Winter was the bejewelling of Temsevar, its crystalline magnificence turning even the most sordid and mean peasant’s wooden hovel into a glittering palace of diamond. The snows softened the harshness, smoothing all into a glorious billowed largesse of white. From every branch and twig, every roof and casement, every eave and doorway, came the glitter of silver icicles, their growth arrested every night and scarcely allowed under the scant warmth of the red sun each narrow day.

Every ugliness was made mild by the glory of a shimmering white crown, every roughness made smooth and the uneven made plain. The winter was levelling, but it levelled in a way that paid vast tribute to the might of the elements. Rich and poor alike were equal before the onslaught, for both could share in the splendour which outshone the most regal opulence of the greatest noble. To watch the sunrise, blood red over the virgin white and silver landscape, washing it with a mystical ruby glow, was to be awed and left with wonder. To trace the pearlescent shimmer of the twin moons over the snow, where the whiteness caught and reflected back to the darkened sky the moist brilliance, until even the night might seem to dazzle, was to feel one had walked, waking, in a dreamscape or broken through to some celestial realm of deity.

But the beauty, if free, was also lethal. The cold wore down the resistance of the weak and made them prey to illness or starvation and the frozen ground would not open to bury the dead, who were burned in high pyres on the ice, in batches like cakes.

Here the rich and the poor parted company, for the wealthy had portals against death in the cold. They had piles of wood to burn, stores of bottled, dried and salted food, they had flour to bake with and flesh to cook. Not for them the privations of starvation in the snow-stricken land. A house could be counted wealthy by the fire that burned in its hearth, driving back the demons of cold and darkness. Even the meanest hovel that could light a fire all day was accounted rich when the chilling shroud of snow and ice descended.

It was in the winter that those who were free-born and poverty-stricken would envy the enslaved. For, worth money and offering labour, even the most meanly treated slave could expect to be kept warm and fed through the White Moons, where their free-born cousins could hope no more than that this winter might be light and their meagre stores of food and fuel might not be gone before the thaw. What value was freedom when the cost was one’s life or the lives of one’s children?

So winter was the glory of Temsevar and its greatest influence. Without it, perhaps the slave economy might have evolved and changed, but with it – and the utter dependence it brought of the weak upon the strong – the frozen arms of ice which embraced Temsevar for two-thirds of the year, also embraced the culture and values of its people, freezing them into patterns as cold and merciless as the brutal winter itself.

The ice cracked the marrow from the bone of the planet, riving rock and stripping life from the land, animal and vegetable. The rivers froze solid and the seas slowed as if sleeping and then surrendered to the embrace of ice. Only the hardiest in nature could survive and most of the larger animals only lived by entering the deep sleep of hibernation through the worst of the cold moons. You would not see tizarts playing in the snow or find therloons leaving ice-tracks under the twin moons.

Most people dreaded the onset of winter as much as they dreaded the onset of old age. For the annual revisiting of the Great White was a similar experience – the pace of life became slow and painful, cold and bleak. In the great Halls, poets would pass the wine, mulled with the herbs and berries of the autumn and sing with lysigal of the great deeds that had been done that summer and would be contemplated the next. But elsewhere, it was as though the planet slept and its people dreamed beneath the alluring counterpane of snow, fringed with its tassels of ice and embroidered with frost.

Transgressor Trilogy   E.M. Swift-Hook

 

 

 

Rubaiyat Sonnet

Alas the Muse must vanish with the light
And close the manuscript of youthful fire
Why must I have so many thoughts in flight?
Why will not my Muse simply me inspire?

For every night a glass I have turned down
On this inverted bowl I call my desk
And bent my head for the laureates crown
To birth another written arabesque.

But whence the bird forth from the branch hath flown?
How is’t Her brightness hence from me doth go?
Now here, abandoned, weeping, I do groan,
To ask why my Muse doth despise me so?

Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

Adoring Fans can join my Facebook Group.

The big bay window was Victoria’s only eye on the world. For as long as she could remember, she had been considered delicate and very rarely permitted to leave her rooms. She was a small, pale, lonely girl, whose sharp little features looked as if they may have been made of old ivory. Her life was both tedious and burdensome, but she was wise enough to know that any attempt on her part to change her lot would very possibly result in the rules constraining her becoming more rather than less stringent. So she sat on her sofa and watched the world through her window.

Her lot would have been worse if those who had charge of her were able to look behind her broad smooth brow into her busy and imaginative brain. Nobody knew about her dream life, and the friends who peopled those dreams. Nobody knew how she laughed, and sang, and danced, and ran, as she lay in her high, narrow bed with its overly decorated curtains and flaring patchwork quilt. These nocturnal adventures were, she thought, the only thing that enabled her to face the boredom and loneliness of her days with tolerable equanimity.

And so matters stood until one winter’s day when the snow was falling so hard that her most officious nurse closed the thick red velvet curtains across the window and threw extra logs on the fire. Victoria stared unseeingly at the blue and orange flames, mentally counting the hours until something might happen to decrease the tedium.

A sudden bustle took her very much by surprise, she was all but asleep when two nurses hurried into her sitting room. They pulled her upright, plumped her pillows, smoothed her hair, and generally tidied with ruthless efficiency. She knew better than to grumble or question, even when their rough handling hurt her bones, or when they pulled her hair. She merely set her teeth and endured. The one bright spot was that they opened the curtains behind her sofa and she was able to see the enchanted landscape the snow had created in the square outside her window.

The door opened to admit her lady mother, and a gentleman. Victoria clasped her hands together in her lap and lifted a mildly enquiring face.
“There she is,” Mama said in a tight voice. “There’s the creature who owns this house, and everything in it.”
The gentleman trod his stately way across the carpet and stood staring down at at Victoria with his hands clasped behind his back. He swayed gently forwards and backwards, a movement that made Victoria feel vaguely queasy, while he looked down into her eyes.
“She seems a sickly little thing,” he remarked.
“She is indeed, but that won’t suit my purposes. Her money goes to charity if she dies unwed.”
The gentleman made a strange humming noise in his chest then nodded.
“Very well. The boy is very little use, but controllable. You have a bargain.”
Mama smiled a taut little smile that exposed her rather bad teeth.
“Victoria,” she said firmly, “this is Mister Arkwright. You will be marrying his son, Makepeace, as soon as it can be arranged.”
“Yes Mama.”
Victoria’s visitors swept from the room, leaving her to wonder what manner of a man they would marry her to in order to gain control of her inheritance. She wasn’t left in ignorance for long. Her nurses, as was their habit, talked as if she was deaf or stupid. While they waited for Mama to be far enough away for them to slope off safely, the bitterest of them nudged the fat one with a sharp elbow.
“Well, I never thought I would feel sorry for her ladyship. But that Makepeace is a vicious little bastard. I give her three months.”
Then they took themselves off about whatever ploy was more interesting than taking care of Victoria.

“Oh my goodness,” she thought, then, with the full knowledge that there was nothing she could do about her impending marriage she put the fear to the back of her mind, and turned her attention to the snowy scene in the gardens outside. There were children playing in the thick snow. One of them saw her in her window and cheekily threw a snowball. Victoria found herself laughing delightedly. Greatly daring, she waved a hand, and the child waved back, grinning infectiously. It seemed that time rushed by as she watched the children play, and before she knew it dusk was falling and the garden began to empty of children. In the end there was just one figure left in the snow. As the lamplighters went about their business, he looked up to the bright window and Victoria saw his face. She blinked as her eyes took in his square face and his bright blue eyes. She knew that face. It was the one she saw every night in her dreams. It was the face of the boy with whom she danced and ran and laughed. He smiled up at her and gestured for her to come outside.
“How can I go outside?” she thought bitterly. “I am stuck in this room and on this settee. I don’t even have any shoes.”
As if he read her thoughts, the boy held up a hand in which there was a pair of fur-lined boots.

Victoria stood up, shakily because she was unaccustomed to walking, and made her way to the window. She put her hands on the sash and tried to raise it but nothing happened. Then she remembered the latch and reached high above her head to slide it open. Once this was done she could lift the window inch by inch, it was hard work and the frigid air that rushed into the room all but stole her breath. She bit her lower lip and persevered until she had enough of a gap for her to squeeze through. The second she was out on the windowsill, the glass crashed closed behind her.

She jumped, startled by the noise, before looking eagerly down into the garden. There was nobody there. For a moment she knew fear and despondency, but then she told herself not to be silly, whether there was anybody waiting for her or not it was better to be out here than inside that overheated room where everyone either hated her or despised her. It was so cold now that her teeth chattered and her hands were rapidly becoming blue and losing their grip. Just as she was wondering how on earth she could get down from the window ledge, she felt warm breath on her neck and heard delighted laughter in her head.
“Jump, my brave one,” the voice was as familiar as breathing, and Victoria launched herself into the air.

The big front door flew open and Victoria’s nurses flew out onto the frozen pavement. Their charge’s broken body lay in a heap on the already dirty snow.

©️jane jago 2017

CHAPTER FOUR

By late afternoon the campervan and its occupants were still north of Birmingham. The traffic on the M6 had just ground to a halt for about the tenth time.

Rod was driving.

“Can we get around this. Or do we need another overnight?”

Anna stood up and pushed a button on the satnav. A list of traffic reports came up and she scrolled through it.

“Well. We could get around. But wherever we go it looks like there are problems.”

“Overnighter then. Got anywhere up your sleeve Anna?”

“Not offhand. But I’ve got a book. It’s in the glove box in front of Sam. Pass it here and I’ll have a look.”

Sam pulled out Anna’s ‘book’, which was a loose-leaf folder with magazine articles, pages from campsites guides, and various handwritten sheets therein.

“Crikey. This is comprehensive.”

“Yeah. I know. I’m anally retentive. That’s what you get if you go campervanning with an accountant.”

Sam and Rod laughed.

Bill looked up from his computer game. “Uncle Rod. What’s anally retentive? Do it mean keeping things up your bum?”

“No it don’t?” Rod all but yelped. “And where did that little gem come from?”

“Well anal means bum, don’t it? And if you retain stuff you keep it.”

Anna giggled.

“That’s you told, Rod. My fault. I should have remembered how good Bill is at listening.”

Then she turned to the small person sitting next to her.

“Billy, anally retentive means obsessed with detail. And before you say it, I know that don’t make sense. But it’s the straight up truth.”

“Okay. If you say so.” Bill went back to killing aliens, and the three adults stifled giggles.

 

Anna frowned at her book. “Nothing. But wait. I do have one idea. Some friends of my brother own a pub and it’s actually only about twenty minutes from the next junction. It ain’t really a campsite. But. Lemme give them a call.”

She got her phone down from its shelf.

“Bill,” she said, “I need a number from my iPad. It’s in contacts. Belle and Chris. Would you be so kind?’

Bill fiddled expertly with the tablet and reeled off a string of numbers before resuming his game.

“Belle. This is Anna Marshall. Yeah, good to speak to you too. Got room on your car park for a camper tonight? A table for four for supper? Ditto breakfast? Me, two men and a small boy. No. Neither. I’ll explain when I see you. Promise. We just have to get off the motorway. Byeee.”

She grinned at the phone.

“All arranged. Although I’ll certainly get the third degree about turning up with three men in tow.”

She handed Sam a business card from her file.

“Stick this postcode in the sitnag please?”

He obliged and handed the card back.

 

Bill finished his game.

“iPad needs charging” he announced.

“Give it here and I’ll plug it in.”

Anna stood up and put the pad into a cupboard where she plugged it into a socket. Bill looked at her.

“Anna. How come you got electric while we are moving?’

‘It’s battery power.’

‘But you didn’t plug your iPad into a battery socket. Them are round. That was a house plug.”

“Many points for observation. I have a thing called an inverter. It changes battery power to ordinary power. And before you ask. No. I don’t know how it does it.”

“Me neither,” Rod grinned.

“Nor me,” Sam’s voice was rueful.

“I should have paid more attention to physics lessons at school.”

Bill smiled seraphically at them.

“That’s all right. I’ll ask Daddy. I could ask him now if I was allowed to call him…”

“Okay. You can.” Anna laughed. “You can also tell him that the traffic is so snarled up we are having to make another overnight stop.”

 

Bill held out his hand for the phone and called his father. They had rather a long conversation, in which Jim seemed to do most of the talking. After a good twenty minutes, Bill handed the phone to Sam.

“Daddy wants to talk to whichever man isn’t driving.”

“I guess that’s me. Sam here.”

Then he listened for quite a few minutes.

“Yes. We saw the equipment. No we haven’t. Not even Anna. Okay. I will. Hang on I’ll ask them.”

He muted the phone.

“Bill and Rod, would you be happy for Charlie to come to the northern isles with you?”

Rod nodded.

“But it’s up to Bill. It’s his treat.”

“Bill?’

“Oh. I’d really like that. Charlie is my best friend. Next to Uncle Rod.”

Sam went back to his conversation with Jim.

“Trip’s fine. I’ll manage the rest. Sorry we can’t get back today. Yeah. Traffic is a fucker. Regards to your wife.”

He handed the phone back to Bill.

“Mummy wants a word.”

 

By the time Bill’s protracted call had finished they were off the motorway and bowling down a green-lined country road.

“It’s like the lane to Granny and Gramp’s house,” Bill declared. “What is the pub like?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been. They only moved here last year and I haven’t gotten round to calling in.”

Bill frowned at her.

“It’s not nice not to visit friends. Tell us about them please.”

“Okay. They are two ladies in their fifties. Used to be diplomats. Which is how Danny met them. They own the Rose and Crown. They are nice and funny. You will like them.”

“Why is a lady called Chris?”

“Because she don’t like Christabel, which is her given name.”

“Okay. I don’t much like William. So I get that. And Charlie hates Charlemagne. Are your two ladies special friends like Danny and Paul?”

“Yes.”

“Are they as funny as Paul?”

“No. Nobody is. And now, if the satnav is telling the truth we are nearly there.”

Jane Jago

 

 

When someone loses their sole source of income through no fault of their own, life can seem suddenly terrifying. This auction is in support of someone in that place and is your chance to bid on some really amazing things!

Any number of ebooks and paperbacks and some very different lots too. It would be impossible to list them all, but here are just a few of the more unusual ones for you to check out.

Amazing artwork from Ian Bristow

A signed book and a T-shirt from Victor Aquista

A custom digital character illustration from Zora Marie

Unique handmade bookmark from Mary Woldering

A line edit on a 100k or less word book by Fiona Skye

A cover design by Brhi Peres

Name a character in the 8th Penny White book by Chrys Cymri

And of course there are some from us here at the Working Title Blog:

Jane Jago’s ‘Pulling the Rug’ ebooks

The entire ebook set of Fortune’s Fools novels as published to date

The First Dai and Julia Omnibus ebook

The auction runs from 7-11 January and you need to be on Facebook to participate.

Hope to see you there!

 

 

 

Dear Reader Who Writes,

As ever it falls onto my shoulders to ensure you are aware whose words of wisdom you are imbibing from the breast of pedagogy. I am Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV. My claim to a seat at the high table of the literary elite is rooted in my credentials as author of the science fiction and fantasy neo-classic “Fatswhistle and Buchtooth”. At one point, this work of incredible creativity achieved the giddy heights of Amazon’s one millionth on the bestseller charts. As such, you can rest assured I am indeed over-qualified to dispense guidance on how you can best write your own delightful fantasia.

I may have mentioned in passing that my father has long since gone to a better place. In truth I do not recall too much about my father. He was seldom at home even when he was still with us. But I do recall one conversation. I was still in shorts being a mere lad of seventeen, he sat me on his knee and grunted a bit, then told me: “Moony boy – you have to learn the facts of life. Fact One – life is a shit heap and only those at the top get to smell the sweet clean air. Fact Two – you only get to the top if you use the heads of others like a ladder. You got that son?”

At the time I had no idea of his meaning. I had little idea of what his job was either I had always believed he was some form of landscape gardener. After all what else should one think a hedge fund manager did all day? Tragically, before I had any opportunity to ask him to elucidate in depth, he was gone forever.

So whilst Mummy and I share a suburban semi-detached residence, he has gone to paradise. I think it is the Bahamas although it may be Bermuda – the pictures on Facebook are always very vague as he has no wish to alert the tax authorities to his present whereabouts.

Which brings me neatly to my topic for today.

How To Write A Book – Lesson 16: The Write Setting.

I can not express strongly enough how crucial it is to provide the precise and perfect backcloth against which to unfold your torpid little tale to transform it from mediocrity (or worse) to stella-luminescence in the literary sphere. Location. Location. Location.

Imagine for a moment if Robinson Crusoe had been set on an island near Tonbridge not Trinidad? Would ‘A Thousand and One Nights’ be as beguiling were the stories set in Swansea? These are things to ponder and as you do so, here is my list of questions to ask yourself when choosing the best locale for your literature.

• What is the weather like?

Vital as it determines your character’s style of dress!

• What is the geography like?

Vital as you need to know if the sea is nearby for a swim or if your characters will be hiking through mountains.

• Does everyone there speak English?

Best to avoid this location if not as you and your readers won’t understand anything.

• Does it have to be a real place?

One of the key advantages of writing science-fiction and fantasy, you can make up everything about the place to suit however you want it to be.

And that is pretty much it. Get those basics right and the rest will fall into place.

Until my next, oh disciples of Calliope!

Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

Adoring Fans can join my Facebook Group.

The day that a patronising little shit of a TV presenter told our heroine she had won a ‘life-changing’ amount of money was a good day. Firstly because she likes winning, and secondly because the aforementioned patronising bastard had his hand on her ass as he said it, thereby giving her the excuse to haul off and belt him one. It was a good punch, leaving him winded and retching. And the best of it was that the cameras were still rolling. But that’s at the end of the story. It would be better to start somewhere nearer the beginning

Messing around with the iPad can be injurious to your health and no more so than the day Jen Evans came across an advert for a new game show. ‘Little physical exertion’ it said ‘but contestants will need good general knowledge and nerves of steel.’ She passed the pad to her long-time partner Adam, who laughed.
“Nerves of titanium, more like” he grinned. “Whyn’t you apply?”
She did. On a whim. And promptly forgot about it.

An email asking for more details about her caused Jen and Adam great hilarity as they vied with each other to be more and more outrageous whilst remaining more or less within the boundaries of truth.

“They won’t” she said cheerfully “be wanting a forty-year-old woman with attitude.”
He grinned. “No. Maybe not. Most don’t. Ain’t you glad I do!”
“Ditto, smart arse.”

Surprise hardly comes close to their reaction – actually the pair of them giggled like schoolgirls – when a bulky envelope arrived in the post. It contained all sorts of information leaflets and an invitation to attend an elimination weekend somewhere in the Brecon Beacons. As most of the leaflets were about extreme sports, she declined the kind offer.
“Creepy bastards” she said brightly as they walked to the Post Office with her somewhat brisk letter of refusal.

It turned out that not only were the people behind the concept creepy, they were also convoluted, because refusing the offered weekend was the way to pass the first round of eliminations. Jen got a letter, a few days after her ‘stuff it’ missive, offering a place at the next round of eliminations in southern Spain. She gave the letter to Adam, who read it twice: once quickly and once carefully. He put the paper down.
“I dunno what to think. But you might be getting close to being chosen, so you’d better decide whether you want to do it or not.”
“No. Not specially. I think I’ll just duck out now.”
“Okay.”

She stuffed the letter back in its envelope with a post it note saying ‘thanks but no thanks’ and returned it from whence it came.
“Thank fuck that’s over.”

Nothing happened for a couple months, so it came as a complete surprise to get an email asking if some people from the production company could come visit.
“It’s your call.” Adam looked at her over his reading glasses.
“No then.”
But they came anyway.

It was a lovely May morning when Jen noticed the shiny new Range Rover parking opposite and wondered idly who had so far lost their way as to find themselves in the one-cat hamlet she called home. She didn’t have to wonder for long, as two people climbed out of the car and scurried across the road, knocking importantly on the front door of her house.

It was one of the cleaning lady’s days, so she opened the door. The uninvited visitors took a couple steps back at the sight of the mountain of muscle and tattoos that was Albany Brown. To do them justice they recovered fast, and the man surged forward with one hand outstretched. Mrs B ignored the hand and stared down at them.

“We’re from One Thick Monkey Productions” the man said in rather forced tones. “Here to see Jennifer Evans.”
Mrs B shut the door in their faces and came to find Jen.
“Will I let them in, ask what they want, or tell them to piss off?”
Leo was hugely amused. “Ask what they want.”
She rolled back to the door and opened it a crack.
“Ms Evans wants to know what you are here for.”
The man turned a smile of blinding whiteness on her.
“We’re here to persuade her to become a contestant in our newest venture. A global game show like nothing that has ever been before.”
He made to walk in, but the door was firmly slammed shut.
“You hear that?”
“Yes.”
“You want I should let them in?”
“No.”

A couple of hours later Adam found Jen weeding in the back garden. He wobbled his eyebrows.
“They aren’t going to go away, you know.”
“They have to go some time…”
He grinned wickedly. “Not unless you chase them away with the twelve bore.”
“What d’you suggest Clever Dick.”
“Let them in. Listen politely.”
She snarled at him and he just grinned wider.
“Okay. You win. Invite them in. But no offer of refreshment. And if they want the john it’s the one out back.”
“We’re agreed on that” he smirked evilly and sloped off to the Range Rover, returning a couple of minutes later with the dubious duo in tow.

Mrs B decided to join in the fun, and leaned against the kitchen wall with her arms folded across her impressively corseted chest.
Jen was brisk. “Sit. You have ten minutes.”
Mister Corporate started fiddling about in his briefcase.
“Nine minutes thirty seconds.”
He looked up with a hint of panic his eyes before he continued his frantic scrabbling. It was noticeable that his female companion was having trouble keeping a straight face.
“What you lost?” Mrs B showed her gold tooth in a grin.
“The contract Ms Evans needs to sign. It’s not here,” Mister Corporate declared dramatically “Caroline. Go and search the car.”
Jen looked at his hair gel and his revolting tie and felt her gorge rise.
“It must have been you left it behind,” she said. “Whyn’t you go fetch it?”
“Because she’s a girl,” he spluttered. Then he bethought himself and tried for a charming smile.
Jen sneered.
“Tell you what, you pop out and sit in the car and let us girls have a nice chat.”
He opened his mouth again and both Jen and Mrs B glared at him. For a moment there was an impasse then he shrugged his shoulders and left. Adam grinned at his departing back.
“You haven’t made a friend there.”
“That’s fine. I’m not running for election.”
The girl, Caroline, smiled.
“I’m not sure I should thank you for that. He’ll have his vengeance.”
“Not if you get him first.”
I could see her thinking about that one, then a slow, vicious grin spread across her rather plain face. She sat up straight.
“Okay. How long do I have to pitch this thing to you?”
“Not long. I bore easily.”
It was boring. Very boring. But Caroline stuck to her guns. In the end the flood of words wore Jen down sufficiently so that she agreed to read information pack, promising to let the production company know by the end of the week.

Caroline went out and climbed into the Range Rover. A stony faced corporate man started the engine and the car pulled away. Jen put the pack of paper on the table and grinned her three-cornered grin.
“You’re gonna do it aren’t you?” Adam asked.
“Very probably.”
“Because?”
“Two reasons. One. It starts just after you go to Saudi for six months and even if I get right to the end it finishes just as you get back. Two. The buggers see me as canon fodder. I’d kinda like to prove them wrong.”
“Three. You didn’t like Mister Corporate a bit. However you did quite like his sidekick.”
“True. What’d you think.”
“I think it might amuse you while I’m gainfully employed for the last time. So fine. But. No risks. I’ll have your promise.”
“Physical risks?”
“Yeah. I’d not expect you to get through a day without rocking somebody’s boat.”
He grinned and hugged her. She hugged back.
“Looks like I’m going to sign up for Mind Games then don’t it?”
“It does.”

Two months passed and Adam finished his secondment in England. Jen packed his bags for him, and took him to Heathrow, where he boarded a flight to his last ever assignment. In Saudi Arabia.

Jen went home and shut up the cottage before presenting herself at Bristol airport early one Sunday morning. She wore combats and carried a very small bag. The brainless bird who signed her in looked at her luggage with something akin to pity.
“That all you have?’
“No. But the rest is invisible.”

© Jane Jago 2017

 

 

Antrey has escaped from Tolenor, south across The Water Road, and into Neldathi territory. She’s been alone, isolated, and lost, until a group of Neldathi hunters appear . . .

Antrey was so transfixed by the elk’s plight that she forgot for a moment that the arrows meant that, after all this time, she was no longer alone. She did not hear the further rustling of the trees, but did see first one, then two, then half a dozen Neldathi emerge from the forest and approach the elk.

They were tall, with just the faintest tint of blue in their white skin. Were they naked, they would nearly blend in with the snowy ground. Each wore multiple layers of animal skins that obscured, but could not hide, that they were strong, powerful men. All had long black hair, which grew from a fringe of scalp at the back of their heads. It twisted in braids that ran halfway down their backs. About halfway down, the black color gave way to a pattern of red, black, and white strips. Three of them carried ornately carved bows, while two others had similar devices slung over their backs. They either had not noticed her or ignored her and approached the elk.

The other Neldathi, Antrey had thought initially, was unarmed. The tallest of the group, he strode towards the elk, reached inside the layers of his clothing, and pulled out a knife, bigger than anything Antrey had ever seen that was not called a sword. In a manoeuvre that showed years of practice and an abundance of skill, he knelt beside the elk, placed the great blade to its throat, misery. All the while, he said something quickly
under his breath.

Antrey had never seen anything like it in her life. When she was young she had never experienced a hunt or a kill, only the end result. The sight of such a brutally efficient killing shook her to the core. The bottle slipped from her hands and splashed into the pool underneath her. At the noise, the hunters turned and saw her.

The one that had killed the elk crouched motionless next to it, knife still in hand. The others moved away from the kill and sprang across the stream swiftly, switching their focus. They began to converge on her slowly, two from upstream in the direction of the elk, two others having circled around to come at her from the other direction. She lost sight of the fifth, but within moments she knew she was surrounded. Before it ever occurred to her to try and get away, five well-armed and curious Neldathi had blocked any means of escape.

She ignored the ones on her side of the stream and tried to make eye contact with the one by the elk. He appeared to be the leader of this hunting party or its senior member. Regardless, he was someone who commanded respect. Maybe by making contact directly with him she might open some line of communication, although she had no idea how to do that. At the very least, maybe he would put the knife away. The way he crouched there, casually displaying the bloody blade, made her think he meant to tell her that it might be her neck that was sliced open next.

As the others inched slowly closer to her, Antrey could feel their eyes on her, covering every inch of her with their eyes. One of them was close enough that Antrey thought he might have sniffed her, but she quickly dismissed that as a work of her imagination. That was something the barbarian Neldathi of the Altrerian culture would do, but made little sense upon rational examination. They would use every sense available to them, just as she would.

With each footstep that brought them closer, the snow crunched underfoot. Antrey’s heart raced the closer they came. It was calmed only somewhat when the one across the stream stood up, wiped the bloody blade of his knife on the elk’s carcass, and returned it to its sheath. When she heard a voice behind her, she nearly exploded.

The Water Road is the first book in The Water Road Trilogy by JD Byrne.

Q1: What’s your favorite book of all time and why did it speak to you so much?

I’m not a huge fan of questions about favorites because they seem to change on an almost daily basis (if you’d asked for a favorite album I’d just throw up my hands and run away – too many possibilities!). Having said that, going back through books I’ve loved and stuck with me and could qualify as the all-time favorite, I’d have to say it was The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
For one thing, it’s funny. At the time I first encountered it in elementary school, thanks to my decade-older brother, sci-fi and fantasy to me was serious business. It was all about big ideas and probing issues related to the future of humanity. Sure there were swashbuckling adventures, but even those got framed in big-picture terms of good versus evil. The idea that you could take the same kind of setting, front load humor and satire (Star Wars may have made spaceships look junky and had a parade of wacky looking aliens, but did Lucas ever conceive something as wonderful as Vogon bureaucracy?) and still slip in some deep thoughts (so to speak) on the back end. These kinds of stories didn’t have to take themselves so seriously.
But one thing I’ve really loved going back to the Guide (in all its forms) is how much Adams uses the freedom of writing silly sci-fi to do really interesting things with world building (again – so to speak). The Hitchhiker’s universe is filled with wondrous, astounding, and downright amusing things that probably don’t have a lot of connection to scientific reality. I’ve noticed similar things in later books that I’ve come to love (Banks’s Culture series, the comic Saga) and it’s given me a little more confidence as a writer to do “weird” things in the worlds I create.
None of which is to say that anything I write comes out anything like The Hitchhiker’s Guide… of course.

Q2: If you had to move to another country, which would it be and why?

Given the current political climate I should probably give this some more detailed thought, but my choice right now would be the United Kingdom, probably (at my wife’s demand) somewhere in Scotland. I have an affinity for lots of British things – soccer, Formula 1, progressive rock – and I think it would be a generally pleasant place to be. It’s got its own problems, of course, but just about anyplace would. Plus, no need to learn a new language!
Besides, we’ve never been there and what better excuse is there for exploring than finding out about the place where you’re living?

Q3: If you received enough money to never need to work again, what would you spend your time doing?

I’d probably flip my life as it exists now. Right now I work full time as a lawyer and only get to write part time. If I was suddenly wealthy I’d go to writing (and promoting) full time. I’d be interested in seeing how productive I could be if I could dedicate my morning hours (when I tend to be more full of energy) to writing. I suspect I could get into a pretty good groove in terms of producing books and getting exposure for them.
But I wouldn’t give up practicing law altogether. I think I’d like to have a small pro bono practice where I could pick and choose a case here and there, help out a really worthy cause or client.

Sometimes the law gives you a chance to play Don Quixote, going off tilting at windmills. I don’t think I’ll ever to be able to give that up completely.

JD Byrne was born and raised around Charleston, West Virginia, before spending seven years in Morgantown getting degrees in history and law from West Virginia University. He's practised law for more than 15 years, writing briefs where he has to stick to real facts and real law. In his fiction, he gets to make up the facts, take or leave the law, and let his imagination run wild. He lives outside Charleston with his wife and the two cutest Chihuahuas the world has ever seen. You can catch up with JD Byrne on Goodreads, Twitter, Facebook and his own website.

'No More Valor' has yet to be published and this is an exclusive, previously unpublished extract from it. Names of people in the story are purely coincidental...

The small storage area he found empty,  built into the bulkhead between two of the cabins. It was a snug fit to squeeze himself in and he was grateful that the door was not airtight. This would be used to carry personal luggage for any passenger but he had seen the freetrader and she was travelling alone. He was fairly certain the vessel was not sophisticated enough to have weight sensors for the human occupancy area, so Durban was not too concerned that the storage might be investigated before take off.
It was uncomfortable, but he was exhausted. He had little rest the night before and then been up before dawn to travel to Keran from the port town of Vinbrith. Closing his eyes meaning to let himself relax a moment, Durban woke to the light of the open compartment hatch shining on him. His first thought was that he had made it off Temsevar but the voice he heard shattered that illusion immediately.
“Man, I could have done without this today. Alright, whoever you are, come out and keep your hands in clear view.”
The voice was male and Durban placed it as belonging to the individual in charge of the spaceport, Agernilio Tavi. Blinking a little he eased himself out of the cramped storage locker.
The freetrader with Tavi, a woman in her middle years, was wearing a slightly exasperated expression as if faced with a naughty schoolboy. The spaceport supervisor had a much less friendly expression, but it seemed ill-fitting on his round face, not something he was used to adopting. He spoke again, a hardness in his voice.
“Your stowaway, Ducky, what do you want to do with him?”
The energy snub the man held was aimed unwaveringly at Durban’s midriff. He would be fully within his right to use it. There was no ambiguity in the laws of space – a stowaway was classed as a potential hijacker or pirate and as such could be executed out of hand. For a moment Durban wondered if he had made the biggest miscalculation of his teenage life.
The freetrader shook her head. “I can’t say I blame anyone from here wanting to get off this planet. I would if I were born here. But this is not the way. What’s your name, kid?”
She didn’t sound as if she planned to order him shot, so he instinctively dropped into a bow, and spoke quickly.
“Durban Chola, Honoured One. And I had no intention of bringing any harm to you or your ship. And you are correct, I just wanted to get off world.”
The woman nodded, her gaze holding his own for a few long moments. Durban looked up at her from his kneeling pose and thought he could see some trace of amusement in her eyes.
“You can put the snub away, Gernie, I don’t think our stowaway is that dangerous.” She touched the man’s arm as she spoke. “And you can get up, youngster, it’s a bad look. You need to stop doing that grovelling if you really plan to get yourself off world. Good thing I spotted you as I’m not leaving for a couple of days yet and you would have got hungry fast in there.”
Hoping that meant he was out of the fire, Durban got to his feet, a smile of relief already creeping onto his face.
The man called Gernie still held the snub, but no longer looked quite so inclined to use it.
“So what do you want to do with him, Ducky?”
The freetrader smiled.
“I think we should go and get him a good meal in Micah’s and find out a bit more about him, what do you think?”
Gernie studied Durban for a few moments more then gave a slight shrug and put the snub away under his jacket.
“I think that could be a good call.”

A short time later Durban found himself sitting in the corner of one of the more luxurious taverns he had seen. Pinned, politely, in his seat by the two people sitting at the table opposite him. The food, when it came was good and having not eaten a full meal since before he boarded a ship in Harkera on the Western Continent to cross the Lesser Ocean, two moons before, Durban had to restrain himself from over-indulging. It was only as he cleaned his plate with a piece of bread and was eating that, he became aware that his two companions were watching him with amusement.
“Man you were hungry,” Gernie said shaking his head and grinning. Durban, hand half-lifted to his mouth with the last morsel of his meal managed to make himself look a little guilty.
“So where are you from?” Ducky, the freetrader, wanted to know.
Durban took a drink wondering how to answer. He put the goblet back down and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand before replying.
“I came in by sea, from the Western Continent. Rode up from Vinbrith with a trader.”
“Big place the Western Continent,” Gernie observed. “Which bit of it did you come from?”
“I took ship from Harkera.”
Ducky nodded.
“What were you running away from?”
Durban decided the freetrader was much more perceptive and intelligent than he had first believed. He favoured her with his sunniest smile.
“If you are asking if I am a fugitive then the answer is no, not in any legal sense of the word at least. I am not running ‘from’ anyone – I am trying very hard to run ‘to’ somewhere.”
“To somewhere?” Ducky echoed.
“I want to go to the worlds beyond the stars,” Durban said without any hesitation. “I’ve heard there is a planet where there is high technology and not too much interest in who you are or where you came from.”
The other two exchanged looks and Gernie shook his head.
“Man, that is just talking crazy. You could never – I mean, ” he laughed briefly. “No. Just no. You would not survive ten seconds in that kind of place.”
Ducky had sat back in her chair and was looking at Durban with a very different expression.
“I agree with you there, Gernie, but what interests me a bit more is how this youngster even know that such places exist?”
Durban let his smile widen, keeping his tone benign whilst silently cursing her sharp mind.
“Temsevar is not completely without knowledge of what goes on beyond our atmosphere. There are tales in the taverns of the amazing wonders out there, the traders bring us news. News of places like Starcity.”
“The ‘City? Shit, kid you are out of your mind.”
Gernie and Ducky looked at each other, two grown-ups in a room with a child. Durban
worked hard to keep his expression ingenuous and open. Ducky shook her head.
“I give up my claim on this one,” she said. “He’s your problem, Gernie. And good luck with that.”

E.M. Swift-Hook