A sample from A CENTURY OF WIND, FIRE, AND WATER
This is a big, ambitious, multi-year project that I began earlier this month. As the title implies, it’s a story that spans a century. It’s a twelve part saga (four trilogies) inspired in tone, plot, setting, and so forth by many of the fantasy stories I grew up loving (Star Wars and Final Fantasy being two big influences, but also Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire).
It’s a series with adventure, mysticism, retro-futuristic tech, light magic, betrayal, growing up, growing old, battles on land, sea, and air, and more. The first book of the first trilogy is entitled THE HAND IN THE SHADOWS and is about two “Wind Monks” who are sent to mediate a dispute between neighboring Kingdoms, inadvertently getting sucked into a grander scheme by an ancient villain, long-thought dead.
The cover is a work in progress, as you can see from the low-quality art, but it’s an idea…
This sample comes from chapter three and features the King of the Evergreen Kingdom, Trillup Riken after a meeting with his advisers. They had been discussing the likelihood of an invasion from the neighboring Daradans, led by the smarmy Newt Scaren. As this snippet shows, the humble and peace-seeking King is at odds with his young, eager, and brash son…
Lance was gone, Haito was gone, only his son, Prince Erik, remained, still slumped in his chair, twirling a lock of his golden mane in his finger. He seemed either bored or oblivious, it was hard to tell which (or to know which was worse).
“Have you anything to add to all of this?” the King asked.
“Well since you asked…” Erik answered, flopping his head toward his father’s direction, “I think you’re making a mistake letting them bring the fight to us.”
“You would have us take to the skies to try and destroy the blockade?”
“Not all of it. You only need to take out the capital ship.”
He was so certain, so prideful of his opinion, as if it was an idea no one else had considered. His father listened with supreme disappointment; the drooping of his lips could not be helped. “They would thump us out of the air with ease.”
“Casualties are part of war.” Erik shrugged. “We send every fighter to the capital ship, disable it, and the blockade crumbles without its leader.”
“You’re so quick to cast away your countrymen to a suicide mission that has no hope of succeeding.”
“Subjects, not countrymen. That’s the burden of a King, having to distance yourself from those who submit to you.”
“Don’t speak to me about the burden of a King, Erik. A King who commands others to die without risking it himself is no King worth serving.”
“You didn’t even address my actual plan…” Erik replied, like a disappointed child.
“I didn’t address it because it’s foolhardy. Even if we could destroy the capital ship another would take its place. The Daradans do not begin and end with Newt Scaren.” He turned away from his son to peer again out the window. “You should learn what a hierarchy is.”
“I know exactly what it is.” Erik replied harshly. The King spun to retort, angered by the remark, but stopped as Captain Lance reentered the throne room.
“My King, we have scouts reporting that dropships are descending from the blockade in the southern lands beyond the Dargoon Forests.”
Riken stepped toward his chief soldier, worry etched on his face. “Are they going around the Forests or through them?”
“Both, by our estimates.”
“Then they are either bold to challenge the Dargoons on their way here or they are wise to have allied with them already.”
Lance seemed skeptical of the idea: “I don’t believe the Dargoons would agree to a foreign alliance. That’s not in their nature.”
“No, but it is in the best interests of Max Deku.” the King replied, saying the name with unconcealed disdain. “He will do what is necessary to ensure what’s best for him.”
“Perhaps we should send our army into the forests to head them off.” Prince Erik offered.
“No…If there’s an alliance in place it would have been done in secret.”
Erik failed to see the point of that tidbit. “Better to fight the Daradans there than here.” he reiterated.
“I will not give Max Deku the excuse to turn his people fully against us.”
Erik finally came out of his seat, ready to argue against his father’s decision. The King saw it and turned away from his son, hoping to walk away and diffuse the tension in the room.
*BOOM*
The window exploded in a cascade of glass shards and debris from the side of the Castle, knocking the King and the Prince down to the floor. A figure repelled into the room, shed the long, plain cloak he was hiding under, and revealed himself as one of Newt Scaren’s Royal Guardsman. The Daradan leaped into the exposed opening, propelled by the repulsor-pack strapped to his back, and brought a dagger down toward the King’s exposed back.
“No!” Cpt. Lance shouted as he dove to block the killing blow. The blade punctured the guard’s armor but no more. With a twist of his body, Lance jerked the weapon out of the assassin’s hand and, before the would-be killer could escape, Lance ran him through with his spear.
More guards rushed into the throne room to defend their King. Lance immediately began barking orders, taking charge in locking-down the Castle. “Rally the local guards, seal the entrances. You!” he shouted to a young, nervous-looking solider lingering near the door. “Help me move the King!”
“Captain!” a guard rushed into the room, blew by the captain, the King, and the Prince, and stopped at the edge of the destroyed window.
“What?” Lance asked, his voice grave.
“They’re here.” Lance stepped to the window and looked out to the land beyond. Cresting over the rolling hills were the assault tanks of the Daradan Ground Forces. Tiny dots of scurrying citizens—the last remnants of the population who had failed to heed the King’s warnings—scrambled for shelter.
The hills glowed with the lights from their discharging weapons. Black smoke began to flutter toward the sky from the buildings being set ablaze by the troops making their way the Castle.
The invasion had begun.