1 Week Until Launch – A Teaser
In the spirit of the launch – which is only one week away! – I thought I’d share some more of what you’ll see once the Dowager Shadow really takes off. This week, it comes in the form of a parable – not actually a portion of the book, but related directly to the prologue itself. Enjoy!
The Apostle of the Light
As Translated by Morvran Emar Garran, Summoner of Lorn
He had come in the night, wounded from some conflict in the north. His shining indigo breastplate had been battered, the long steel sword he carried chipped and dull with use. He told them he was an Apostle of the Light, that he would free them. No one believed him. In the morning, they had come from the south, black forms inching up the ravine leading to the escarpment the town sat upon. He stood before them, this brown-haired northerner, holding his sword high in one hand, a crystal knife in the other. ‘You will leave of your own accord,’ he told them. ‘Or I will dispatch you.’
The demons laughed and rushed the black-cloaked man. Who stood, defiant, before slitting open his wrist and spilling horror upon the invaders. Every drop that hit the ground became a hound of the Pit. Every hound that fell to the demons became two and rose. Soon, the demons had fallen, and the hundred hounds of the Apostle bayed at Jag Har’Oah. He told the villagers, ‘I will free you.’ This time, they believed him.
The armies gathered on the plain below the town three days later, line after line of black demon forms, standing before the Apostle and the three dozen of his followers who had arrived from the north shortly after his victory over the demons. The Apostle himself strode out over the intervening plain, a lone black figure starkly visible to the crowd assembled atop the escarpment. The general of the demons’ army rode out to meet the black-coaked Apostle. There was a pause as they met, before the warrior’s cloak flickered in the morning light and the ground erupted about the demon general.
Great fingers of bone rose from the ground like a cage and trapped the raging beast. Membranes grew between the sepulchral bars of the cage, enclosing the beast completely. The membrane pulsated, kicking up dust and sending horrid screams into the air from a multitude of fanged mouths, screams heard even in the crowd at the rop of the rise. Then it fell apart, the bones retreating, dessicated membrane cascading to the ground and loosing the shattered form of the demons’ leader, its body twisted and crushed. The black-cloaked figure of the Apostle retreated at a liesurely pace to his waiting disciples, who joined him in making their way up the ravine and back toward the village. Leaderless and shocked, the demon army struck west, rather than lighting up the ravine, choosing a path of lesser resistance to whatever goal they sought.
“I have freed you,” the Apostle announced to the elders of the town. He and his followers refused all gift and reward from the town’s council, electing rather to depart in the same evening, leaving only words in their wake.
“Trust that the Light is the Truth and the Way,” one of the discuples had said when asked why the group had come. “Do not allow yourselves to be decieved by those making bold claims of greatness.”