Book Two: Roc Excerpt #1
I thought it would be fun to post some snippets of my progress on Book Two: Roc. Currently, I'm on Chapter 4 and it's going really smoothly so far. I'll post a little bit of the book here and there up until its release July 2013.
Book Two: Roc continues the story of Rone and Keiara, two teens with a budding romance although they come from opposing races constantly at war.
Here's a little bit of Chapter 1. It picks up where I left off in Book One, with Rone trying to find Keiara after she escapes the Blak Army.
The wind howled around three figures trudging up the side of a mountain. Their faces were red, their eyes squinted shut against the cold, and their hands were enveloped by thick, wool-lined gloves. Heavy coats with thickly padded hoods covered their heads and bright silver packs were strapped to their backs. They all wore about three layers of pants. Despite all of their efforts, each one was nearly frozen solid.
“We need to go back the way we came!” one of them shouted. He screamed it as loud as he could, trying to be heard over the shrieking winds.
The figure in the lead turned around. There was a hard, unyielding glint in his icy blue eyes.
“I’m not going back, Asher!” he yelled.
“Rone, this is suicide. Even if she’s up here, there’s no way we can get to her. We have to be reasonable!” Asher begged. He hated himself for even saying the words, but somebody had to. If they kept going, the only thing they would accomplish was their slow, frozen deaths. He glanced up, way up. They were on one of the biggest mountains in the Polaris range. Its snow-capped peak was still a couple of thousand feet up. It was too much.
“Can we go home?” Fowler asked from the back. His eyes were squinted so tightly they looked like they were closed.
“Shut up!” Rone yelled, whirling on the both of them in fury. Asher and Fowler both flinched. “Just shut up! I’m not leaving her. She risked everything to save my life and I am going to do the same for her. She’s here, I know she is.”
He turned away from them and started trudging up the mountain’s treacherous slopes again, his body bent forward slightly to shield himself from the wind. Asher let out a breath and followed after the Rook. Fowler grumbled to himself and started walking as well. He wished he’d never left Vitari.
Rone kept walking. He slipped several times, falling heavily onto the icy snow, only to get back up and doggedly continue. A voice inside his mind screamed at him to stop being such an idiot. He was going to get himself killed, along with Asher and Fowler, but he ignored it. He shut it out. The only thing he let himself believe was that he would see Keiara again. That he would get to hold her, comfort her, kiss her, love her. He could still see her tied to the post,flames wreathing her like a dress, her eyes streaming as Wilhelm pulled the trigger and shot him. He saw her as she was in Vitari, beautiful and alluring. Exotic. Compassionate. He remembered the first time he’d seen her face, after he’d woken up in a Terraqouis healer’s hut, scared out of his mind and utterly alone. He’d been disoriented and confused (and a little violent), but still thought she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen.
Hours went by and it looked as if they’d made no progress. To make things worse, night was coming on fast and the snow and wind only seemed to pick up. The temperature plummeted. Despite his best efforts, Rone knew that they needed to stop and make camp. They needed to shield themselves from the weather or they wouldn’t last another hour. He looked through the blinding snow, trying to find a place that would offer some measure of protection against the elements. Thirty or forty feet up the mountain was an overhanging ledge. The protection it offered was minimal at best, but they were out of options.
“We’ll camp there,” he said, pointing up the slope to the ledge. Asher nodded his head, his teeth chattering uncontrollably. Fowler just let out a sort of grunt, his entire body trembling.
They hiked to the overhang and Rone quickly shed his pack. His nanos flew out and created a sturdy domed tent with solid metal walls. A circular door opened and they all shuffled inside. It was pitch black, but Rone took care of it. He willed his nanos to create an electric lantern that he placed in the middle of the tent. The shrieking winds could still be heard outside, but their banshee-like screams were muffled.
“Can you make anything that will give us heat?” Fowler asked, hugging himself. His body was still trembling violently.
Rone concentrated for a moment. When he had what he wanted firmly pictured in his mind, he had his nanos create it. A cylindrical object with slatted vents appeared, blasting 360 degrees of heat into the tent. He turned to his mechpak and tapped a few buttons on the screen. The blueprint for the heater suddenly appeared and he saved it into his database. He knew he’d need it again.
Asher and Fowler immediately sat as close to the heater as they could. Rone moved closer to it too, but weirdly enough, he didn’t feel as cold as the other two seemed to be. His body wasn’t trembling and his teeth weren’t chattering. His face was slightly red, and that was about it. If his thoughts weren’t preoccupied with Keiara, he probably would’ve wondered why that was.
After everyone got warmed up, they slid into their respective sleeping bags and tried to get some sleep.
Keep checking back for more excerpts of Book Two: Roc!
Feel free to comment, share, like, or re-post. I would love for word to spread of my epic sci-fi/fantasy Histories of Purga series.
