Chapter 1) Creator

Below is the first chapter of the Guardian of Dawn spin-off. It's a little rough and needs revision and polish, I'm sure, but I promised the first chapter of this (un-titled) novel, so here it is! So far I am about 18,000 words in (31 typed pages) and it's turning out really good, I think.

So follow me futher into Tristen's dark world, and find out what fate has in store for him!


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Chapter 1) Creator

     A scream blistered in Tristen's throat, begging to be let out. I am the strong one, he silently reminded himself, they are weak bastards. This is what he'd been trained to deal with. I can handle this . . . I have to handle this. He swallowed the fear, there was no use in screaming, after all. He was alone with her, and no one would hear him. He reached around behind him and pulled Danika against his back.
     “How far is your camp?” Tristen said, attempting to hide the panic in his voice.
     “Twelve miles west of here.” Danika's voice mirrored his own panic.
     “Do they know you're here?”
     “No, they wouldn't have let me go. I snuck out.” Tristen glanced over his shoulder at her, sapphire eyes pierced him, thick tears plowed her ivory cheeks. She was the only one he'd ever wanted, and the only one that was guaranteed to never—ever be his again.
     “It's going to be okay, Dani,” Tristen whispered, hoping that sounded believable. Her silence confirmed his worst fear, she had lost faith in him. He couldn't blame her. He had lost faith in himself. They were cornered. Tristen knew it, the demons knew it . . . and she knew it.
     Tristen's trembling hand clutched his last, lonely arrow. The trigger on his crossbow begged to be pulled, but it was too dark and there were too many of Them. Six pairs of glowing, red eyes floated against black. No use in wasting a perfectly good arrow. If he was damn lucky, he could maybe take one out, but what about the five others?
     Maybe we should run. Well, swim was more like it. Salty waves lopped around their ankles. The freezing water numbed their feet in a matter of minutes. Tristen didn't mind the cold, though. Actually, he welcomed it. The ocean was sadly the one safe place left for humans. As long as they stood in the water, the Things wouldn't come after them. The ocean, once human's salvation, now a prison. Salvation . . . prison, there was a fine line there. But where wasn't there a fine line anymore?
     The water churned behind them, a storm brewed on the horizon. Swimming was out of the question.
     “You have no where to run, Tristen,” the head-slimer, the Creator, said. “You might as well surrender yourself. Don't worry, you won't die right away. I'll have you answer a few questions first, if you don't mind. Then we'll move on to more pressing matters. Like . . . whats for dinner.”
     Before he could think to control it, Tristen shuttered. The reaction was that of someone raking their fingers down a black-board, or the mental picture of a slimer eating a person alive, from their feet up, savoring every morsel. Danika stifled a scream and clutched the cotton of Tristen's Guardian of Dawn t-shirt. He pulled her around beside him and wrapped his arms around her trembling body.
     “Tristen . . .” she whispered. He combed disciplined fingers through her mahogany waves.
     “You know you've got no where to go,” the Creator shouted, “it's over, boy.”
     Boy. That's what Tristen had called the Thing lifetimes ago, well, it felt like lifetimes ago, when he knew the Creator as Eli Welsh: Human. Tristen found him earlier that day, hovering beneath an abandoned car, eating something he had picked from a dumpster. He was seventeen, he said, like Tristen and Danika. He was nothing more than a preppy, innocent, terrified kid searching for a Guardian of Dawn, searching for a hero. He had found one. Tristen was the best trained, and bravest Gaurdian of Dawn that Long Beach Military Station had ever seen. Young, agile, smart, willing, and fast. Almost too fast. Tristen's kill list was longer than anyone else's. He was a well-oiled machine, born and bred from the MDAS. Military Defense Against Slimers.
     Slimers can't come out in the sun. They can't take on the form of a human . . . Tristen recited the golden truths in his mind, the same truths that had forced him to push through every moment of uncertainty during the last five years. Their weaknesses: Sunlight and ocean water. Knowing they had weaknesses, knowing there was some way to eradicate them, kept Tristen moving through uncertainty and pending death. Seeing them now, standing dangerously close to the sea and waiting, like him, for the sun to rise, he realized: The truth is a deceitful bitch.
     “I trusted you,” Tristen screamed to Eli, “I thought you were one of us.” The demon stared at him, smiling. Body of a slimer, head of a sandy-blonde, blue-eyed boy. “I saved your worthless life!”
     “Are you really trying to negotiate with me, Tristen? Honestly, what do you take me for? And just for the record, my own creatures never would have killed me. No, you did not save me. All you did was kill my children and further piss me off! Now stop playing games, boy and come over here. You know you're trapped.”
     Rain pelted against the ocean, thunder exploded like a bomb in the distance. A reminder that time was ticking. They couldn't stay in the water much longer. Tristen would have to make a move, and soon.
     “Come get us then!” he shouted.
      Danika stiffened beneath his embrace. “Tristen . . .” When she spoke her voice was short, clipped and the sweetest sound Tristen had ever heard.
     The last month of his life had been spent finding this point in time, finding Danika. Now, as he stood still in the water, staring at the monsters and feeling hazed with Danika in his arms, he realized he had broken every rule he ever learned in boot-camp. Never stop moving, never look back, never lose focus.
     “Please, Tristen. Help me,” the slimer sounded eerily human as it mocked him. It laughed, its grimy teeth which hung far below its jaw glistened with fresh venom.
     This demon has made a fool of me for long enough. “Come on, shit head, come get us. Don't we look tasty?” Tristen waved an arm in the air while holding Danika in the other, gesturing the Things toward him.
Eli screamed, the high-pitched feral sound rattled through Tristen's bones. He'd heard that same scream hundreds, if not thousands of times before and still, it broke through him like a cold wave on the hottest summer day.
      “Do you really think I'm scared of you?” I am. “What is it . . . am I more tasty if there's rebellion in my blood, or do you just enjoy being a sardonic little bitch?” The Thing stared at him and cocked its head to the side. “What is it, Eli? You look confused,” Tristen smiled wryly. “I almost forgot that you all are dumb bastards,” he laughed.
     The Creator bared its ugly teeth and poised to spring.
     Tristen pressed his lips to Danika's hair, a bouquet of lavender and brine, and whispered, “get back.”
He loosened his grip on her, she stood frozen by his side, her arms viced around his waist. Tristen gripped his arrow and put the point of it against his naked palm. “Now,” he told her as he sliced the metal across his hand.
     A thin line of crimson rose to the surface of his flesh. Danika's eyes froze on his palm, a deer-in-head-lights look. He pushed her back until he heard her stumble and fall into the waves.
     “Tristen, no . . .” she screamed.
     “Go,” he shouted at her, “As far out as you can.”
     He lifted his hand into the air and pointed his open palm toward the slimers. A thin line of blood seethed down his wrist. The demons stood where the beach met the street and screamed. It was ear-piercing . . . and terrifying.
     “Come on,” Tristen belted again.
     Their massive feet peddled onto the sand, their eyes bulged from their pulsing skulls. “Stop, you fools,” Eli said to the others. They obeyed, stopping just yards from Tristen's bleeding hand.
     A typical slimer was agile, fast and strong, but they were also dumb as bricks. “Come on,” he egged them on, smiling. He waved his hand up in the air, twirling it in wide circles. A few drops of blood peppered the water.
     The things became confused, their pea-brains battled with primal instinct and logic. The ocean water would kill them, but the scent and sight of blood might be enough to make them . . .
     Bingo.
     They chose instinct, and went nuts. The slimer to the far left, a nubby, fat looking thing, took another step closer. A taller, leaner one in the middle grabbed fatty and threw him down on the sand. They swung at each-other with glistening, razor-sharp claws. The others joined in the chaos and Tristen's fear turned to hope as they wreaked havoc on each other. Eli stood back on the beach, screaming incoherent profanities at his stupid slimers.
     The sun broke over the endless blue. Day time meant safety, they were susceptible to sunlight . . . or they were supposed to be. Tristen had spent many nights with one eye open, so to speak, weapon by his side, loaded and ready for action. As he watched the Slimers now, beneath the pearly sky, in all their grotesque glory, he realized he would no longer be biased to day. Every minute of his existence would be game for fear. The reality of that fact spun in endless circles in his mind, and his hope turned to fear again. Rain pounded the waves violently, thunder tore through the pearly gray, leaving darkness in its wake.
     Tristen risked a quick glance behind him, Danika stood waist deep in the water, hugging herself with trembling arms. He lifted his cross-bow and aimed. One split second--that's all the time he had and all the time he'd need, and pulled the trigger. The arrow whipped past the fighting Slimers and found its target with precise precision. It plowed through Eli's head, right between his remaining baby-blue's. His insides exploded with the force of the arrow and a sticky green concoction showered Tristen. Ugh! He had killed a ton of these things, and still hadn't gotten used to the mess.
     Bulls-eye. Now he just had to wait for the children to finish each other off.
     But once again, the Things surprised him, and his hope surpassed fear and turned to straight to raw terror. Instead of continuing to fight until they tore each other to pieces, they stopped to stare at the goopy blob on the ground which had been their creator. Blood-curtling screams ripped from their quivering, grotesque bodies.
     One by one, the monsters turned to face Tristen, angry red eyes locked on his wide chocolate brown ones. They moved forward so quickly they were a blur. Tristen backed away as quickly as he could, stumbling into the water behind him. Danika screamed and pushed forward through the waves to save him from the demons. He wanted to yell 'get back', but there was no time.
     One of them plowed into the water and reached a thin, slimy hand out. Its mouth gaped open as it readied its appetite, huge, red eyes wide and raw. A wave rose and smacked down on its face, and it got a mouthful of salty water. It choked for a minute, struggling to release the poison, and exploded. Tristen turned his back on the Thing, cupping Danika into the curve of his bowed body and was blown further out to sea with the explosion of its insides.
     Green slime mingled with rain and landed on them with heavy, cold plops.
     “Shit, are you okay, Dani?” He couldn't hide the panic in his voice this time. He knew the slime couldn't physically hurt humans, but the fact that he had let one come so close to her confounded him.
      “I'm f-fine.” She stammered. She didn't look fine. Her lips were blue and her body damn near convulsed with cold, or terror. Probably both.
     “I'm sorry, Dani. You're in this trouble because of me, I'm so sorry . . .”
     Tristen led Eli to the beach, led him straight to Danika under the pretenses that Eli was just a human boy looking for a new family, and a home. I did this to her.
     Tristen held Danika's face in his hands, knowing she wasn't physically hurt—yet, but still searched frantically for any sign that she was about to unwravel in the midst of madness. He searched her eyes, as if they were a literal window into her soul, and wished that just holding her would make it all go away. He knew better, though.
     Danika shook her head, dismissing his apology. “Have you ever seen one enter the ocean before?”
     “No, that'd be a first.” At least Tristen knew they were still susceptible to ocean water. Though that thought was comforting, it wasn't comforting enough to morph his fear back into hope. These particular slimers weren't quite smart but they weren't dumb, either. They knew their creator had been murdered, and they were experiencing feelings. They were angry. Angry enough to trade their pitiful lives for vengeance. They were evolving.
     A line of electric-blue flashed through the sky, blinding Tristen and Danika for a second as it impaled the water just yards from them. The lightning hovered over the waves, veins reached out from the core as if searching for prey.
      “What are we going to do?” Danika yelled through the chaos of the storm. Her sapphire eyes, wide and panicked searched Tristen's for an answer.
       He had none.
       He clutched the now empty cross-bow and mentally kicked himself in the ass. What have I gotten myself into? More importantly . . . What have I gotten her into? He turned toward the beach, five slimers blurred as they paced back and forth along the waters edge. Tristen was right back where he started, trapped in a freezing, wet salvation.
      Lifetimes passed as they waited in the water for a savior who wouldn't come. Tristen's insides ached from the cold. Danika's body was pressed to his, searching for an ounce of body heat that she wouldn't find. The slimers screamed and howled as they relentlessly combed the beach, waiting for the humans to either come out of the water, or freeze to death. If Tristen could form coherent words through his chattering teeth, he would have agreed to freeze to death before surrendering himself to the demons.
     Tristen looked up at the sky, patches of gray and black swirled in unison, a sheet of rain pounded his face. With each wave, they were sucked farther and farther out to sea. They kicked their legs as fast as they could and just barely stayed afloat.
     Tristen watched as small, black dots formed in the clouds, he blinked a few times. His head pounded, stomach lurched and the dots grew wider, and darker.
     Oh shit. Not now. Pull it together.
     Tristen wasn't a huge fan of the water, or rather, it wasn't a huge fan of him. When he was young, he almost drowned in the Cape May ocean and since then, he feared it. It was the only fear that penetrated him deep enough to leave a lasting, invisible scar in his soul. And tonight, that same ocean threatened to steal him away from the world, from Danika. But he wouldn't, couldn't leave her.
      He blinked hard and shook his head in hopes of clearing out the dark that threatened to pull him under, but it didn't work. His grip on Danika faltered and the pressure from the darkness pulled him away from her, pulled him away from consciousness.
     “T-Tristen?” Danika chattered. “Are you o-okay?”
      He looked into the sapphires through a curtain of darkness and saw pure panic.
      I can't leave her. Pull it together, damn it.
     “Help!” Danika cried.
     The dots formed a black curtain over his vision and his head fell back, exposing his bare face to the tunnel of rain.
      Just when he thought it couldn't get any worse, it did. And then, there was nothing.

Guardian of Dawn is available TODAY on http://www.youngrebelpublications.com/%22%3Ehttp://www.youngrebelpublications.com/%3C/a in the Rebel Moon anthology. I am doing a happy dance.

The following is an excerpt from Guardian of Dawn:

Guardian of Dawn

“Quit dragging your feet and run Eli, it's gaining on us!” He was at least two yards behind me and close to tripping over his damn untied shoelaces. You've got to be kidding me. Newbie.

“I'm trying. Please don't leave me, Tristen,” he pleaded through broken breaths.

We rounded the corner of an old brick apartment building which glowed brilliant ruby against the setting sun. I had every intention of leaving Eli behind for the bloodsuckers if he slowed me down. But there was something about him, his innocence, maybe, that reminded me of my brother. The newbie was already softening me up, and these days I couldn't afford to let my guard down. No one could.

A slimer rounded the corner behind us. It hunched over, poised to spring. Pulsing veins glowed white just under the surface of its paper-thin boiled flesh. Bones, sharp as razors, rose from its back and spread like the fin of a giant, hideous reptile. But this thing was far from a reptile.

Oh damn. Here we go.

“Duck!” I yelled as I pulled my cross-bow from the strap latched around my back. I aimed a split second – that's all the time I had, and all the time I needed – and pulled the trigger. An arrow pierced through the thing’s head, right between its bulging red eyes.

Five days and counting!

Five days remain until Rebel Moon: A Paranormal Anthology is available on http://www.youngrebelpublications.com/. My story, Guardian of Dawn, will be featured toward the end of the collection since the stories will be arranged alphabetically.

Editing has been surprisingly fun. It's amazing how much work and editing goes into a 3,000 word short story. And this is where I must give a shout out to my brilliant edtior, JacquelineYoung. Thanks Jx for this amazing oppurtunity and for helping me polish this story to perfection! Also, thanks to the few close friends and family who read this story before publication and offered support, advice and encouragment.

In the mix of editing, there was one crucial change that had to be made. My main character was stripped of his name, Caden, and assigned a new one. Tristen. It is so odd how some characters linger in my mind and grow to develop backrounds and histories that never had a chance to make it into the pages of the story. Maybe this is why I mourned over the name-loss, (sad, but true). Caden had become real to me. But as the saying goes, a rose is still a rose by any other name.

I have taken a break from the spin-off novel, and am currently working on another short, YA romance story for the Young Rebel publishing company. I am not yet ready to reveal anything about this story as it is still a work in prgoress, but I will say its sub-genre is fantasy (duh!).

What would I do if I didn't have these fantasy worlds to escape to, and these characters to get lost in? *Sigh*

Anyway, look forward to Guardian of Dawn, which will be released in FIVE DAYS on October 25th, 2010 on http://www.youngrebelpublications.com/  And as always, thanks for the support!

~A~

Short Story challenge

With the launch of my newest short story, Guardian of Dawn approaching just around the corner, I thought it appropriate to decorate my blog with the "Guards Light" and their one source of life, the ocean. I know whoever reads this now won't quite understand what that means, and that is okay. The story will be available October 25, 2010 on YoungRebelpublications.com.

For a girl who is used to writing pure YA fantasy novels, it was quite a fun challenge writing a 3,000 word horror based short story. The challenge was to write a scary YA story that would "raise hairs". My first thought was . . . I am screwed. Despite being an avid fan of Stephen King, (who doesn't love Mr. King?), Alfred Hitchcock and those classic, creepy vamps, (they are my weakness) every idea I came up with paled in comparison. Where to start . . .? I started a story about ghosts. Sure, that should be easy! I am sucker for a good, old fashioned ghost story. So I started writing and . . . (drum roll please) it fell flat. Ugh! I forced myself to keep writing, even though it just felt wrong, but after a while reminded myself of my own golden rule: If it feels forced, it will sound forced. I wasn't about to submit anything that I wasn't absolutely in love with. I never settle for second best. My computer desktop is littered with chapters here and chapters there of novels that just never made the final cut.

With no ideas, and no inspiration I sat down, put my pen to paper (well, put my fingers to keys) and just started writing. I didn't bother trying to come up with a game plan this time, since having a game plan with the ghost story worked out so well *sarcasm*, and I was pleasantly surprised with what developed.

Caden introduced himself to me immediately and I found myself immersed into his twisted world. But rescuing Eli and fighting "slimers" wasn't enough to send that story home for me. Then another character introduced herself to me.

Caden was a solider, a well-oiled, born and bred military machine who's been hardened by his loss and his life. His one weakness is not the monsters, it's not the injustice or the entire world falling to pieces around him. It's Danika. (As if the action/horror wasn't enough.) But she is with someone, his brother. Now this story's getting juicy . . .

My fingers moved so fast across the keys they became a blur. Okay, I'm exaggerating but that's what it felt like, I swear! I'd only stop for brief seconds here and there to check my word count. Capping this world at 3,000 words was torture. When I was finished, I went back and read my story several times, surprisingly pleased with the way it turned out.

Then it was over . . . I submitted it, kept my fingers crossed, and waited. Despite writing a story that I thought was decent, a story I thought people might possibly like . . . I was sad. I found myself in the car listening to songs from Paramore and thinking about Caden and Danika. Wondering . . . what happens next?

So the night after I sent my story in to Young Rebel, I sat down and again, just started typing. Caden showed up on my pages, in third person this time, and started unraveling his complicated situation to me.

I am happy and proud to say that I am not nearly done with these characters! I am turning this story into a novel and am loving getting lost in the pages of Caden and Danika's world. In just a few weeks I am already 17,000 words in (of course this is my very raw first draft and will need lots of editing on my part) and I just can't stop thinking about these star-crossed lovers. I will market this book not as horror, but as YA sci-fi. Don't cringe, I don't like sci-fi either, but this is a different kind of sci-fi, I promise.

I will update my progress on here and keep everyone who's interested up-to-date with the progress of my newest, untitled project. Who knows, maybe I'll even post snippets of the book for curious eyes.

Thanks for following my blog, and welcome to my fantasy world!