I'm Back

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen,

It is indeed I, your favorite neighborhood wacko foul mouthed, angry Scotsman.

It has been a good long while since I posted, there was the massive the massively drunken rant over the UK blackout of events on Fight Pass, I got over it since I get BT Sports for free and just record it, but apart from that there hasn't been anything since the Referendum, which I'm just going to say much other I'm bummed about, but come May hopefully the Westminster Establishment of theives, cunts, pedophiles and wankers are going to be kicked squarely in the arse by the rolling freight train of the renewed vigour of Scottish interest in how we are governed, and how badly we've been getting shafted by the Tories, the Red Tories and the Yellow Tories.

I passed two of my units for the first half of my Uni 3rd year, the one I failed was Unix and it was the exam that I failed miserably but it doesn't help when you the study materials you have don't even remotely match what's in your exam, you can't study the whole of Unix, it's frigging impossible. Hoping this half won't be as bad, doesn't seem like it (Helps that HTML and Javascript doesn't have an exam) and I get to resit in August so won't be repeating and wasting a whole year on it.

The Dystpian Wars extraveganza is rolling on, 6000 points strong of Prussians and 4000 points strong of Russians, and while we are fighting the Battle of Gibraltar at Carronade in very early May, the Rock itself is being crafted masterfully by the great George Dick, is rolling along quickly and not absolutley prepared for it, but I'll be orgainising that little bit in the ext few weeks, emails need to be sent and the delivery of members of the clubs who cant be there's ships needs to be arranged.

On the Wargaming front still and I just spent over £200 on a new World War II American army, with the required Sherman, in 28mm for Chain of Command by Two Fat Lardies and Bolt Action by Warlord. Pictures will be forthcoming when the painting is complete. Yes, I am a glutton for punishment and always give myself more work than I can handle but screw it.

Yet again staying with Wargaming, I will be taking part once again in the Scottish Battletech Championship this year at the Schiltron Wargaming tournament, hoping to make up for last years debacle with a top half finish this year. If you are interested I believe there are some places still available for Battletech so if you pop along to the website and have a look see

On the writing side of things, I am in the middle of working on the first draft of Warrior Rising, it is the new title of my first Caleb (originally Calibern) O'Hearn novel, it is actually a completely different book from Running out of Space which along with the several books that I started since I began that, got stopped because I couldn't take them anywhere at a certain point cause I didn't feel it (maybe because I'm an idiot and didn't have a plan for any of them). This was precipitated by a conversation I had in the Pub (oh, everyone has to be surprised by that) with my good friend Ferdinand, big crazy Dutch Philosopher in chief of Rufus T Firefly, about how I always start things and have great plans for them (or not really in my case) but they always go to shit, I started afresh with a brand new book but using the back story I had created for him and a number of the characters, sat down and went through all the backlog of stuff I had written and then made a plan of the novel section by section who the characters would be that were in the story. It'll be finished at the end of August this year, drafted, read by people I trust, drafted, read, drafted and then polished up and in September I  begin shopping it around publishers after that and if I don't get a bite I will be self publshing for this time next year.

In other writing news the Alliance of Worldbuilders is in the final stages of prep (I'm a lazy shit and only just wrote my Bio) the irrepresible and awesome Sammy HK Smith, author of In Search of Gods and Heroes, mother of Cats (seriously she has a whole fuck load of them), one of the head honchos of Grimbold Books is working her way to completing that, I have two short stories in there, Mr Gabriel of Alba, protagonist of my Urban Fantasy work is hacking away and shooting spells at people in there, so watch this space or my facebook or even my Google+ feed for that and if you haven't bought and read In Search of Gods and Heroes why the hell not?

This year also as part of my attempt to become healthy and fit once again, am seriously (aposed to fucking around with it for short periods) taking up  Muay Thai and Brazilian Jui-jitsu as part of an MMA orientated regime, it will encompasse eventually the whole spectrum of training in MMA but I'm starting with the hard bits first. Also I begin 352 days of no Booze, that's correct no more drunken ramblings for almost year, as of  the 16th of March, conveniently those 352 days land on the end of my birthday celebration period of one year and end at the beginning of the celebration period of another year, not really all that convinient since I sent the time limit. I reckon if I can go that long without booze after losing three stone over three months without it, I will be a lean mean and less angry machine by the end of the 352 days, that and I'l save a shitload of money.

That's about it for this particular blog, as I am about to eat dinner and head out to Falkirk for some Chain of Command, first outing of my new army.

Peace, love and all that good shit.

Progress Report number how should I know.

Alrighty folks

So, it's been a couple of months since my last update.

Just spent the better part of three months losing over 30 pounds, and any time anyone tells you excercise is fun is talking out of their ass, it's not fun if you are 50 odd pounds from healthy and want to kick that fat's ass, got another nine pounds to go before I get back to the gym and start rebuilding the upperbody and getting arms to resemble the tree trunks that are my legs.

That's going to be slowed down due to me starting my 3rd year of my degree, it started last Monday and I'm already bashing my head off of the wall at one of the modules, Proffesional Issues in Computing, more like philosophical claptrap designed so I don't go out and start destroying people's computers just cause I'm getting paid to do it. I'm already a member of the BCS, the rest of the course isn't bad so far other than the fairly heavy duty labs for Unix, but Unix is frigging important for anyone that wants to deal with more than 2% of the World's servers.

Just found out that I'm potentially going to be published again somewhere around Christmas, you may have noticed that They Rise and We Smite was removed from the blog, that would be the reason for it, there's also another couple potentials. I had submitted it to the Anthology well back into 2011 but it never seemed to ever be going to materialise, hence the posting up here, but my good friend and all around crazy worker Sammy HK Smith, author of In Search of Gods and Heroes, available at Kristell Ink Publishing, and her team at Grimbold books, who recently held a very successful Kickstarter campaign to keep the indie publishing house open for another couple years, are going to publish it, more on that when everything is finalised and I'm actually sure that I'm going to be featured, from recollection They Rise was a bit of a frigging shambles and in need of some serious editing. But I'll probably still shill it anyway since it's a charity anthology and I can resist shilling for charity.

The Falkirk District Wargames Club to which I am a member is doing a Necromunda campaign, which I bought the day it came out way back in 1995 and had been playing in campaigns on and off into the early 2000s but probably not since 2004. I was going to use Ratskins, none of the official models right enough, just some Sci-fi Native americans that I had from some game that I got for nothing that I never ever played, I had converted them and painted them and then played with them a couple of times and promptly realised it that was a slightly dumb idea to use a gang that had no heavy hitters and ancient weapons even for today's standards. So I promptly changed my mind, and decided that I would use one of the House Gangs. Back in the day I used Orlocks, cause back when I was young and stupid, I liked the look of them so I bought them. This time around I decided that I would choose a gang that was more geared to how I play games, full tilt aggresive, so I went for the Goliaths. I was just going to use the plastics I had from the two boxed sets that I had bought in 1995 and 2002 the first for a fraction of the actual price in some one day sale that the Glasgow Games Workshop had on. But the problem with the plastics was no individuality, even putting in new heads and converting heavies, it wouldn't have the flavour of my old Orlock gangs where I only used one of each of the plastic figures, so I went onto ebay to see if I could find any, find many I did, and I promptly put three bids on two of which were essentially the same models, minus one player or another, the other was a group of Orlocks incase I didn't get the Goliaths and I could just supplement my old ones with the new ones. I was thinking, I might win one but I'll never win three, nope I'm an Idiot, I went and won all three, so here I am sitting with all these models and thinking, gods damn it I'm still going to have to get converting shit, though screw trying to convert the heavies, just be two heavy stubber identical twins with some different tatts and a different hair colour.

Once they're all done with the paint jobs, I'll be uploading the pictures from each stage of the process, a well documented one, I like projects like this where every model itself is an individual project in it's self.

As for the writing of the books, it's in it's constant state of who the fuck knows, I think I started another two projects over the summer and really didn't do much of it, though I did manage to sit down and go through Burn Forest City Burn, and decided the title sucked a disesed Monkey's puss infested nut sack, and the second go at the first edit will be beginning as soon as I get a few spare days to sit and go through it, line by line, otherwise the writing hasn't been too far up the line over the last couple of months, felt a little disconnected from my creative side for a while.

For this current Glasgow District Wargamers Society club year I will be doing both the Falkirk Carronade show and the Edinburgh Claymore show, both will be Dystopian Wars, Carronade will be a port strike, witht he Prussians striking a Brittanian port, possibly Malta, or Gibraltar, the port itself I won't be making, that'll be down to the esteamable George Dick who's Wild West town at this year's Claymore (At which we were fuckin well robbed of the best Public Participation game by the Political shitheads at SEWC, who I found to be kind of obnoxious and cunty) was absolutley stunning and made all the more so by his hand crafted Mine. The pictures are somewhere which I can't remember and I'll post them at a later date. The Claymore one will be probably an aerial battle between Brits and Prussians again, mainly cause between us in the club that's the most collected fleets.

Anyway, that's me all up-to-date as far as I can think of.

Adios

Clearout

Well, today I did what every gamer I know dreads doing, deciding what in their collection is dead weight and needs to go and what they use and gets to stay.

Needless to say not the most fun moment in my life, as collections that were painstakingly put together are going to be put to the wayside and sold.

To be fair though it's figures that have barely been out the box in the last ten years and none of them have even seen the light of day for the past five, except when I was looking for a box of something and cause I'm a lazy get haven't labelled them.

My entire Star Wars Minitures collection, all 74 Revenge of the Sith and  48 Clone Strike models in a box ready for another persons gaming tables.

My Catachan Jungle Fighters, which I'll admit hasn't got the best paint job, but was kittbashed with abandon (Empire Free Company boxed set were awesome for that back in the day where 15 quid got you twenty to thirty a box) along with Metals which are few and far between these days, the classic big ass bazooka missile launchers, the Captain big enough and ugly enough to wield a power fist and a bolter and make anything but a marine of any stripe his bitch, the wheelie heavy weapons teams, and the Heavy flamer teams that scared the bejesus out opponents in a jungle.

My Dark Eldar that I've been slowly but surely pairing away for the last couple of years, mine are all of the original run, when Scourges looked badass rather than like fairies and something with bat wings, and Warriors that looked Eldarish but with plenty of blades to cut you up.

And onto my flintloque collection, small it may be but for the dozen times it was out the hand crafted carry box that they are in (I'll be keeping that for sure) it was much loved, my 105th Rifles along with Sharke and all the characters so lovingly ripped off from the Sharpe Novels, my orc foot and Ogres along with a great big hound from somwhere far off that never got to play, of course the Duke of Wheeling-turn on foot, the Velite Grenadiers de la Garde who I never got to play nice ever, always ruining the plans, my Voltiguers that made the Grenadiers look like puppies, then there is the Witchlands mob that like the ogres and orc line, never got a game, unfortunately my only opponent for the game sauntered off to the land of Hobbitses.

Which marches me onto my Lord of the Rings models, what a frigging waste of time they were buying, the Fellowship, warriors of the third age, moria orcs, rohan, uruk-hai. I stopped at the Two Towers because not only did the game blow, Games Workshop had got to the point that their over inflated prices had finally taken there toll and I gave up to go onto pastures Historical, where you could buy three whole armies in 15mm for one GW army.

And last but no means least, the surplus Battlemechs, yes there is such a thing, Mechs which I have at least one of (If not more than one) of already and will never use in a battle because one or two is more than enough.

But there is a side to them, 9 Rogue Trader Space Marines, two of which were in the first release of Marines, all more for collecters rather than the current crop of players, considering one, as you could in Rogue trader, is armed with a freaking shuriken catapult, no doubt scavenged from the Eldar pointy eared ponce that he's just stomped to death.

So the list is drawn up and been passed onto Gateshead games to see if they'll take the whole lot off me before I need to think about ebay and other avenues. If the price is right they can have it at Claymore but if  the price isn't anywhere near my minimum I will be considering other avenues.

Of course as the money comes in it will probably be feeding that insatiable Dystopian Wars addiction I have developed, the new Battlegroups for both my main fleets land and air will do nicely and by the looks of it my ally fleets are going to be getting some goodies to. Of course some of the money will be liberally spent on libations in my favourite pub, just as soon as the dry month comes to an end.

An excerpt and some thoughts.

  Little bit of Running out of Space, one of my works in progress, it comes in after the main character Caleb O'Hearn has been talking about the history of Psionics and language in the Magiverse to demonstrate his genetic memory from his Magi heritage, that bit is about six hundred words itself and it's a little bit lecturing but part of the rolling history into the story without it being just flung at you so I'm not going to post that. After the excerpt there are a few thoughts of mine on shared universes and collaboration between writers and shared timelines.

****************

'But it's funny to watch you drone on and not even realise it though, but also educational. Learned a little piece about my own heritage while bored shitless about yours.' Kerry-Anne told him and he flipped his middle finger at her. 'That wasn't Magi ancestor knowledge, all of your Magi ancestors were Hunters, Guardians and Soldiers. Where did that come from?'

'Sarah of Trenton, her sire's sire was a Professor of Germanic Languages at the University of New Amsterdam.' He replied with a grimace. 'When the hippie pothead wasn't on a commune.'

'Your warrior attitude would be an embarrassment to him as much as he's an embarrassment to you.' Kerry-Anne chuckled at him. 'Hell his granddaughter was an embarrassment for joining the FIB. He considered the whole notion of war and Big Government pointless.'

'War is fuckin pointless.' O'Hearn sighed and Kerry-Anne gave him a look of surprise. 'Show me a true warrior that wouldn't rather he never had to fight again, and I'll show you a damned liar or a homicidal maniac that should never be in uniform, like dear old dad. It is true, I am never more alive when I am chasing down prey or fighting hand-to-hand in a struggle to the death, but I've been stabbed, shot, sliced open, gouged, blown up, and had to heal from those wounds too many times in what has not been the longest life. I would really rather that I could spend the rest of my considerable life time with my feet up until I'm old enough that it's the end for me and one last battle for me to shuffle off the mortalish coil and sit in Bilskirnir until I am needed  once more.'

************************************

 This plus everything else I'm working on, is running through my mind constantly, interlinking all the Magiverse stories can be a bit of work, especially when you are jumping two thousand years from the time of Gabriel to the time of Caleb,  and even when I jump just under a hundred years to my cyberpunk work, totally inspired by Continuum and Shadowrun, Corporate governments and Megacorporations.

Haven't seen series two of Continuum beyond the third episode been too busy with writing and painting soldiers. I can have TV shows in the background if I've seen them before but if it's new I have to actually sit and concentrate on it. But I'm getting off topic.

When I'm doing the Cyberpunk I have to remember what the map of Gabriel's Terra looks like even though it's all in my head (not the best idea, right now it's a bit fluid), trying to fit the Corporate Nations later in the timeline to nations from earlier in the timeline and then having to remember to use the right names in Caleb's time can hurt your head sometimes but I love reading shared universe fiction, and seeing how they evolve and how the stories evolved from where, granted you don't normally see three different periods on a timeline at the same time but that's me, glutton for the punishment I put upon myself.

I always wanted to be one of those authors that inspires collaboration with his fellow writers, I think that's what makes the Roleplaying, Comic book and TV & Movie shared universes so fun to immerse yourself in is the vibrant and many voiced reality, that no-one person is telling the story. Don't get me wrong they always need a strong hand to guide the ship and some of my favourite books series are written by one hand but I still believe it doesn't happen nearly enough in Sci-fi and Fantasy fiction that many hands help to form a better universe unless they tie in with a TV series or Movies or RPG's. 

Often enough authors will have others write for short story anthologies from their Universe which they edit,  but I think personally that D&D settings especially the Forgotten Realms Novels and even the Games Workshop forever dubbed the Evil Empire, fictional universes are made so much better, deeper and more real by the dozens of authors that write in the universe, though I'm sure most authors wouldn't like giving up money they would make writing their own work. 

People I'm sure will quote the expansions of the Cthulhu Mythos, the Man-Kzin Wars that added to Larry Niven's Known space, the expansion of Asimov's Foundation series and the adding to Lyman Frank Baum's (A prophet was he) Oz, the additions to Robert Howard's (Himself a Cthulhu Mythos expander) Conan, to me but I will also point out none of these except the Man-Kzin wars were ever done in the original author's lifetime.

But I won't deny that's always something nice to see, people trying to anticipate what would this author have written about next if he hadn't passed onto the halls of Valhalla, and I do applaud that, I would however like to see more authors collaborating to expand their own universes.

That's my end for today, off to the Falkirk District Wargames Club tonight, so dinner and work out an army, which I should have done last week when I was sitting on my arse at the club.

Healer's Touch

As part of the bloggers tour that brought you Seasons of the Dead, it now brings you Healers Touch, unfortunately this is a couple of days late, because I finally replaced my PC (yay) and spent the first twelve hours after replacing it minus time for food consumption and other things that we won't name I played Star Trek Online (withdrawal from Gaming much?) also apart from that I've been busy writing my own stuff, and I'm going to stop myself from ranting and droning so without  further ado.

HEALER’S TOUCH

by

Deb E Howell

For Llew to heal, something must die.

Llew, a young pickpocket who lives as a boy on the streets of a wild-west mining town, finds her real problems begin when she survives the gallows. Forced to run, she persuades a group of fighters escorting a young girl to her wedding to let her travel with them across the badlands. On the journey Llew faces hostile tribesmen, desperate bandits and, the enmity of her own companions should they find out who and what she is: a girl, a fugitive, and a feared Healer. One of the fighters, Jonas, possesses superhuman prowess as a warrior, and carries the knife able to ‘kill the unkillable’; the knife that can kill Llew. Despite being of races at war for centuries, they are drawn to one another.

During the journey, they encounter Braph the magician, Jonas’ half-brother and potential nemesis. He pursues them as they journey across the sea to the continent of Phyos and at the moment Llew finally feels safe, he abducts her. He begins to take what is most precious to him: her blood.

Healer’s Touch is a mesmerising mix of fantasy, steampunk and Wild West adventure – and even a dash of romance!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Bio:

Deb E was born in New Zealand’s North Island, but her parents corrected that within months, moving south to Dunedin and staying there. Childhood nights were spent falling asleep to cover versions of Cliff Richard and the Shadows and other Rock ’n Roll classics played by her father’s band, and days were spent dancing to 45 LPs. Many of her first writing experiences were copying down song lyrics. She graduated to scientific reports when she studied a fungus in the Zoology department of the University of Otago, trading all traces of popularity for usefulness... then traded both for fiction.

Deb lives in Dunedin, New Zealand with her family and a menagerie of pets.

Links:

Website/Blog: http://deberelene.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deberelene

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/deberelene

and many more...

REVIEWS

REVIEW BY JO TOON,

SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY ASSOCIATION OF NEW ZEALAND

Healer's Touch is set in a fantasy world where magic and the Wild West era have combined. Llew is a street girl with the ability to heal herself, whose life is changed beyond recognition when she tries to steal a knife from a stranger. Disguised as a boy, she is forced to leave her home, the gold-town of Cheer where she has lived all her life, and accompany the stranger, Jonas, and his companions on their mission, crossing country and continents. Along the way she learns more about Jonas, and the ancient emnity between the two races, the Aenuks and the Kara. She also discovers where she fits in in this battle and that her ability to heal herself and others is more dangerous than she could ever have imagined.

Healer's Touch is Deb E. Howell's debut novel, and is an absolute page turner of a read. The setting of a Fantasy book against a Wild West era background provides a novel viewpoint to the quest story. The world which has been built is intriguing, and the history of both the races and the main characters is very well written.

There isn't a dull moment in the story, with the action starting from the first page. Deb E. Howell has a great knack of building the tension up subtly without ever making it seem forced, and mixing it with moments of calm and sudden bursts of energy. She draws the reader in to the world and brings it to life, allowing us to discover the landscape, people and history along with Llew as she starts her journey from the small frontier town of Cheer, Aghacia, to Rakun in Brurun and beyond.

The principal characters are very much frontier town folk and are very well rounded and realised. The secondary ones could have possibly done with a little more fleshing out, to give us a bit more of an insight into their history and motivations, and I am hoping that this will come in the second volume of the series.

Overall, this is an excellent read, and a very promising start to a series; I am now eagerly awaiting the next book!

REVIEW BY ELISA NEVILLE (blogger/reader)

lostinsidethecovers.wordpress.com/

This is an epic fantasy adventure and is a tiny bit reminiscent of an Eddings book or something similar. Llew is a healer, but knows nothing of her people, history or abilities.  She has to get out of town fast when she heals herself in public and the townsfolk come after the “witch”.  She hooks up with a girl and her guards who are going across the countryside to meet her new arranged husband.

Llew has been hiding in plain sight as a boy since her father disappeared when she was 11.  She hasn’t had an easy time of things, and even though she makes friends in her new travel companions, things aren’t that easy.  Her abilities are a double-edged sword, sure she can heal, but she pulls the life force from living things and can kill people, animals and plants using her healing powers.  Because she is so dangerous to living things, her kind is not popular in many countries and she will either be killed, studied or sent to a breeding program to make more like her.  Not good options.  Llew starts to find out who and what she is, a bit of a coming of age and taking responsibility for ones actions - I always love stories like that!

Jonas is also gifted, but with strength and speed and is the mortal enemy of the healers.  So guess what happens…

Llew is a strong heroine I loved reading about.  She is pragmatic, women aren’t treated very well but she has learned some tricks and stands up for herself physically and verbally.  I wanted to cheer her on a few times when she stood up for herself.  I was also embarrassed for her a time or two when she couldn’t control her mouth.  Double edged sword.  It is funny, I was reminded of the fairy tale Ring of Consequences while reading this story, because the ring grants wishes, but you never knew what the result of the wish would be: something good and something bad, that dang double edged sword again!

This story does have a little romance in it, but it is pretty PG13 and stays fairly clean even though there are definitely adult “situations”.  There is a lot of death, some curse words and they have to deal with rape.  Nothing violently written, and it was “well done” but it was still a bummer and the characters struggle with it – as they should.

Ok, so this is an epic fantasy, and there are three books planned for the series and I was super worried it would end with them in the exact middle of a quest on the trail or something, and while there is more story to tell, it was ok.  Shew!  It wasn’t one big book cut into three parts (cough, LOTR cough).  But I want the next book NOW!  There are some things, and some decisions, and what will happen and somewhat about that guy questions I would really like to get some answers to.  So this is a rainbow day (happy yet sad) I am happy to have read this early, but I read it early and now have longer to wait!  My life is so tough. I give this book 4.5 glowing stars (out of 5).

SHORTER REVIEWS/SNIPPETS

“There isn’t a dull moment in the story, with the action starting from the first page.” — Jo Toon, Science Fiction & Fantasy Association of New Zealand (SFFANZ)

“It has been a while since I rated a book 5 stars for more than the fact that I liked the story… but I have to say Healer’s Touch was definitely a truly well earned 5.” — Miz Reader (Book Blogger).

“Deb E. Howell comes out swinging!” — Craves the Angst Book Blog

“Howell is only scratching the surface of her writing talents and worth watching as the series develops.” — Noor A. Jahangir

“Healer’s Touch brought very real, very wet tears to my eyes on several occasions, and this is one of the signs that let me distinguish between good authors and great authors. …I really felt this book.” — Hypervorean Book Blogger

“From the first chapter Llew grabs hold of your heart and you are there fighting with her.” — Eclipse Reviews

“…an epic fantasy adventure and is a tiny bit reminiscent of an Eddings book…” — Lost Inside The Covers Review Blog

“Healer’s Touch Delivers Transfusion of Originality to Fomulaic Fantasy Genre” — Author Dean Lombardo

“…a must read for all fantasy lovers especially those looking for a new slant on the genre.” — Amazon Review

An Excerpt from Healer’s Touch—

“Llew!”

He gathered her to him. So alive moments earlier, now limp. All he could see was blood. It covered her hands, soaked her shirt and pooled on the ground. He clasped her chin, turning her to him. The touch sent a tingle through his fingers even as more blood gushed from her open throat and he jerked his hand away, letting her head fall back. His eye was drawn by movement in the grass. One of Llew’s hands had fallen to the ground and the grass around it was dying in an ever increasing circle.

Jonas swallowed down his revulsion and dumped her unceremoniously on the ground, jumping to his feet. In a daze, he reclaimed his knives from the corpses, taking them to the water’s edge to clean with vigorous sweeps of his fingers down the blades. He berated himself for even toying with the idea of getting involved with her. What did he really know about her? He knew her name. And now he knew all he needed to know.

He wiped the half-clean blades on his thigh, sheathed them in his vest and drew the big knife at his hip. He cradled it in his hands, watching the moonlight fly off as he tilted it back and forth. There was one purpose to this knife’s existence: to kill the unkillable. And there was no safer time to make an attempt on the life of an Aenuk than when they were already half dead.

Jonas turned from the water. The meadow was now like a hayfield. Each blade of grass, each leaf of clover, each dandelion had given its all to provide but a tiny fraction of the energy – jin, as it was known in Turhmos – needed to bring a person back from near-death.

She lay unconscious, but her breathing was steady now. He had limited time to act. He crouched beside her, knife hovering over her back right where her heart should be, assuming Aenuks had a heart. But this was Llewella. She wasn’t like the Aenuks he had faced on the Turhmos killing fields. She wasn’t trained to fight, to continue to fight, and to take the enemy with her when she faced final death. She was merely a girl doing what she had to do to survive.

PURCHASE LINKS

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/323265

Amazon US (Kindle): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00DJE8NSK/

Amazon UK (Kindle): http://www.amazon.co.uk/Healers-Touch-ebook/dp/B00DJE8NSK/

Progress report #1

So, after yesterday's vehement rant I thought I would return to sanity for a little bit and give you all a low down on what's been happening as it comes to my writing.

You may have read a couple of the posts with short stories, and seen a couple of new ideas for characters, but a couple of the characters I've been working on I haven't written short stories for.

I'm of course working on the newest draft of Burn, Forest City, Burn, adding new bits and losing crap bits, once I'm done what I've got down on paper into the computer, I'll have probably added just under ten thousand words and only taken away three or four, leaving it in the 70k range. The original story I felt concentrated too heavily on the good guys without really fleshing out the dark side of magic in the Magi universe.

When I need time away from Gabriel and co but on the same block as them, I've been working on a series called Daemonhunters surrounding the escapades of Maximus Kane, a Daemonhunter, specialist wizard and his sidekick Sarah Bardot, human Cop in the city of Omaha. They're fun characters to write, because they are easy to write, in my mainstay sub-genre of Urban fantasy, so different from Gabriel and co.

Also been working on some Military Sci-fi when I need a break from the fantasy genre, it's still in the same universe as Burn, but ten thousand years later when the human race has reached for the stars and expanded across the Milky way galaxy, befriending, enslaving and decimating alien worlds as we have gone along, and what was once a United Earth has been split asunder by warlords and politicians. Main character is a Naval officer who has many adventures. I'll get around to a short story for it eventually but now it's just something to jump to when not working on other things.

  Lastly when I want to get a little bit more realistic (though it's me, if I tried to do something without a little fantastical fun it would be weird) I've been working on a comic book hero, who I eventually want to write the script for comics but right now I'm doing an origin story novella, and a series of short stories, when I'm done with the first short story I'll be posting it up here. As a huge fan of the comic book medium, but with absolutely fuck all ability to draw, paint or sketch, I'm pretty much screwed when it comes to comic books, so I'm writing what I am. It is really good fun, the character is kind of a cross between Cyborg and Batman, with a little Slade Wilson thrown in for good measure (Yes, DC characters, I know so unlike me to be dropping the DC).

So, hopefully I can finish this draft of Burn by the time my 30th comes along, that's twenty-six days away, if I don't quiet make it I'm sure I'll hit it there abouts, once that's done I can concentrate on something else while it's away, waiting with anticipation for the return.

Saturday Night Blogging (part 2)

Part 1 closely followed by part 2. This is a story that has been edited a couple of times, various bits added and subtracted until I was happy with the end product because when I looked at it until that last time it just felt it wasn't right.

I felt after what I've been doing and talking about today that two examples of different ways I write, the first totally unplanned, unedited, uncut, this was submitted to a short story thread on a writing website after it had been edited a couple of times were appropriate for me to share.

Now a little of the back story of Gabriel and Susie's reality has changed since I finished this story, but I haven't edited that because it's fiction and fiction is fluid, when it get's published in a book then it'll get fixed, but now it's just this a case of this is something I've written, enjoy it and let me know what you think, this story is only about a thousand words.

Fury of the Ages

 

 

Gabriel of Alba’s fist met flesh and the Sorceror rocked back. The Gabriel grabbed his opponent by his collar and landed a headbutt upon the foul dark magic user’s nose. Blood and cartiledge exploded from and he ducked down. The War Master of the Magi’s free fist met the recidivist’s neck and smashed his spine.

His partner Susie Owens, Wizard of the Sydrian School, fought her opponenets Magic for Magic, shields being pummled with spell after spell. She faced three Priory members at once and was just about holding her own, when a lightning bolt shot from Gabriel’s hand and exploded two of the dark magic shields.

His own shield was being peppered with spells as he stalked towards the Mistress of the Priory, her people and the Daemon’s that they had conjured using the life force of a Magi child protecting her like a living shield.

He caught two of the Priory by their coat tails as they tried to flee from him, his own hand wreathed in flames and sparks igniting the cotton of the men’s coats. He knocked the men clean out so they were incinerated by the flames enveloping them.

Gabriel refused to allow the remaining children of his people to die at the hands of these soulless wretches share that first boy’s fate. Lightning bolts and fireballs flew from his hand as Priory member after Priory member fell to his fury.

The Mistress saw the fire in his eyes, white hot and filled with the fury of the light. She directed the half-ton eight foot, almost reptilian, Cordisangui daemons to either kill him or at least weaken the furious War Master.

A feral roar issued from his mouth, almost like the roar of a lion, as a double headed axe, wreathed in white flame appeared in his hand, for him to swing at the first Daemon that came into reach.

He bisected the daemon, groin to head, and then sliced the next in two, he beheaded a third and transected a fourth, each with a single stroke of the weapon.

“I am Gabriel, Son of Galdanis and Shiona, War Master and Warrior of the People. I am Death Incarnate.” He bellowed at the top of his lungs in the Warrior tongue of the Magi

His axe clove left and right, taking arms, legs and heads from human and Daemon alike. Susie had dispatched the last of the three Priory members in her path to the children, slamming him into a wall with a sickening thump. She unshackled them, but they all stared in awe of the de facto leader of their people.

The Magi War Master was like an engine who wouldn’t stop. Lightening bolts, fireballs and shards of ice flew from his free hand as the axe took apart yet more of the Priory.

He reached the Priory mistress and grabbed her by the throat, his eyes had changed into those of pure white light, and his accent was no longer that of a man born and bred in Glasgow, she had never heard the accent before.

“I am here to serve justice for the life you have taken and those that you would end.” He told the Priory Mistress who’s eyes were full of fear. “I name thee Omnino diabolus incarnatus inredux by the ancient laws of the Magical world, I cast your rotten soul back to your Dark Masters in hell.”

With a single twinge of his wrist he snapped her neck and threw her lifeless corpse to the ground, then launched the axe with eery accuracy so it decapitated the last of the remaining Cordisangui daemons.

His hands dropped, along with his head, then were lifted up to the sky and a bolt of lightning struck him. Using his body as a conduit it began forking into every living member of the Priory, electrocuting them on the spot.

Another roar issued from his open maw, the power surged through the body of the War Master and it would be awe inspiring if Susie wasn’t sure that he was no longer in control of it. She ducked and dived in order to avoid the forks as they continued to keep aloft the desiccated and charred remains of the Priory.

She reached him and tried to shake him to awareness.

“Gabriel, stop it you are going to die if you don’t stop it.” She said, almost crying at him, she realised she wasn’t getting through with his own name. “Michael, Stephen, Liam, Angus, Shaemus…”

She continued on using the names of his ancestors until she reached back almost a million years. His eyes returned to their normal colour.

“How long?” Gabriel asked her, sagging and almost falling to his knees, his voice back to normal. “How long Susie?”

“Almost before Pythia.” She replied with a concerned look on her face. “It’s getting worse Gabriel, I don’t know if I can pull you back if you push before Pythia.”

“Don’t worry,” he said with a tight smile. “You will, at least the children are safe.”

“You are far too important to let yourself lose control like that. You must not let it happen again, you are magic’s future.” She said with a wet growl, she was almost sobbing.

“No, my dearest friend Susie,” he replied with a smile, holding her tightly, and pointing to the children. “They are the future of magic, I am but a conduit for that future to spring forth and I always was.”

“They Prophecies…” He interupted her with a hand.

“The Prophecies are vague and inexact, in due time I will fulfil them and you will see just how vague.” He let her go and walked towards the children. “Come let’s return these lucky ones to their parents and break the news to the ones who are lost, may they rest in the embrace of the Great Father and Mother until it is their time to walk the world again.”

Saturday Night blogging (part 1)

 Okay dokey folks, bit of a double header tonight. First up a brand spanking new adventure of Gabriel of Alba and Susie Owens, written in around 60 minutes, it's around 1100 words, I had no plan for what I was writing I just wrote, if you think it's any good let me know, let me know if you don't. I've not read it back, I haven't edited it, it's just going up. This is one of the ways I keep my mind on what I'm writing in the novel without writing the novel and getting writers block, which I hate and try and avoid at all costs.

You can't ever win.

"What?" Gabriel of Alba asked Susie Owens as she growled at him.

"You know fine well what." She replied, covered in the goop from a Layoch daemon, her brown hair caked in it. "You slice it's stomach open, it's insides burst out and I got covered in it."

"So what?" He was confused by the look on her face.

"Gabriel, I'm wearing a nice outfit, that cost quite a bit of money, because I was meant to be going on a date." She shouted at him, pointing to her short and muscled body and the mess that the dress and the shoes were in. "Now the outfit is ruined, and I'll have to phone my date and tell him that I won't be able to make it because my idiot of a boss dragged me into something he could have dealt with himself."

"He's a mage, he knows me, he'll get it." Gabriel said with a shrug.

"THAT'S NOT THE POINT." She roared, slapping him on the back of the head. "I don't want him to have to understand that because my boss and partner is an insensitive, pig-headed, pain in the arse, I have to cancel my date. Gabriel, you could have come and did this yourself, it was a nest of Layoch Daemon's a Greenback on their first day could have handled this on their own."

"You are the one constantly quoting regulation 12.b to me, never take on any potential danger without your partner or some other form of back-up." Gabriel shot back with a smug grin.

"Your an ass." She growled at him. "More to the point, 12.b doesn't apply in this case, 12.b is for category five hazardous situations and above, 12.a applies, inform your partner of any potential hazardous situations category one to four. A nest of Layoch's is considered to be a Category three hazard."

"No, a single Layoch daemon is a Category three, a nest of Layoch's is a Category Five." Gabriel corrected her.

"There is also always regulation 12.c, Gabriel of Alba is exempt from the previous two sub-sections unless the Hazard is of Category 13 and higher as he is entirely capable of taking care of them on his own." Susie quoted and he couldn't think of a retort. "Ha, speared by the regulation sub-section you yourself had them add, bet you wish you hadn't now, you jackass."

In all the arguing the pair didn't notice the danger that was beginning to surround them. A pack of Werekin, evil and malevolent lycanthropes turned from human beings into what they were by Truewere's, the blood enemies of the Magi, Gabriel's magical race, and Hell's mortal soldiers, immune to most magic.Werekin despised the monsters they were turned by and in turn all magic users and tried to kill them when they came across them.

"It's not my fault you didn't change when I called you. I would have." Gabriel said to her.

"Gabriel you don't dress any differently whether you're on a date or not." Susie scoffed, waving her hand up and down at the Magi Warmaster who was dressed head-to-toe in black clothes, a hoodie, a greatcoat, a pair of combat trousers and boots which were not all black but mainly black. "I've seen you in something other than this all of once in the eight months I've known you. All you did was instead of a t-shirt, you wore a shirt, and you never wore the New Rocks, you wore plain black boots."

"I'm sure that's not right."

"Oh, no, it's right, believe me." She replied as a clawed hand reached out to grab her. Gabriel's reactions were however measured in nanoseconds as a ball of white flame slammed into the Werekin and threw it into three of it's fellows. "Behind you."

Gabriel turned and lashed out with a double-headed battleaxe of white light that appeared in his hand, taking the clawed hands off of two Werekin assailants.and ducked the sword of one of the few with human-like hands in it's turned form. Lashing out with his free hand he took it in the side, and his superhuman strength sent the beast flying.

 Susie was enveloped in a spherical force shield so none of the beast could touch her. Her chin sat on her chest as her lips moved, quietly mouthing incantations as her hands lashed out, sending bolts of lightening into Werekin, holding them on the spot and electrocuting them. A number of the beasts were hammering on her shield with claws and weapons but none were getting through. 

Gabriel was in about the monsters, laying about with his axe and flicking his wrists to send shock waves into unengaged beasts, snapping bones and holding them off of him. The largest of the beasts, almost as big as a True Werewolf, and most likely turned by one, broke through his defense and scratched it's claws down his chest, tearing fabric and flesh alike. The big warrior let out a feral roar of pain and anger. Letting the axe go, he grabbed the beast by it's hind legs and tipped it over onto it's front, when he had it in the position he wanted he roared, tipped himself back and snapped it's spine with such force the break could be heard a mile away.

With their leader dead, the remaining Werekin ran for the hills, but Gabriel would not let them go, he dropped his hands to his sides and began to shake vigorously, then when the energy he needed was gathered shot his hands out with a piecing howl, everyone of the Werekin exploded in a conflagration.

Gabriel dropped to one knee from the exertion the spell had wrote on him, and Susie helped him to stand, he shook his head to try and get rid of the dizzy feeling.

"You alright?" Susie asked him.

"I'll be fine." He replied with a sigh. "Just haven't used that spell in a long while."

"Yeah, well as long as you'll be alright." She sighed and slapped him behind the head again.

"What the hell was that for?" He asked incredulously.

"That's for almost getting me killed you moron." She replied as if it was obvious. "You bring me along for what you think is a Category five hazard for what was clearly a Category five hazard with the side hazard which was category nine, and I'm still covered in Layoch leftovers, but now it's covered in Werekin entrails and blood. This is never going to wash off."

"Alright, already, I'll buy replacements." Gabriel told her holding his head in his hands. "I can never win, why do I even try."

Anthology in Paperback

Howdy all,

Now as promised when I found out I would send this out, Strange Tales of the Scriptorian Vaults has gone live to buy in paperback so if you want to buy it from amazon the US Canadian and UK links are below and the ISBN below that. Mine is on it's way.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Strange-Tales-Scriptorian-Vaults-Robert/dp/1909374016/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1359472356&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.ca/Strange-Tales-Scriptorian-Vaults-Robert/dp/1909374016/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1359472660&sr=8-2

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Strange+Tales+from+the+Scriptorian+Vaults



ISBN: 1909374016    ISBN-13: 9781909374010

New stuff

 Little bit of new fiction for you all, short, sweet and new characters for my readers to enjoy. Don't have a title because I suck at titles, suggestions welcome.



Two warriors stood back-to-back surrounded by the foul minions of hell.

Dog faced, goat horned, red skinned, cloven hoofed beasts standing like men, with flaming, acid dripping blades in their hands.

Sarah Bardot creaked her neck and unsheathed her heirloom Guntō in her right hand, having transferred her sidearm into her left. Her riding jacket zipped covered her heavily tattooed torso and arms with it's Kevlar armour plates, her long silky hair held back by her Omaha Storm Chasers baseball cap.

Behind her stood Maximus Kane, tall, Scandinavian and scary as hell, a Viking sword in his right hand and a flintlock pistol in his left, his long leather duster covering the belt that held their sheaths, his homburg covering his hair.

"For the Brotherhood." He bellowed at the top of his voice and threw himself into battle, blasting a hole in one of the daemons, then whipping his sword through the neck of another, as Sarah pirouetted, bellying her ballet training during her childhood in Jerusalem, dodging the abyssal blades of two daemons, slicing the hand off of one and smashing her pistol into the maw of the second and fired blowing it's brains out.

"Well, I must say, life working with you is never dull." She said with a grin as he elbow struck another daemon, he slipped his pistol in it's holster, flipped his hand open and blew the mana dust that had come off his pistol, turning a breath into a conflagration of fire which incinerated the bodies of a dozen of the daemons. "As I said, never dull."

Kane grabbed one of the daemons and snapped it's neck before grabbing a second and running his blade across it's throat. Sarah blasted away with her pistol as she held of daemons at bay with her sword. While his blade had been in his family for twenty-five generations, she had inherited hers from her grandfather, fine for dealing with minor daemons like those they were fighting but not so good for fighting higher daemons, which was the point of the pistol loads.

"I think it's about time we made our way to the boss." Sarah said to him and he nodded, pulling his hands back behind his back, he threw them forward and the force bowled over the remaining Dog daemons in front of him, shattering all the bones in their bodies. "Well done." 

He looked at her and raised an eyebrow.

"Your the wizard, I'm the muscle." She shrugged and followed him past the ruined forms of the dog daemons. "I'm sure as a daemon hunter you know what they are called."

"Hundurhelvíti." He replied, wiping his blade clean of the blood with a cloth, checking it for pitting from the daemon blood. "Islandsk for Dog of hell, pretty much literally."

"First engaged in your neck of the woods then." She said and he looked at her with a scornful look. 

"I'm from Norge, which is part of the mainland, Island, is an island." He replied, using his native language names rather than the English ones, as they moved on up the stairs, further into the dwelling of the daemon lord. Further up the stairs a bat winged daemon launched itself and dropped to land on top of him, but he launched a fist sized ball of ice which exploded like a grenade the shards fragmenting and piercing the daemon's body, slicing it apart. 

Sarah blasted away at the other daemons of it's genus dropped from the lintels they had been perched upon, Kane pulled a six-shooter from another holster and he blew holes in the backs of the daemons heads.

"Gods damned Altimors, I hate winged daemons." Sarah swore, slicing an arm off of one of the daemons that had survived the onslaught from her pistol. 

"At least these are little ones." Kane said headbutting a daemon unconscious, and replacing his hat on his head before killing the prone daemon, as a roar came from above them, both of them looked up and he swore.

"Yeah, you spoke too soon." She shook her head, two feet with huge talons slammed into the floor, the beast had a tail longer than it's legs. It's wing span was twice the size of it's little cousins. The tail smacked Sarah and sent her flying slamming her into a wall and stunning her.

"Hey, óhroða sogskál, I'm going to tear you a new arsehole." Kane growled at the daemon lord.

"Puny little mortal man, I will rip your limbs from your torso, and make you watch as I take the woman so she will bear my mortal spawn." It returned, flapping it's wings to batter him with wind.

"Bitch please, I am no mortal and I am sure as shit not puny." Kane retorted, throwing a force ball at the daemon lord, rocking it backards.

"DAEMON HUNTER." It squealed, attacking him simultaneously with it's sword and it's tail, Kane dodged both and slammed his seax into it's tail, pinning it to the floor. Kane slammed a fireball into it's jaw rocking it backwards and tearing off a length of it's tail.

"You going to give up or are you going to make me kill your ass?" Kane asked it, it swung it's sword in reply. "Fair enough."

Kane's own sword stopped the Daemon lords and he pushed it up, he followed on, picking up the seax, using it and his sword to hamstring the beast, after ducking under the monster, it dropped to it's knees and he backhanded the wings off, before launching himself onto it's shoulders. He dropped his blades to the bottom of it's neck and dug his blades into it's flesh, tearing and shearing until it's head came off, the whole time the paralyzed daemon was screaming at the top of it's lungs. 
  
When he was finished, Kane flicked the blood from his blades and cleaned them off, not bothering with the blood and gore on his clothing. Sarah pushed herself from the floor feeling her head for splits, then walked over to him.

"Who was it?" She said looking down at the daemon lord.

"Azazel." He replied, spitting on the remains. "Fallen Angel, daemon lord."

"You might not want to look behind you." Sarah said to him and he looked to where she was looking. His hat was destroyed and he just dropped his head and shook it. "Told you life was never dull around you." 

Looking for readers

Right, ladies and Gents, I'm in the process of editing Burn, Forest City, Burn and I'm looking for people to read it for me and let me know what they think, this is the second draft and I'm hoping to get maybe another draft or two in before I submit it on the 31st of December for Fox Spirit books, and once I'm done also farm it out looking for publishers other than Fox Spirit..

I know not a lot of people have time to read and edit a book, trust me, I've been the process myself for this book, so I'm not expecting you to if you want to read the book, if you are willing to edit a couple of chapters that would be helpful, but I'll find someone to do a full edit before it's submitted.

Just email me, at davidjmmuir@yahoo.co.uk, leave a comment for me to get back to you here or message me on facebook : http://www.facebook.com/davidjmmuir.

Cheers guys.

Hazards of the Job (Fiction)

This is a little piece that I thre together to try and get rid of the writers block, so incoherent and messy it may be, but it's hard to do this when your brain doesn't want to play.

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Hazards of the Job

Damien Ambrosius Caledonensis McCain, High Marshall of the Grey Council, grappled with the Majiesa daemon, both using thier supernatural abilities to keep the other off balance. The High Marshall tore free his huge right hand and formed a ball of ice smashing it against the face of the daemon, who let him go squealing in agony.

"That's what you get when you mess with me." He said, in his thick Scottish brogue, with a grin, throwing the pair of ice shards in his hands, piercing the heart and the head of the daemon, killing the demagogue human that it had inhabited, sending it back to the daemon realms. "Well, that was fun."

"Ah, the work of a Sheriff is never done is it." A figure said from the shadows of the alleyway. "That was but one of my many minions and eventually I will destroy you."

"Oh, really, let me see how much I'm shaking in my boots." He chuckled looking down and his size sixteen boots from the top of his six foot six frame. "Nope, nothin whatsoever."

"You dare insult Temorican the Terror?" The figure's voice began to tremble.

"Really kid, you need to get a better name." Damien said with a snicker. "My new born son could come up with a better one than that."

"I am the greatest terror of the nine pits of hell...." 

"Yeah, there are fifteen pits of hell, not nine, you've been reading too many fantasy and horror books kid, if you were a real power you would know that." Damien snorted and walked towards the alley exit. The figure jumped from the shadows in front of him, he was a foot shorter than Damien, and half his age and weight, in a purely physical confrontation the boy would get beaten to a pulp if he didn't get killed. "Seriously, come on I don't want to hurt you."

"I am the one going to be doing the hurting." The boy said, throwing a fireball at the Marshall, which bounced harmlessly off of his energy shield.

"Really, you really want to throw down?" Damien said with a shake of his head. "Fine, I'll throw down."

"Come meet your doom." The young man said with a snarl, as he moved and slipped on a banana peel as Damien unleashed a bolt of magical energy, exploding his shield and burning the boy's first layer of skin off. "Stop, stop, I yield."

"Boy, you just attacked the High Marshall of the Grey Council, a Wizard of the 1st order no less." Damien growled at him, as he grabbed the boy by the collar and slapped his cuffs on the skinny arms, pulling the teenager towards the alley mouth. "You are going to the cells at Caerleon and you will be found guilty."

"What are you talking about?" The boy said with a whimper.

"I am the leader of the Sheriff's kid, I'm the guy you don't want to be messing with." The Scotsman replied as they got to the mouth of the alley. "You mess with one of us and you best be willing to deal with the consequences Caerleon is the home of the Grey Council, where Merlin started it all, we hold prisoners there awaiting trial for acts that break the laws of magic, don't worry you didn't break any of the Primary Laws, so your ass isn't grass but you're not going to be seeing the light of day anytime soon."

"But, but..." The boy started to whine, but stopped with a whimper.

"So pitiful." Damien said as he dragged the boy towards the portal to Alfhiem, and the leylines which would take them quickly to Wales and the council gaol. The portal itself was covered by four figures and the Marshall sighed, taking his cuff key from his pocket. "Kid, it is your very lucky day, I'm going to let you off with a warning, I'm not going to be responsible for your life if I have to fight a quad of Thenrdak."

"I won't argue with that." The boy said with a nod, and hopped off to let the Damien deal with the underworld's assassin daemons. 

"So, what do you turds want?"

"By the order of the Black Hand, we have been charged with your end." The leader of the hulking, reptilian beings, their skin cracked and oozing lava, informed him. The Black Hand where the Dark ones analogue to the Neutral Grey Council.

"Oh, really, well you're welcome to try." He said with a snort, he formed a pair of iceballs in his hands and launched them at the nearest of his foes. The creature wailed with pain as the water melted on it's skin, many daemons anathema being water. The rest of the quad moved swiftly to surround the Wizard. "Just four of you, really, I thought I would merit more than a single quad."

"Our masters do not rate you, despite your position as a Wizard of the 1st order." The leader replied as he lunged at Damien, the Marshall redirected his shields energy to let the thing's rebound off of it and go flying into a car, crushing it. A second came at him from the opposite side and he blocked it with the bracer of Iron on his arm. He threw his power to the sewer and the filthy water from below exploded through the manhole the creature had stepped onto, engulfing it in the stink but killing it none the less. The two Thenrdak had distracted him enough that the remaining one managed to score it's blade across his right side, but it was just a glancing blow. The Wizard's staff of office appeared in his hand and from it shot a rush of water, engulfing the daemon that had caught him and the leader in a wave.

Damien breathed a sigh of relief as he headed towards the Alfhiem entrance when his mobile phone went off, he pulled it from his pocket and answered it without seeing who it was.

"Damien McCain." He answered chirpily, then realised it was his wife. "Oh, hello Fang, what's wrong.... no.... I'm working... well killing daemons and chasing down dastardly wrong doers.... No I did not forget the milk it's at the office, where I am headed right now... No, I promise... I promise, I'm right at the entrance to the Alfhiem right now, I'll be in Caerleon in half an hour and I'll be home in an hour and fourty-five. I promise, no more trouble tonight, straight to the office to pick up the milk then straight home.. yes, dear." He cut the call off and headed through the entrance to the lands of the Fae. As he stepped out he was confronted by a troop of Kilneir, spiderlegged humanoids with a nasty streak a mile wide, and even though he was an emissary of those of neutral allignment, the Kilneir followed the court of Winter and it's chaotic nature. "Here we go again."

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Hope you enjoyed that little read, took a bit of time but I've got the old creative juices flowing again, even missing the second half of the football because of it.

If you haven't already got a copy of it Strange Tales of the Scriptorian vault is available on Kindle right now, I think it should be up on Smashwords now or very soon and when the paper copy is on it's way, all the profits goes to charity so please buy it.