These last couple of weeks saw me ticking off a few goalposts: the blurb for Fire Dance has been updated to reflect the novel’s primary focus better (I hope), and Fire Dance is finally available both as an ebook and paperback. I’m counting the days to get my box of paperbacks. That’s when it will finally sink in that the story is now done and out of my hands.
To celebrate, I’m pasting a passage from the first pages of the book which introduces the protagonist, Maia, a seventeen-year-old acolyte studying in the temple of the Goddess of Light. Maia has a secret ability which could get her executed if discovered.
Maia walked past the temple guard with an unconcerned gait. Reaching the stout door of the underground cell, she bent down to push the dish against the food flap. The plate was too large to pass, which was why she’d chosen it.
“You’ll have to open the door.” Maia looked over her shoulder at the guard breathing down her neck. She again stooped to push the plate against the flap.
The man grunted. “You could change the plate.”
Showtime. Maia let her gaze wander from the guard’s sandal straps criss-crossing his beefy lower legs, to his belted tunic with the dagger and bunch of keys hanging from his waist and up his broad chest—as if she had every right to demand and expect obedience. As if she were already a Sentinel.
He flinched, and the slight tension in her guts relaxed. The Day of the Mother was thirty-four days away. To the temple employees, that made her practically already one of the Mother’s chosen. One of the elite.
The guard dipped his head, his irritation at having to obey a slip of a girl tightening his face. “Prefect.” He fumbled for the keys and unlocked the door.
Even her title rhymed with her reputation.
The creak of the wood and the stench of sweat and burning beams released through the open doorway hurled Maia into the scenes of the nightmares that woke her up at night. Smoke filled her mouth; the crackle of flames and the sound of someone screaming numbed her mind.
It’s a trick of the mind. It doesn’t exist.
Maia tightened her grip on the plate. Perhaps she should have let the guard see her indecision and guilt and given him a reason to doubt the wisdom of obeying her. She would have had a good excuse then for not helping Dorienne.
She lifted her chin and hid her shortening breath and the shake in her limbs. Fear—especially irrational fear—was a sign of weakness. But the very stones round the cell door sucked in the light and air.
Maia stepped into the darkness, as thick and smelly as Cook’s kitchen on chicken-butchering-and-plucking day. A rustling to the left told her Dorienne was awake.
And after that (hopefully) intriguing introduction to the protagonist, let’s move on to today’s fantasy creature…
N is for the Nephilim
Nephilim are the children of a human parent and an angel. They often have a human appearance but are very attractive, strong and brave.
Nephilim have great powers but the type of power and their general physical characteristics depend on who they take after and who their immortal parent was. In fact, some Nephilim are closely similar to mortals while others more closely take after their angelic parent both physically and emotionally.
Nephilim can be long-lived especially as they don’t easily sicken. They are often the good-guys when they use their supernatural abilities to protect humanity and hunt demons or other evil-doers.
References: https://unnaturalworld.fandom.com/wiki/Nephilim; https://powerlisting.fandom.com/wiki/Nephilim_Physiology; https://xsupernaturalcreaturesx.weebly.com/nephilims.html
Books You Might Like
My ex-crit partner’s debut novel Blood of the Stars is out. I’m honoured to say that I got to read part of it before its release and it immediately hooked me. So happy for you, Karyne.
Harnessing the power in her blood could turn the tides of war—if it doesn’t destroy her first.
It’s been fourteen years since Prince Gaeren lost Aeliana, the childhood friend he’d sworn to protect. Haunted by the unfulfilled promise, he searches for a way to bring her home. But with threats against the kingdom from both a rebel faction in the south and Mayvus, a power-hungry priestess in the east, he only has time to follow one last clue across the seas.
Kidnapped as a child, Aeliana is desperate to be rid of the chaotic magic in her blood, magic her captors use to ravage the land. When she’s found by Gaeren’s rebel enemies, she joins their fight to rescue her mother from Mayvus, but her unwieldy power only serves to attract Mayvus’ attention. Aeliana must learn to control her magic before they reach her mother, or risk becoming the weapon Mayvus needs to take complete control of the kingdom.
Blood of the Stars is the first book in an epic fantasy series full of magic, intrigue, found family, reluctant royalty, & descendants of Stars on the brink of war.
For lovers of all things fantasy…
And… FREE BOOKS
Visions of the past forge second chances for the future.
Silas isn’t just a thief. He’s the best in Veralian. But he’s not the city’s biggest problem. As the leader of the Ashen Hawks, Silas has to keep a clear head, even when his younger sister gives him a piece of her mind. But even with her warning, he can’t resist helping a beautiful prisoner escape the city’s barracks, not realizing she’s the prize he was searching for. Lucca uses trinkets to see glimpses of the past under the military’s cruel control. When an emotionally damaged, yet annoyingly handsome thief gives her an opportunity to start over, she sets her focus on saving him from a danger neither of them saw coming. When the truth of Helgath’s experimentation is exposed, it will either destroy the Hawks or force them to rise above and become the corrupted country’s most notorious criminal guild. Dawn of the Thieves is a prequel novella in the Pantracia Chronicles.
**This book is intended for mature readers and contains violence and sexual scenes.
An enemies-to-lovers romance
Vendrick is my captor and savior, a man with darkness mirroring my own- fueling conflicting emotions. My instincts scream to despise him while an undeniable attraction sizzles between us. Abducted and thrust into Sayah in the treacherous Dark Realm, I am forced to endure grueling training to awaken my latent “Light” powers. They call me the “Chosen One,” yet they keep the true purpose shrouded in secrecy. Vendrick unveils the dangers and injustices of Sayah. It ignites my unwavering resolve to train relentlessly and safeguard its innocent souls. As we face mutual adversaries and delve deeper into Sayah’s secrets, we must find a way to work together. Every moment I spend in Vendrick’s presence, I risk surrendering my heart to him. I’m trying to resist the allure of darkness and fulfill my destiny as the Chosen One. But love may lead me astray in a world of perilous seduction.
Some self-promo!
When sixteen-year-old Shael helps a mortally wounded messenger, he entrusts her with delivering to the queen three magical statuettes stolen from the Hyllethans, her country’s feared enemies. But Shael accidentally cuts her fingers while handling the statuettes and magic links her to them—any breakage or pressure on the clay is felt on her flesh. Shael’s fate is now inexorably tied to the Hyllethans, the statuettes, and the political turmoil in the land.
A terrified girl with a deadly ability. A penniless soldier who loves her. A lord with the power of life and death over them.
For seventeen years, Maia, a promising acolyte of the Goddess of Light, has hidden her unholy ability to conjure flames. But when she performs in the temple’s Summer Solstice ceremony, the Emperor’s envoy, Lord Quei, tells her he knows her secret. Quei threatens to enslave Vane, the young man Maia loves, and execute her as a demon unless Maia recovers coins that were stolen from him. He claims these will reveal Maia’s true nature and restore their memories of who he and Maia were in previous lives.
To save herself and Vane, Maia goes against her principles and resorts to deceit and thievery in her search for both the coins and the truth about her fire. But if what Quei says is true, the coins will destroy her beliefs about who she is, the nature of her world, and even worse, Vane’s trust and love.
How do you choose between protecting your family or following your heart?
Maia, her family, and Ryse, the love of her several lives, are desperate to reach their spacecraft and return to their home planet. Only Ryse’s presence there can prevent a devastating war from erupting. But Maia’s heart is torn: the spacecraft is too small to take them all and leaving means abandoning family members in a land ravaged by conflict and rebellion.
Their plans are further thrown into disarray when they attract the attention of General Dardarin, who suspects they are enemy spies.
With the enemy armed with alien weapons, with the rebellion entangling Maia in its web and with Dardarin following their every move, Maia races against the clock to find a way to protect all those she loves on both worlds. Even if it means sacrificing her happiness and her centuries-long love for Ryse.
Colours of Fantasy (FREE DOWNLOAD)
Not enough time to read, but love fantasy?
Colours of Fantasy is an anthology of short stories that range from magical realism to sci-fi fantasy. They are short enough to be easily read while commuting or during a lunch break. Read about paintings that are truer than true-to-life, or the heart-wrenching decision Poseidon’s human son-in-law has to take, or perhaps you’ll prefer a glimpse of life after an apocalypse, or a story about a space pirate with an uncomfortable past.
And if you like longer reads, Colours of Fantasy gives you a taste of Book One of two series: The Hyllethan Gifts Trilogy and Fire Dance Chronicles.
Till next time!
Caroline
Caroline Sciriha 