Shiloh Walker's Blog, page 97

Authors Against Bullying

There’s a big blog hop going on right now…authors against bullying, organized by Mandy Roth.

I wasn’t able to join in on the blog hop-vacation and edits and too much happened this week to work it in, but a bunch of authors are speaking up against bullying and guys, we all know bullying sucks.  (And if you don’t…um, that’s part of the problem.)

Definition of a bully:

(from M-W.com)

a : a blustering browbeating person; especially : one habitually cruel to others who are weaker

bul·lied bul·ly·ing

Definition of BULLY
transitive verb

1
: to treat abusively

2
: to affect by means of force or coercion

We see more and more of this anymore, and cyber-bullying, in particular, is getting out of hand.  My kids don’t have facebook pages or twitter for these very reasons.

Some ‘antibully’ pages pretend to ‘speak out’ against bullying and do the very thing they ‘claim’ to hate…using fear and coercion to try and silence others. (I previously had the page here, decided to delete it cuz I don’t to give them the attention they don’t deserve.)

Monsterous asshats stalk teen girls so horribly, one girl, in the end, felt the only choice she has to find any peace, at all, is to take her own lives.

Freakazoids like Vitaly Borker threatened and harassed dissatisfied customers-threatened to rape/murder them…the good news is, he was found guilty and sentenced to jail.

Somebody decides they don’t like how Harriet Klausner does reviews and decides to hunt down as much info as they can, including ordering final copies of the books she receives from pubs, then sells (note…this isn’t illegal) and posts info, including birthdates for her kid, hometown, names, etc. Because…why?

When is does it stop?

When is it too much?

It’s already too much.

 

All new again

I revamped the JC Daniels.  Looks all new again, well, better even, I think.  Shiny and spiffy.

I’ve merged the blogs…well, attempted, basically just putting up a link that directs all blog readers to this one, because I’m not maintaining two different blogs.

And the site itself looks prettier.

Also, there’s a shiny new splash page for Shiloh… http://shilohwalker.com, one that shows both of us.  Me and all the voices in my head…

Hopefully this doesn’t mean I’m about ready to go on a tangent and start redesigning this site.  It’s good as it is.  Right?  (Say right…whimper).

My first German release…Blinde Wahrheit

It’s available now.

It’s a pretty cool cover.  And it’s my first German release.  It’s If You Hear Her, book 1 in the Ash trilogy, although that got changed a bit.

I want to buy it.  I wonder if I can get it from Book Depository.  Yeah, I’ll end up getting copies, but it’s my first German release.  I should totally buy that, right?

Look it!  Cool cover!

I think it means Blind Truth, but I don’t trust online translators, so that could be way off.

If by chance you’re German and you’d like to read it, it’s from Egmont Lyx.  It’s available here.

Blind Destiny is now available

Have you entered to win a feather From an Angel’s Wing?  It’s the contest to celebrate the release of Blind Destiny…

The floorboards, old and worn, creaked.

Shooting a glance over my shoulder, I saw Luc coming my way.

He moved slowly, with an easy, casual grace. When we’d first settled into the room, Krell had trotted all over it, time and time again, and I suspected Luc had been committing the room’s layout to memory. He’d moved around it several times over himself and now he came toward me unerringly. I was tempted to dodge around him and go hide on my bed.

Only one thing stopped me—pride.

Damn it, I was Myrsina. Others of our ilk trembled when they heard my name.

I’d be damned if I’d dodge away and hide because this one man made me nervous.

Even if I was standing there in just a T-shirt that skimmed a little high on my thighs.

I was nervous, damn it. Nervous and it made me even more nervous, and that pissed me off.

Defensively, I crossed my arms over my chest and decided I’d make a point of studying the black and white framed photograph hanging over his bed. It was of a ruin—probably local. The landscape was oddly familiar. Yes, yes, focus on the mundane—

“Why do you think you hear it when I don’t?”

Baring my teeth in a mockery of a smile, I said, “Because I’m the lucky sort, I guess.”

“Hmm. Nice try. But I’m not buying it. Try again.”

“Maybe you are the lucky sort,” I offered, shooting him a narrow look.

He cocked his head, a frown on that incredibly perfect face. I wanted to push my hand through his hair. Pull him to me, and for once…even if it was just once…I wanted to kiss him. Taste those lips, and feel his mouth on mine.

“Why are you angry with me?”

“I’m not,” I bit off. Was I?

“You’re angry with something and it has to do with me,” he said, his voice mild enough. “I feel it—your anger is like a red wave in my head.”

“I’m not…”

He lifted a hand.

Unerringly, he touched my face and I felt my breath squeeze down in nothing in my chest.

No, don’t touch me—

But I couldn’t move away.

Not for anything. “You are angry,” he murmured. “And…”

Move, Sina! The voice of self-preservation was a trumpeting roar in my head and I knew I needed to move, needed to break contact. Even with my shields up, there were some things that were simply impossible to hide if the person had a gift like my own.

And Luc’s gift…was…just…like…mine.

Helpless, frozen in place, I stared at him and watched his eyes narrow. As something passed through his gaze, an awareness, I finally managed to find the strength to pull away and nudge him aside. “I’m not angry with you,” I said, my voice so raw I barely recognized it. “I—”

He caught my arm.

I jerked away but he didn’t let go.

“If you don’t let me go,” I warned him. “I’ll…”

So many years.

Did he have any idea what it was like to want something, to need it, for so long? And now, here he was…right there. In front of me. And not only was he right there…in front of me…it was happening at a time when I was so fucking vulnerable, when I felt so raw and exposed already.

“Let me go, Luc.”

 

The wave of red he felt in his mind stunned him for a second.

It was anger.

Luc knew anger.

Had lived with it with Perci for years, although it hadn’t ever been directed at him.

But he was no stranger to it.

Feeling it come from Sina was something of a shock, because to his knowledge, he hadn’t ever done anything that might anger her that much—had he?

The wave shuddered…and like one crashing against the sand, it broke. Over in the distance, he could feel another wave gathering, rising, rushing to the shore, but under it, he felt something else.

Under his hand, her skin felt smooth. It was odd that he noticed it then. As his mind was trying to understand that puzzle of her, he couldn’t help but notice how insanely soft, how impossibly smooth her skin was. And she smelled incredible.

“Let me go, Luc.” Her voice was husky, rough. She jerked against his hold and reflexively, he jerked back.

She tumbled against his chest and he lifted a hand, rested it on her hip.

He’d lost his mind.

It was the only thing that made sense.

Nobody in his right mind would touch Sina if she didn’t want to be touched—

There—

The puzzle pieces clicked into place and all of a sudden, he saw it.

Saw what he hadn’t seen and understood what it was under the wave of anger. Anger…yes. Mostly at herself. Frustration…

Hunger—

His brain clicked off.

“Damn it, are you not hearing me?” Sina demanded, her voice rising. “Let me go.”

He opened his mouth. The words came out of their volition, he’d swear it. Because he wasn’t so crazy he’d challenge her like that…was he? “And if I don’t?”

He felt her tense against him.

It had been centuries since he’d lost his sight.

He couldn’t remember missing it more than he did at that moment.

“Luc…”

He fisted his hand in the material of the shirt she wore—it was cotton, he thought, soft and warm from being against her skin. Maybe he’d like to peel it away from her. And—

Her mouth covered his.

Her hands pushed into his hair and she jerked him close.

Now available…

~*~

Enter the contest…

Read more about Blind Destiny… or you can just buy it…

Amazon | BN | Samhain | iBookstore

(This won’t be out in print for a while…it’s not long enough so it has to be paired up.)

 To win a $10 GC to Samhain Bookstore, just leave comment…telling me your favorite fairy tale!

 

Blind Destiny

Have you entered to win a feather From an Angel’s Wing?  It’s the contest to celebrate the release of Blind Destiny…

taking a different spin today… how about a little peek at Will…and a new sort of angel.

“This one is new,” he murmured. A dark, demented smile curled his lips. “New…but she’s not human anymore.” Something flashed in his eyes. “She can survive in the void.”

“Don’t even think about it,” Will warned.

Crow’s smiled widened. “And how will you stop me? You are not as old as I. Not as strong.”

He took a step toward them.

Will ripped opened the fabric that separated their world and shoved Crow through without blinking an eye. “I said, don’t.”

He snapped it shut before Crow managed to snap his wings closed.

A spray of black feathers, blood and bone drifted down.

Mandy gulped and stumbled away. “What…what was that?”

Will blew out a sigh and knelt down, lifted one of the feathers.

“Somebody who hates me.”

~*~

Enter the contest…

Read more about Blind Destiny… or you can just preorder it…

Amazon | BN | Samhain | iBookstore

(This won’t be out in print for a while…it’s not long enough so it has to be paired up.)

 

Saturday Snippets… The Reunited

Raining down is today’s topic.  Nobody said it had to be actual rain, though.

From The Reunited, due out in February

A hot meal.

A hard run through downtown.

And when he got back to the hotel, Joss deliberately sat in the lobby for an hour.

Surrounded by people, listening to them come and go.

Dimly, he was aware of their thoughts.  The chaos.  It was like rain pounding against an umbrella he carried, though.  It didn’t leave him overwhelmed this time.  Finally.

It was an exhausting exercise and his head was still reeling, so he didn’t feel at all bad about missing the evening pow-wow in Jones’ room.  He headed to his, showered and crashed.

It was another night of deep, tormenting dreams.

He would have liked to fight but this time…the dreams reached up and grabbed him. Pulled him under.  Choking him…

 

 

Choking–

Fuck all, the pain choked him, but it didn’t matter.

All that matter was that he get up.  Get on his feet and get her away from her.  Struggling to roll over, he clawed at the grass, searching for something to hold as he clambered to his feet.

But there was nothing–

Then there was something.

A hand.  Pressing on his chest.

Her hand.  “Be still now, do you hear me?  You must be still. Oh, look at…no.  It will be fine.”

Fine…No.  He wouldn’t be fine.  Everything was getting back and gray, his vision fading as he tried to focus on her face. “Amelie.  You must run now,” he rasped, grabbing her wrist and trying to blink away the gray clouds that wanted to hide her face from him.  “Run.  Get away…”

Other authors, discussing rain-related issues…

Rhian Cahill

Leah Braemel

Mari Carr

McKenna Jeffries

Taige Crenshaw

HelenKay Dimon

Lauren Dane

TJ Michaels

Cover… awesome, pretty, wonderful new cover

Can you tell I like it?

It’s not totally final, because it needs to have this awesome, pretty, wonderful quote added by Carly Phillips:

“Friends make the best lovers and soul mates in WRECKED. A beautiful look into true and enduring love…” Carly Phillips, NYT Bestselling Author

So here’s the awesome, pretty, wonderful new cover…

Due out in April.  This is straight contemporary and I do believe it’s my first non-erotic full length contemporary.

Also… I kinda love Zack.  He’s the hero.

Wanna read more?  Here ya go… Wrecked.

Blind Destiny…another peek

Have you entered to win a feather From an Angel’s Wing?  It’s the contest to celebrate the release of Blind Destiny…

She hadn’t always been this…volatile. Luc was sure of it.

But now, as they walked to the hotel Will had arranged for them, the energy he felt coming off of her was so chaotic, he felt like he was walking inside a thunderstorm.

Strange.

She was the one who had taught him control.

And now it seemed she had none of it.

“You know, your mind feels a bit of a mess,” he said softly.

“It is a bit of a mess. If you don’t want to see anything, I’d suggest you mind your own business,” she snapped.

“I’m trying, but you’re broadcasting so loud.” He shrugged. Krell gave a soft yip and out of habit, Luc merged his mind with the dog—and saw the obstacle in the sidewalk. With his hand on Krell’s head, he bypassed the area where work was being done.

Sina nudged him. “We’re staying there.”

Luc stopped and contemplated the low, squat building through the dog’s eyes. Then he used his mind to guide Krell to look at Sina again. She was serious.

“There?” he echoed.

“Yes.” She tucked her hair behind her ear, her lips pursed. “It looked a bit better online. I told Will to find us a place on this street, so it’s the only option we have. Maybe it will be better inside.”

Luc had done a bit of exploring himself online, using a refreshable Braille display.  Sometimes he really did love technology—it had made it so much easier for him to do some things…read, surf the web, check out this little village, since Sina wasn’t particularly forthcoming.

The town was a nice-sized one and it did a fair bit of tourism traffic—there were other hotels. “Am I to assume all the other hotels are booked solid, then?”

“No.” She touched his arm and murmured, “Listen…don’t you hear it?”

“Hear what?” There was nothing—

Then Sina lowered the shields on her mind.

Screaming.

He heard screaming.

It was like it came echoing to him down through a long, long hallway, one with many, many doors. But the sounds of the screams were unmistakable. “Can you see as well through Krell’s eyes as you can if you look through mine?” she asked softly.

He shrugged. “It depends on what I’m looking for. Shadows, colors, nuances…not exactly. Now if I’m out trying to hunt for somebody or something, I can see better.”

She was quiet a moment, then said, “Look through my eyes.”

He’d rather not. But he wasn’t going to tell her that. Sighing, he slid his mind into hers—carefully—he had to do this carefully, because if he didn’t, he’d see bits and pieces of her he’d rather not see, and she’d see bits and pieces of him.

Usually it was an awkward thing, settling his mind into another’s. Even the first few times with Perci had been a struggle.

But Sina’s mind opened for him like a glove—one designed to fit just him. Only him—

He shoved that thought aside and settled within her mind to look. “What am I looking at?” he asked, eyeing the dismal little hotel. It wasn’t that he hadn’t stayed in squalid places before. He had, but…

Sina turned her head toward the building across the narrow road. It all but cast the entire area into shadow—dark, oppressive and deathly.

What he saw almost shattered the connection between them.

The walls before him were bleeding.

“Merde…”

“Yes.”

“What is this?”

“It’s the house. It’s where she died.”

Briefly, he caught the echo of something else in Sina’s mind, but it was gone, silenced by her own powerful presence almost instantly. “And it’s the house where the seven bloody sisters were supposedly tortured.”

Abruptly, Sina shoved him out of her mind.

He couldn’t think of another who could do that, break that connection so easily.

She did it without blinking an eye or breaking a sweat—and she gave him a fucking headache while she did. “And that, dearest Luc, is why we’re staying here. We need to be close, I figure. If you and Will force me into this, then you’ll damn well let me do things as I see fit.”

As she turned and walked away, he reached down and rested a hand on Krell’s head. “She’s in a mood, isn’t she, boy?”

Krell growled a little, deep in his throat.

“Ah, now. Don’t be like that. She doesn’t like it here.”

Although he couldn’t see, he glanced back at the house. The darkness was an ugly maw, one he could sense in his gut.

She didn’t like it here…and the reasons for that went deep.

Very deep.

 

 

Sprawled on the bed, fingers resting on the Braille display, Luc did his damnedest to pretend he was alone in the room. The hotel had, in fact, turned out to be nicer than he’d expected.

Their room was a cozy affair, two beds, a kitchenette and a bathroom. But…it was one fucking room. One.

Will hadn’t gotten them separate rooms?

What the fuck?

He heard a soft, whispering sound, and although Krell was asleep and Luc wasn’t looking at anything, he was having a hard time ignoring the fact that Sina was in the room.

What the fuck indeed.

He set his jaw and once more tried to focus.

He wanted answers, and since Sina wasn’t giving him any, he was looking on his own.

So far, that search hadn’t shown anything. Shifting away from the display, he tried a different search.

Sina + Greece + fairy tales. That took him on a fruitless search, thirty minutes of his time that he’d never get back. Of course, he had a lot of minutes in his life to kill, so thirty minutes wasn’t so bad and he was stuck here until the truculent woman in charge decided to enlighten him. Wasting time…for the win, he thought, broodingly before heading back to restart the search over.

Greece + fairy tales.

The first one that came up was one he’d heard before. Not anything terribly clever or unusual, just a variation on a hundred different tales he’d heard a hundred times over. Brother and Sister. Nothing there that made him think of Sina.

Returning to the search results, he clicked on the second one and lowered his hand to the Braille display so he could read. Wikipedia. Either a treasure trove or a trash heap…or somewhere in between.

This wouldn’t be too bad, though.

Less than twenty fairy tales…odd. Most of the older places had more legends than this.

He was tempted to wake Krell, so he could look at her. But he didn’t.

If this place had the pain for her that he suspected, it made sense she hadn’t spent as much time crafting fairy tales for her, though.

And there would be others, he knew. They just weren’t noted. Most of the tales Sina had her hand in had ended up in the Grimm’s books, or become American folklore. Some had Russian or Asian roots, and some had their beginnings in the Native American lore.

But the oldest of them had come from this part of the world, so many of the tales had originated here.

This was, after all, where they had been born, so to speak. Where the first whisperings of their very strangeness had first started.

He checked each story, reading them through.

And when he came to hers…he knew.

It was a jolt, right to his gut.

It was, like so many of their tales, filled with outlandish tales of sudden death, reawakenings with true love.

In short, complete bullshit.

But somehow, he knew this was more of a lie than most.

This…this wasn’t her story.

It didn’t have her…heart, for one. Even though the Grimm brothers had made merry with the tales, there was something of Sina’s voice in many of the them, even to this day.

Not this one.

Of course, he was just reading a short summary…maybe he could find a complete version…

The next search yielded a few sources. He paused over one. He’d typed in Mysina + The Myrtle fairy tales.

One of the top searches was actually an Italian fairy tale. Some of these were hundreds, possibly a thousand years old, at the root. Clicking on it, he started to read.

And his gut went tight.

Hot.

Seven wicked women…

Seven bloody sisters…

Smiling to himself, he tucked that information in his mind and started to read.

 

 

The pretty prince looked too pleased with himself. What was he about, I wondered, but I wasn’t going to ask him. It was something of an annoyance that I couldn’t peek in on his thoughts without him knowing.

It was even more of an annoyance that I worried about that. There wasn’t anybody else I would have concerned myself with. I’d either ask, or I’d look. Why did he matter so much?

But I knew that answer.

I’d known that answer for centuries.

He mattered…because he did. He always had, when he’d first been sent to me, all those years ago, so battered in spirit, but so determined not to let anybody know. So broken in heart, and yet he never let it show on the outside—he always had a kind word for everybody, a gentle smile for those who suffered, or a dirty joke, if that was what it took.

Truly the knight gallant, Luc.

A whisper danced through my mind. Sina…I was tortured in ways you can’t imagine before I died. It’s going to take more than grinding my bones to dust to bother me.

Tortured. Yes. I knew that.

It twisted my heart to think of it, but he was wrong. I did know the depths of his torture, because I knew the depths of his mind—I knew memories that his mind had blocked away, memories he had blunted. Things we did to keep ourselves sane.

His stepmother had blinded him, wounds so awful, they’d rendered his eyes useless.  It  had happened well before his mortal death and the damage had set it in. Undoing it just hadn’t been possible. He’d come into this life unable to see. But it hadn’t stopped him.

He’d been tortured for days, weeks, while his wife was held prisoner, too ill and sick to come to him. Unable to help him.

Both of them broken.

He isn’t broken, I thought sourly. I am broken. Luc, like the good hero he was, kept on going. That’s what the heroic, gallant prince in the fairy tale did, isn’t it?

And what did I do?

I hid.

Wallowed in my own self pity—

Snarling, I flopped onto my belly and buried my face in my hands, blocking out anything and everything I could about Luc. In the end, he didn’t matter. He was just one more tool I’d use on this job—a job. That was all it was. An assignment, one of hundreds of thousands. I’d see it done, and then I’d move on.

And do another, and another…

Another infernal shriek tore through the air and I shoved upright, settling in a kneeling position on the bed, turning my head to glare at Luc. He was in the exact same position as he’d been in when I’d fallen asleep, his laptop on his thighs, a Braille display positioned close by. He ran his fingers across it, a faint line between his brows as he read whatever in the bloody hell that held him so fascinated.

“Can’t you hear her?” I demanded.

Those sightless, impossibly blue eyes turned to me. If one looked closely, you could see the scars at the corners of his eyes. They were faded—a few hundred years of life would do that. One black brow winged up and he said, “Hear who?”

Snarling, I climbed off the bed and stormed over to the window, glaring outside.

Of course he didn’t hear her.

He hadn’t even realized anything was off earlier until I’d pulled him into my mind.

I was apparently rather keyed into her. Perhaps it was because I’d added to the weight of her insanity. Krell didn’t seem to notice anything unusual, either, and that was rather strange.

Most animals were rather in tune with that sort of thing.

Maybe I’m going mad.

Standing there, I thought maybe I could even hear their screams. And that just wasn’t possible. But it had been close to two millennia. Even the most determined ghost couldn’t cling for that long.

Oh, Despoina wasn’t that old.

But whether she’d come into this mess or not, I knew if I’d come here at any given time, I’d still hear those screams. I’d cursed this place. Cursed it well and truly.

Then I’d driven a wretched, evil, old woman mad.

Now I got to lie there and watch the house endlessly, thanks to the lovely window in our room.  I’d checked it out once Will had booked it and sent me the information. Preparing myself, I supposed.

It faces out over the street and you can see the mountains! See the mountains. See the birth of my nightmares. I could lie there, hear the screams again, see the blood as it spread across the building under the rise of the moon.

Others didn’t always see it.

But some did…there were whispers of it. The house that bled. Rooms that screamed.

Children were terrified of the place.

But that could be because of the legends. Because of Despoina’s tales, the stories of her descent into madness. There was a pall here, one even I could feel. It made little sense. She’d been dead for a long time. Well, not by my standards, but almost two centuries had passed.

Why did the taint of madness still linger?

Suppressing a shiver, I crossed my arms over my chest and closed my eyes. Behind me, I heard a sound but I ignored it. It would be best if I tried to get through this job without paying any more attention to Luc than I absolutely had to.

Why in the hell had Will paired me with him, anyway?

It wasn’t like I needed a partner.

And—

~*~

Enter the contest…

Read about The Myrtle (inspiration behind Myrsina’s story)

Read more about Blind Destiny… or you can just preorder it.

Amazon | BN | Samhain | iBookstore

(This won’t be out in print for a while…it’s not long enough so it has to be paired up.)

 

Blind Destiny … another peek

Have you entered to win a feather From an Angel’s Wing?  It’s the contest to celebrate the release of Blind Destiny…

“What in the world are you wearing on the back of your jacket?” Luc asked, peering through Krell’s eyes and trying to make sense of the odd-looking little man.

Sina craned her head around, as though trying to see her back. Then she laughed abruptly. “Oh, that’s Grumpy. He’s my favorite.”

Grumpy…? Luc frowned. Well, the man did look rather cranky and if Luc looked that way, he’d be rather cranky as well, but that still didn’t explain why Sina was wearing it…wait.

Something trickled through his memory and he managed to snag it, pull it to the front. Seven little men— “You’re wearing one of the seven dwarves,” he said slowly. “On the back of your jacket.”

“Yes, what of it?”

Through Krell’s eyes, he studied her and abruptly, he had the answer. He couldn’t see the colors of her face clearly…dogs weren’t truly color blind, but they didn’t see colors quite as clearly as mortals did. So he couldn’t see if she had lips as red as blood. She was pale, though. And her hair was dark, but was it black as pitch?

“Tell me,” he said. “Do you have lips as red as blood or was that poetic license on your part?”

Sina smiled at him, and while those lips may or may not be as red as blood, they were rather full and Luc felt the punch of lust hit him low in the belly. It wasn’t altogether unpleasant, but it was unwelcome. Shielding his mind, his thoughts, his everything against her, he continued to wait as she sauntered toward him. “Well, Luc…you can see me; can’t you tell?”

There was a challenging look on her face.

Almost anybody who knew Sina would understand that look.

It was a look that said, Don’t ask…forget whatever you think you know.

“You sit in here and watch Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,” Luc murmured. “You wear one of those silly little cartoon characters on the back of your jacket. So many of us try to distance ourselves from those silly stories you fabricated. But you seem to embrace it.”

“Do I?”

Sina continued to watch him. He was no longer able to see her face now. Krell was sitting at his side, giving him the disconcerting view of staring upward at her chin…and over the enticing swell of her breasts, the flat plane of her belly, long legs…

Breaking the connection with Krell, Luc placed himself once more back into the darkness, he said, “Tell me, Snow White, were you chased by a woodsman? Threatened by a wicked stepmother?”

Sina laughed. Then she turned away. He felt the passage of air against him, the slight lessening of her presence.

“Trust me, Luc…I was the threat during my mortal years. It wasn’t some foolish, yet noble woodsman, it wasn’t a selfish or vain stepmother. I was the villain of my story.”

Something brushed against his mind and then he felt a whisper deep inside. And if you do not believe that…simply take a peek inside my memories…and see it for yourself.

She didn’t wait for him to look.

She showed him just a glimpse…only long enough for him to see the blood dripping from her fingers. Only long enough for him to hear the screams as they bounced off arched walls of stone.

Then she pulled her mind from his.

Luc staggered. Krell pressed his solid, sturdy body against his leg and Luc reached down, steadied himself against the big dog’s weight. Sina had left.

Sucking in a breath of air, he fought to clear that image from his mind.

But he couldn’t.

It was there, etched upon the surface of his mind.

Because Sina had wanted it there. She hadn’t wanted him to forget.

Will, what have you gotten me into?

 

Chapter Three

He stirred.

The darkness. The blackness. It was still there.

That did not concern him.

There was evil, though…and that drew him. Cloying and thick, an old, familiar stink, something he had sought time and again. But he had yet to succeed at finding it.

As he pulled himself back into the world, he searched for it. Scowled when he found it. Nothing had changed. He still couldn’t reach it.

Even as he was ready to retreat, though, he stilled.

Something new. Something different.

Something…other…calling to him.

 

 

“What have you gotten us into?”

Natasha Curry ignored the men and women behind her as she shoved her hood back and studied the towering monstrosity of a house.

She was here, damn it.

Here, at the home her ancestors had once owned. It was derelict now, in danger of being torn down because nobody would stay there. People would buy it, thinking to renovate it. Then they’d leave. Sometimes in the dead of night, leaving their belongings and everything behind.

Eight years ago, one group had bought it thinking to set up a boutique hotel that catered to those who liked spooks and haunts. Even they hadn’t stayed.

Walls that bled.

An old woman wailing.

Screaming.

Mocking laughter.

Cold spots.

Hot spots.

Whispers of death and despair.

Maniacal laughter.

Even the locals avoided this place.

Getting here had taken just about every penny she had and she’d all but lied through her teeth, promising she knew how to fix things.

Well, she didn’t know how. She just had a way of doing it. Fixing things. With unsettled places, as her mom had called it. And this already felt like the most unsettled place ever.

It would have to stay that way for a little while, because first they needed proof.

She needed proof. Proof of the stories here. Proof of the secrets.

One story, one secret in particular.

For years she’d felt drawn here, ever since she’d uncovered that album in her mom’s room, all the clippings about this place, and the stories her mom had told.

She was going to find what it was that had haunted her ancestor, an aunt many generations back, but somebody who sounded like she had maybe been a little…off. Like Natasha was. She felt a weird kinship with the old woman, something she couldn’t quite explain and that was why she was here.

To find out about her aunt Despoina. What happened to her, why she died, why a pall had fallen on her family ever since, why this house seemed to be cursed…

There was a low, eerie sound, like leaves skittering along the grass, but there was no wind. Something seemed to brush against her skin and she could almost swear something touched her.

Behind her, the crew muttered and grumbled. Two were excited. Two were pissed. Ah, yes. All was well in her world. This was how they worked. They had an Internet show, Monsters: Real or Imagined, and if this went well, maybe, just maybe, that Internet show could become the real deal. Nat had dreams of Discovery Channel. Or bigger.

It would take something monumental, though, to get noticed there.

Something huge.

And there was something huge in front of her.

The sprawling, old house looked somewhat out of place, surrounded by quaint little shops, cafes, B&Bs…it was a bygone thing, but plenty of the places here were old.

It wasn’t the age that set it apart.

It was the aura of despair.

Just looking at the house made her blood sing. Actually, it was almost a scream—terror was just barely kept in check and part of her wanted to run. But that was a good thing. She knew it was. It meant there was something here.

It had taken all of her savings, some begging, some borrowing, and some pleading to get the team to come here. But in the end, the excitement of it had won out.

A haunted house. On the island of Crete.

One where a lot of freaky shit had happened.

There were whispers…it was cursed, it was haunted…

Nat had grown up hearing the stories about this place.

About the seven bloody sisters who had driven one of her ancestors insane.

“So…we’re staying there.”

She glanced back and smiled at Max. “Yeah. For a few nights. I only got the permit for three nights.” Then she wiggled her eyebrows at him. “If anything happens, we might be able to get it extended, but we can’t go in for a few more days. I’m supposed to get the ball moving on that tomorrow. Relax, you’ll like the B&B we’re staying at. It’s supposed to be haunted too. But I think that’s just crap. We’ll have fun tearing that story apart.”

They’d done it before and more than a few people had tried to sue them, but it never worked. If you faked a ghost, you were just setting yourself up for it.

But some of it was real.

Was this one of them?

Her gut said YES…practically screamed it.

“Hey, Nat, are we going to go? Or just stand here for forever?” Jake said from behind, nudging her with his shoulder.

She scowled at him before moving forward to curl her hands around the wrought iron fence post, staring across the distance that separated her from the house. So close, damn it.

So close, after all this time. She could feel it screaming at her.

So much had happened here. In the past thirty years alone.

A couple had bought it and spent their life savings to refurbish it, turn it into an inn. The first night it opened, a young married couple had left, irate about an old woman had appeared at their door, whispering to them about the seven bloody sisters.

The next night, a second couple had fled screaming into the night. They had said there was blood in their room. On the windows and spilling all over the floor. Of course, the innkeepers had seen nothing.

The inn had closed within three months.

It had functioned as a home for unwed mothers for a time. But that hadn’t succeeded any better than the inn.

All the complaints were the same.

An old woman.

Blood.

And sometimes, people would whisper that there were screams. And sobbing…sobbing that sounded like it came from a young woman.

Some seriously spooky shit.

This wasn’t just orbs floating through the night.

It wasn’t just disembodied voices.

This was some seriously fucked-up shit.

And Nat wasn’t leaving until she had some of it captured on video. After she had that done, she’d see what she could do about the unrest she could feel burning in the air, but first…proof. Proof, vindication…

A voice buzzed in the back of her mind and she scowled, pressed the heel of her hand to her temple, turning away.

She needed some sleep. Turning back to the crew, she gave them a short nod. “Come on. Let’s head to the B&B. Maybe we can catch something scary happening there.”

Halfway down the narrow road, she glanced back. One last look at the place…just one. She’d been waiting for this her whole life, it seemed. She couldn’t believe the moment was finally here. Centuries…

She scowled, wondering where that odd thought had come from.

~*~

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Blind Destiny

Have you entered to win a feather From an Angel’s Wing?  It’s the contest to celebrate the release of Blind Destiny…

Then…

“Look at that pasty white face…”

The girl ignored their vile  whispers as best as she could. She had known she would not receive a warm welcome in this life. She had not thought it would be this unwelcoming, perhaps, but she had not expected anything pleasant. That, at least, had been a blessing. It would have been a cruelty beyond measure to think she had been given into a marriage where she would be loved, valued, even treated with kindness, only to come to a place where she had known nothing butbrutality from the very first day.

Myrsina had known her life here would not be kind. But she had only herself to blame. Her father had wanted nothing so much as to be rid of her. It was all any of them had wanted.

He was well rid of her now, was he not? He was well rid of her and she was here, alone.

“See how she acts as though she cannot hear us, or see us? As though she thinks herself better than us.”

The malice in the woman’s voice was enough to send a shiver down Myrsina’s spine. The hatred that particular woman carried for her was…unimaginable. And Myrsina didn’t understand why. It wasn’t as though their shared husband had any love for her. He cared nothing for her. He cared nothing for any of them. All he wanted was to get them with child. To breed, then move on to the next. His rutting on them wasn’t particularly pleasant, but nor was it particularly painful. There were no sweet, tender moments that he shared between any of the wives.

A fact Myrsina knew all too well.

“I hear she speaks with devils. That she does unnatural things.”

Myrsina tensed as she went to leave the courtyard. Lifting her head, she stared across the gardens as the woman. Their gazes locked and the older woman smiled. It was a cold, ugly little smile, full of hatred and ugliness and contempt. And Myrsina realized the truth. That woman knew; somehow, she knew.

Myrsina eased the cloak she kept wrapped around her mind, lifted it as much as she dared and she chanced a quick look. Quick, she must be quick—one never knew what awful things lurked out there, waiting for a vulnerable soul. Myrsina had seen what happened when those vulnerable ones weren’t careful. She wouldn’t be one of them. She wouldn’t.

But all she saw when she glimpsed that woman’s mind was meanness. A vicious, ugly woman with a shallow, twisted bit of a heart. But still. Just a woman.

Why do you hate me so ?

Then she turned away. She would go about her life. And sooner or later, her husband’s other wives would forget their torment of her. It was how life worked, after all.

 

But she was wrong.

The taunting and jibes worsened, rather than lessened. Cruel words gave way to cruel jabs in the ribs. Myrsina would find herself stumbling on the stairs, and although she knew which of the women had pushed her, when all of them stood together and assured the husband nothing had happened, Myrsina had simply tripped…

Eventually, she kept her words to herself. Even when she was pushed hard enough that she broke her arm, she said nothing.

It became so awful that she rarely wanted to leave the comfort of the kitchen. There, she felt safe. A woman had taken pity on her and in her, Myrsina found something of a friend. It was as she was sipping from a cup of tea her sixth month into marriage that the woman asked her how she was faring.

“You’ve been sick in the morning, child. More and more.”

And Myrsina knew.

Chapter Two

 

Now…

“The seven bloody sisters are myth,” I told him, turning away and moving to the balcony. It faced out over the fountains and I focused on the play of the water as I reached down to cover my belly.

Many memories of my life have faded. Both my time as a Grimm, and my time as a mortal. I’d only been eighteen when I died—when I killed myself. But I remember that bright and shining moment when I realized I was carrying a child. And I remembered those awful, horrid days that followed when I lost the babe. The only one I’d ever carry.

I also remember the day when I was strong enough to strike back. I didn’t strike back as a mortal woman should have and that was my sin. The one I’d borne for all these years.

I could hear Luc moving behind me and I turned to watch him. Krell stood at his side, but the man didn’t touch the dog, and the dog didn’t touch the man. After a moment, the dog moved, nosing a bit here and there. Getting the lay of the land for his master, I knew. If I had felt like being nice, I suppose I could have offered to show them into the sitting area. The suite was enormous and the sitting area was through the doors to our right. But I didn’t feel like being nice. Besides, if I knew Luc, he’d rather find it for himself. And he could do that just fine on his own. Neither he nor Krell really needed my help.

And they proved it too. Moments later, Krell padded into the sitting room and Luc followed along behind him, his steps sure and steady. Nobody looking at the man would guess that he couldn’t see, that he hadn’t been able to see in more than six hundred years. I hadn’t known him while he had his sight. I’d met him a few years after his change, once it became apparent that his psychic skill was going to be rather…substantial. Then they turned him over to me.

I rather wish they hadn’t done that.

I rather wish I’d never met the man.

And I rather wish I’d never heard of the seven bloody sisters.

“We’re all myths, aren’t we?” Luc asked from behind me.

I glanced at him from over my shoulder. “Some more so than others.” Then I shrugged and went to wander around the room, seeking anything to occupy my mind. The seven bloody sisters. Why was he here asking about them? I could look; if I really wanted to see inside his mind, he couldn’t keep me out. It would damage him, though. That was what kept me out. I wouldn’t do that, not to him.

Other people, it may not matter—I couldn’t care less if I caused headaches…or worse. But I wouldn’t bring myself to harm him.

“So you’re telling me there is absolutely no truth to their existence, whoever the seven bloody sisters are supposed to be?”

I sighed. I could still hear that silly movie playing. And for some reason it bothered me now. Listening to that silly dialog, that overly high voice, followed by the comical voices of the dwarves, while he asked me about the horror that spawned an awful legend. “The seven bloody sisters—no truth to it? Luc, you should know that one person’s truth is another person’s story by now. But no, there is no truth to that tale. It’s simply the ramblings of an old mad woman. She thought she knew the truth, but her mind was so eaten up by insanity she couldn’t have told truth from fiction if her very life had depended on it.”

Although he couldn’t see me, he kept his face turned in my direction, and I could tell he was thinking through what I had told him. I hoped he would let it go at that. I should have known better.

Yes, he should know by now that one person’s truth was very often nothing more than a fairy tale. But he also knew how very adept I was at twisting words. After all, I was the one who’d created his story.

“Who was this old woman, then?”

I closed my eyes and sank down on the edge of the bed.

The old woman? She was another one of my sins.

I had many of them. But I couldn’t regret what I’d done to her. Not any more than I could regret what I had done to the wives.

It’s no wonder I’ve never found any real hint of happiness. I lack any true conscience, and a woman like me? I don’t deserve peace. I don’t deserve happiness.

“The old woman. She was a something of a mystic,” I murmured, forcing myself to open my eyes and stare outside. “And in the end, she doesn’t matter all that much to this tale, I can tell you that much. She came along more than a millennia after the so-called sisters had already died. The old woman, well, she could sense remnant energies and she was convinced that gave her something of power. She tried to seek out the books.”

I worried the hem of my T-shirt, thinking back to the night when I’d found her the first time. I could have killed her then and never had been bothered by her. Killed her and not felt any guilt. But I hadn’t. I couldn’t even explain why. But she’d been so close to that place; following her was something I simply hadn’t had in me.

I’d stopped her from getting her hands on one of the demon tomes and that had been enough for me. It shouldn’t have been. I should have ended her then.

Blowing out a breath, I rubbed my hands over my face and then looked at him. “She almost had one. I stopped her. If I had been wise, I would have chased her but I didn’t. Because she went to Greece, and that was one place I hated to go. But eventually, I had to follow her there. We always watched those who tried to get the books, you know. And since she’d tried once…”

“She would try again.”

“That was our fear.”

The books. Damnable things. Crafted by demons, beguiling to mortal eyes, the books would seem like one of those silly coffee table or novelty books now. Spells and incantations and shit. Yes, it would seem like nothing but harmless fun.

They were deadly. They’d been deadly when they were first crafted, of blood and skin and death and despair, and they were deadly now. I didn’t even know how many were still in existence. We’d destroyed dozens.

But there were more out there.

Sometimes a new one sprang up.

It took a particularly strong sort of demon to craft one and it was a blight we could all feel—a process that didn’t take minutes or hours, but weeks, months. If we could feel it, we could hunt it. Hopefully find it, stop it.

It didn’t always work that way.

The reason so many of them existed is because for a very long while, Will and I had been the only ones on watch. Hard to guard against all evil when there are only two of you.

Even now, centuries and centuries later, we were still doing the clean up.

“So she hunted the books.”

“Yes. With a lot of success, I fear.” I sighed, looked away from him to gaze out the windows at the dancing waters of the fountains. Usually it brought me peace. Joy. Now it just struck me as absurd waste. This entire waste, a useless extravagance. “Sometimes I wonder if I didn’t let her live because she was so adept at finding them. I destroyed three because of her. Anyway, she had enough power to hear things. Voices of those long gone. And she saw things, things long since past. And she could whisper to those we’d rather not mention.”

Now Luc’s attention sharpened, focused on me. “She could sense them.”

Them…not the dead. But the demons. He knew, without me saying anything.

“Yes. Every so often, she’d leave and try yet again to get to a book. And she’d be stopped—but sooner or later, I knew there was a risk she’d succeed. The third time, I almost didn’t get to her in time.” I slid him a look from the corner of my eyes. “So I stopped her—I made sure that canny mind of hers was nothing but rubbish by the time I was done. But her power…that lingered. She spent the rest of her years rambling about the energies she sensed. All the folklore from that place comes from her insane ramblings. The place where she tells of the seven bloody sisters—a tragedy happened there once, and she spun this convoluted tale about these women. She said they were sisters and she tells this terrible, heartbreaking story of their untimely death. It’s nothing but rubbish, Luc.”

“Apparently, it’s not. There are people at the place where the legend is supposedly from and they think the place is haunted.” He paused and made a face. “Mortals and their fascination with ghosts.”

I tensed. “What?”

“You heard me.” He pushed a hand through his hair and shrugged. “Will didn’t tell me much more than to seek you out and find out about the seven bloody sisters. That, and we’re to go to Greece. Some fools have a mind to make a documentary and we’re to stop them. I don’t know if there’s any of the demonic involved or not, but he was clear on one thing—we don’t want that documentary made.”

“A documentary?” I stared at him for a long moment and then I turned away, looking outside. Just then, I’d like to shatter the bloody glass and take a flying leap. Except it wouldn’t kill me. It would hurt like hell, it would be all very dramatic and while Will was picking the glass out of my skin, he’d lecture me for doing something so foolish.

My legs went boneless as I thought it all through. A documentary. They were going to make a documentary. About that place.

Where I died. Where I’d lived. Where I’d killed the wives.

And where I’d become.

Fuck.

As my legs gave out from under me, I dropped to the floor and continued to stare outside. This was really happening. I had to go back to Greece.

“Sina.”

“Yes?” I asked distantly. I could handle this. I knew I could. I just had to get my mind in the right place. Separate what I had done, who I had been, the child I’d lost, all of that from who I was now. All well and good.

“I would assume, though, judging by what I’m sensing in the air, you know more than you’ve told me. Just what do you know?”

Mortals and their fascination with ghosts. Filming a documentary. There?

Drawing my knees to my chest, I rested my chin on them. “I know that the woman was a lunatic. Beyond that?” Shrugging, I closed my eyes. Perhaps we’d get there and the place would gone. Nothing but a hole in the earth. Stranger things had happened, after all. I was living proof. I’d stabbed myself in the belly and instead of rotting in hell, I was still here.

“Greece,” I whispered. “I assume I’m to go to Greece with you.”

“Yes. And we have to go to wherever this legend was born. You need to tell me more about it, Sina. There’s more to it than what you’ve said.”

As he came around and settled down at my side, unerringly sitting so that he was just a few breaths away, I gazed at him. So perfect. So patient. So not for me. I hated that. Why couldn’t he be for me?

“Sina.”

“Yes?”

“What aren’t you telling me?”

“Hmmm.” Shifting my gaze away from him, I focused my attention back on the glass. “Oh, I’ve told you everything I can about how the legend came to be. The old woman was born in 1749, died in 1829. I damaged her mind 1804 and she had a quarter of a century to spin tales about whatever she thought she knew. That’s about it for the legend, Luc. Truly. There were no sisters there, Luc. Just an old madwoman.”

He didn’t believe me.

I didn’t care.

There hadn’t been seven bloody sisters.

There had been wives. Eight of them. Seven of them had been terribly cruel, while one of them had been terribly mad.

I had to go back there.

Back to hell.

Back to the place where I had died.

To the place where I’d been reborn.

Back to the place where I’d killed seven women. Where they’d tormented me. Tortured me. Where they’d killed my unborn child…and nearly me.

I supposed there were a few other things I might be less inclined to do. Telling Luc how I felt about him, perhaps. That, and going back to my mortal life—miserable, unhappy years that they had been.

Other than that, I couldn’t think of anything that appealed to me less.

~*~

Wanna read about the inspiration behind Myrsina’s ‘myth’?  It’s The Myrtle, one of a bunch of ‘Snow White’ type tales.

Enter the contest…

Read more about Blind Destiny… or you can just preorder it.

Amazon | BN | Samhain | iBookstore

(This won’t be out in print for a while…it’s not long enough so it has to be paired up.)