Swept Away_An Epic Fantasy

  Contents

  Dedication

  Copyright

  Title Page

  THE BLOODY SHOE

  BORN OF ICE AND FIRE

  WINDINX

  DANCE WHEN YOU’RE DEAD

  TAKEN

  THE ORANGE MOON

  CROSSING ENEMY LINES

  WHERE IT WAS FORGED

  THE GIRL WITH THE DOLLS EYES

  SCULPTURES OF WAR

  AND SO THE TIDE CHANGES

  JUST A TASTE

  CONFESSIONS

  HEED MY WORDS

  LET HIM BURN

  WHAT HAPPENED WHEN…

  HALL OF HOLOGRAMS

  VIOLET EYED

  THE PLAN

  BORN OF WATER

  CONFIDENCE IS KEY

  TELL OF ME

  THE REVEAL

  A CAGE OF BONE

  THE RECRUITS

  FORGOTTEN FAIRYTALES

  THE TRAP

  CARRY ME HOME

  TRAINING DAY

  NOT WITHOUT REASON

  AND SO IT GOES…

  IS THIS HOW IT ENDS?

  TO THE SKY

  A BALL FOR ALL

  BEYOND THE MOUNTAINS

  SACRIFICES

  SILENCE

  WHEN LINES BLUR

  MELAXOUS IS BURNING

  MAKING SENSE OF NONSENSE

  About the author

  This book is for the dreamers and the make-believers, the ones who still play pretend, lose themselves to possibility and dance amongst the clouds.

  Published by S. McPherson Books

  Copyright © 2017 S. McPherson

  All rights reserved.

  Second paperback edition printed 2018

  Second eBook edition published 2018

  Swept Away is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN 978-0-9933605-7-2

  No part of this book shall be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information retrieval system without written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  To learn more about the author visit:

  www.smcphersonbooks.com

  Twitter: www.twitter.com/smcphersonbooks

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

  Instagram: www.instagram.com/s_mcpherson_books/

  Cover design by: © Eight Little Pages

  Cover illustration: © Eight Little Pages

  Title-page art: © Ibrahim Al Saffar

  Logo design: © Charlene Devismes

  Formatted by Dragon Realm Press

  www.dragonrealmpress.com

  SWEPT AWAY

  by

  S. McPherson

  The Last Elentrice - Book 3

  THE BLOODY SHOE

  I roll the rock over in my hands, the petals of its flower still ever changing colour, from red to pink to gold, and the words—Milo’s words—stand out like an angry scar on pale flesh.

  ‘I did it,’ they say. ‘Maybe they’ll write songs about me.’

  I close my eyes and let my fingers trace the rough surface of the rock, following the letters engraved there. I know Milo is referring to the gethadrox. He’s done it. He’s made the device that will allow people to travel the Nynthst and enter the realms that only Tranzuta was ever mad enough to imagine. A way for anyone and anything to cross worlds. Cold trills up my spine and my stomach plummets, like a ships anchor. Milo is somewhere out there, in a universe too vast to truly understand with creatures I shrink from imagining.

  The vague message he carved into this stone may well be a gash cut across my heart. It tells me nothing of his plans. Nor how I can follow. My bottom lip curls between my teeth as I steady my breath and tame my thoughts.

  Milo? I mindle, though even before I think his name, I realise I don’t expect him to answer. He doesn’t mean for me to follow. He blames himself for the deaths of all those Coltis—the warriors that were killed saving me on the night he came to my rescue in the Exlathars lair—and he’s gone to make sure that those who died didn’t do so for nothing. But this time his life, and only his, stands to be lost. As if this will somehow crack the weight of guilt that crushes him. I know how he feels. I wear it like a crown of stone. But the Nynthst is no place to be a hero.

  My hand wraps tight around the gethamot as if I can will the portal to reopen. Pointlessly, I wait, mildly sated by the hiss of the brook as it flows past, by the distant chirrups of birds I hear above the cover of the trees and the sudden shudder of wind as it whistles through my hair.

  A crunch echoes, what sounds like a branch snapping, and I race behind a tree, crouching at its trunk. R.U.O.E. are still out there, watching me, my brother amongst them. I still can’t be sure why they haven’t killed me yet. The desire to do so was practically tattooed in Drake’s eyes and yet he fled with the others.

  ‘Stick to the plan!’ they’d said. Whatever plan that might be.

  I try to ignore the way my heart pounds like an animal caged, and the tremor of my hands as I scrounge through the earth for a weapon: a sharp stick or broken glass. But there’s nothing. I peer around the tree, the coarse bark flaking beneath my grip. I listen and hear nothing but the sound of my own breathing. Then there’s a scrape and the rustle of leaves, as if someone has slipped. And at last they come into view.

  A wave of relief washes over me: Nathaniel. I forgot he was waiting for me to leave the manor and meet him by the local pub. I should have been back ages ago. His eyes are wary and he holds a sodden piece of wood between his blooded hands. His breath comes thick and heavy, hair up at angles and his sweater torn. He’s been running.

  Carefully, I step from my hiding place. He swivels to face me, eyes wide and raging, a plank poised in his grip.

  ‘Dezaray!’ He drops the frail weapon to the ground and hurtles across the brook to meet me. Water sloshes, swirls and tugs at his feet but he barely seems to notice. At the sight of him, I unravel. The tightly wound chinks in my armour shatter and I let him pull me close. ‘We need to get out of here,’ he murmurs.

  ‘They were watching me.’ My words come muffled from under his arm and he pulls back, keeping hold of my shoulders. He studies the canopy overhead.

  ‘And now?’ he asks, his voice low, eyes searching, body tense.

  I shrug, ‘If they are they’re hiding. They’ve been told not to hurt me, not even on pain of death.’ My mind offers me memories of the man, the member of R.U.O.E., who chose to take his own life rather than risk being captured, questioned by me. Me! I’m barely past seventeen and yet he chose death over life. Though I doubt it was me he feared. R.U.O.E. are monsters; would they believe him if he said he’d told me nothing? Or would they devour him whole?

  The changing petals must have caught Nathaniel’s eye, for he frowns and thrusts his chin towards it. ‘What’s that?’

  I pinch the rock, as if checking it’s real. ‘Milo.’

  Nathaniel splutters. ‘You went into Storm manor to get some of your old things, and now it somehow involves R.U.O.E. and Milo?’

  I simper, ‘Put the kettle on, love. This could take a while.’

  As we slip out of the woods and make our way through the familiar deserted streets to Feranvil Farm, I tell Nathaniel everything. Of how members of the R.U.O.E organisation, Drake included, lurked in the shadows by the manor, surveillance equipment in hand…to survey me. I tell him how I stalked after them and he tells me he saw them the same time I did. Nathaniel had followed but
lost me in the woods.

  ‘I didn’t know which one to follow, and in the end I wound up following the wrong one,’ he tuts. ‘He ended up knocking me onto my arse and getting away.’

  I place a hand on his. ‘I almost got one. Had him on the ground and asked why they were following me. His ankle seemed twisted. He didn’t run. But he,’ I hesitate, ‘he chose to kill himself, instead.’

  Nathaniel stumbles over his feet. ‘What?’

  I squint and hold up my fingers, to indicate a size. ‘With a little blue pill.’

  Nathaniel frowns, drapes an arm around my shoulders and squeezes. The gesture is supposed to be one of comfort, to make me feel safe but instead it makes me feel trapped, more confined to this world and the whims of fate.

  ‘What now?’ he asks, lifting the boulder from the ground as we at last reach the entrance to Feranvil farm.

  ‘I don’t know. I need to get in touch with the Coltis. Tell them what Milo’s done.’ The earth trembles but Nathaniel and I stand firm, now used to the tremor as the ground parts. My legs barely notice the difference, quaking anyway from having raced through the woods.

  ‘Any idea how?’ Nathaniel asks. The mouth of the hole yawns at our feet and he gestures for me to go first.

  ‘That is the question,’ I note as I leap down into the abyss. Scrapes and shuffles and a sprinkle of soil let me know he’s close behind.

  I always like visiting Barnyard Bakery. It’s not much, a small café with tarnished furniture and peeling walls. It stands in an alley to the right of Feranvil town centre, surrounded by paving stones and concrete buildings. The grassy hills leading to Feranvil farm stretch across in the distance, bosoms on which the sky rests—but it’s close to home and private enough.

  The first time I came here was with Jude and Nathaniel a few months before, for my birthday and consequently, the day of the Elenfar. It feels like a lifetime ago now, but the floral tablecloths are the same, as are the olive-green chairs aged with rust, and from nearly every white painted beam still dangles a birdcage, held by some ornate chain or simply suspended by magic, gliding through the air. Not a bird in sight.

  Now I lean back, the ornate pattern of the chair pressing into my spine. Imogen raps her knuckles on the table, as if to smack me to pay attention. I turn my eyes to her.

  ‘This is odd,’ she seems to conclude, but then adds, ‘Why do you suppose they were watching you?’ She steeples her fingers. Her eyes crinkle with concern.

  I shake my head. ‘I couldn’t say,’ and I keep my voice low, my eyes trained on the table, tracing the flower petals printed on the cloth. ‘Drake says they know who I am.’ The ‘Last Elentrice’s counterpart’ goes unsaid. ‘Perhaps they’re afraid I’ll suddenly get glowing amber eyes and start flying,’ I grumble.

  Imogen chuckles without amusement. ‘If that were it, those cameras would have been guns.’

  I sigh and let my eyes sweep over the empty café. There are only two other people here: a couple canoodling by the display case. The man seems ordinary but the woman has a lock of gold winding through her hair; Premoniter. I watch them for a while; as they laugh, snuggle and play with each other’s fingertips…pick a cake already!

  ‘It’ll never last.’ Imogen harrumphs. I shouldn’t laugh but I do.

  ‘Imogen!’ I scold and twist my smile into a forced frown.

  ‘Look at them,’ she goes on to say, gesturing wildly. ‘It’s purely physical.’

  I make a grab for her wayward hands. ‘It might be love.’

  ‘Love for a bit of skirt.’ She hoists her thumb at the man—thankfully the couple haven’t noticed us. ‘Any day now, he’ll tire and make a run for the hills.’

  I shake my head and snort into my mug. I know she doesn’t mean a word of it, but she has successfully managed to cheer me up, which I feel was her intention.

  Bleary eyed, I wake; my mind probes through thick smog, and irritation slashes my resolve. Almost a fortnight has passed since Milo threw a rock into our world and announced he’d made the gethadrox. Nearly a fortnight of excruciating silence and stuttered sleep. No one in Coldivor has attempted to reach me and all my attempts to mindle them have yielded nothing more than static and air.

  Whenever I bring this up with Nathaniel and Jude, they simper and pet me, as though I’m a wounded kitten. They tell me to relax, that the Coltis surely have everything under control but I can tell from their sideways glances and uneasy squirms that they’re as worried as I am. Our enemies span the realms and our allies lie out of reach.

  Based on all I have learnt since the Elenfar, the odds are against us. Not only do R.U.O.E swell their own ranks and slaughter Coltis, cutting down all who possess magic and those who dare believe in it, but there is also Daniel Schawsmith, D.S., the one the Coltis seem to call Diez. A Corporeal from long ago, one who broke through the barriers and into Coldivor at a time when the Coltis sought to keep Corporeals out, afraid of the C.P. curse: a plague of counterparts who co-exist in one realm. But Diez got through. His brother, though, was not so fortunate.

  Years later, when creatures—vampires, warlocks, Borum wolves and Exlathars—were let out of Vedark and into Coldivor, they wreaked havoc and destroyed any semblance of happiness. Their attack was deliberate, precise and calculated. They swarmed into Taratesia, but at the time, no one stopped to ask why not the barren land that was Melaxous? They targeted Elentri, targeted the strongest first. And no one wondered how they knew them to be strong. Without a gethadrox, how did they even open the portal? A part of me fears the answers all point back to Diez, the cloaked figure I saw wielding more power than anyone else, the night Drake was sent into Feranvil Farm to kill me. The half-man, half-monster.

  I rub sleep from my eyes and swallow the urge to dredge up more questions. The sun hangs low in the sky, the dullest I’ve ever seen it, and I wonder if The Makers are intentionally making it rise slowly, allowing the people of Feranvil a much-needed lie in.

  At last, I fling back the quilt I’ve tangled around my middle and roll out of bed. The boys and I said, if we hadn’t heard anything from Coldivor within the fortnight, we’d meet at the crack of dawn in the Bar and Grill, to strategize. I stretch, running lazy fingers through my matted hair. It’s been a fortnight.

  When I plonk down into my seat, I chuck the rock onto the table and send Jude’s milkshake skidding off the edge. I think about apologising as pink, wet clumps slop down the table leg but scowl instead, my earlier irritation freshly peaked. The crystal ball Milo once gave me as a way for us to communicate had thumped against my thigh the whole way to the Bar & Grill, cocooned in my satchel, a constant prodding reminder of how no one is trying to reach me.

  I eye the flower, still perched comfortably on top of the rock, its petals changing as often as a candle flame. It’s a harsh red now, matching my anger, and I fight the urge to yank off each curling petal, one by one. I avoid the boys stare as Jude and Nathaniel gather napkins from the centre of the table and mop up the mess I’ve made.

  ‘I hope you realise you owe me another milkshake,’ Jude says, coolly, and I can’t tell if he’s joking or not.

  ‘Gladly,’ I grumble and slither out of the booth, keen to get away from that bloody rock and its taunting message from Milo.

  The Bar and Grill is quiet today. Soft, sleepy melodies sail from the speakers and only a few tables hold customers. It’s often less crowded on Sunday mornings like this one—people nursing hangovers or running last minute errands—but today’s quiet is something else. Things haven’t been the same in Feranvil since my brother escaped, taking with him information for the R.U.O.E. organisation potentially to use against us. ‘Rid Us of Evil’ is what they say, yet they’re the only evil I see. Magic, like weapons, is not the real evil, it’s only the people wielding it. I skirt around the tables, gnawing at my bottom lip until I reach the bar.

  ‘Another milkshake?’ Carl, the server, asks, wiping down the counter.

  I force a weak smile. ‘Strawberry, please,’ a
nd I slump down on a stool. Too soon, Carl sets the new drink down in front of me, and pinching the straw between my fingers, I absently take a sip.

  ‘I saw that!’ Jude screeches from his seat.

  I roll my eyes, pay Carl and head back to the booth, placing the glass in front of Jude.

  ‘Don’t panic. My insanity isn’t contagious,’ I soothe.

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that,’ he gripes but drinks the milkshake all the same. It seems I’m not the only one who didn’t have a very restful night.

  ‘So…’ eventually Nathaniel says, ‘the Coltis haven’t been in touch and The Makers are too concerned with tracking down R.U.O.E. to care much.’

  Jude regards me. ‘What do you make of it?’

  I lean forward, feeling useful for the first time in days. ‘If I know Milo, and I do, I’m the only one he’s told about the gethadrox. The Portologists are probably still stumped and no closer to freeing Coldivor than they were when I left.’

  ‘And you think you know where Milo has kept his findings?’

  ‘I do.’

  Nathaniel sighs. ‘So, it falls to us.’

  ‘It falls to Jude,’ and I lift my eyes to his. It seems he has the same thought. No trace of confusion crosses his face.

  ‘I’ll cross the portal,’ he says. ‘I’ll tell them about Milo and the gethadrox.’

  ‘And I’ll tell you where Milo keeps his notes on stuff like that.’

  Neither of them ask why I’m not crossing the portal. The Coltis may have banished me but I learnt my lesson long before they did. I am the last Elentrice’s counterpart and the last time I got myself in trouble, it almost killed us both. I won’t be crossing that threshold anymore. Like a tide coming in, my anger makes way for sadness and I long for my irritation to return, anything but this hurt. All at once, my bad mood this morning starts to make sense.