unpolished manuscript every couple of weeks until release. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them.
Laughter like the tinkling of a wind chime drew my attention to a small copse. I approached slowly, my heart fluttering, peering closely into the shifting branches. A delicately pointed ear nearly escaped my notice until a merry eye the color of deep indigo followed it around the trunk of a tree. It disappeared the instant I saw it, but the chiming laughter rippled through the leaves. I followed it, forgetting the strange path entirely as the mysterious creature led me deeper into the forest.
The laughter suddenly ceased, and a heart shaped face dropped from the branches overhead, inches away from my nose and upside down. Green hair hung like Spanish moss from a pale impish face, and slim fingers sprouting tiny pink flowers prodded my eyes and ears and pulled my hair. I tried to back away but my heel struck a root that had inconveniently pushed its way above ground behind me, and I crashed into the underbrush with my arms and legs flailing awkwardly. The creature laughed again, tumbling out of the tree and somersaulting through the air as it clutched its belly that shook with mirth.
I stared at the creature from the flat of my back, too astonished to even be irritated at its mischief. “What are you?” I asked, my heart skipping with excitement.
The Word Worker 