Author: Jim McGowan

Post-Coital Design Advice

  By

The following Stelfire.com exclusive scene depicts the parting of Ashe Stelfire and Nirva Silv.  It takes place between Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of the REPENTER novel.  ADVISORY: It contains explicit content.

 

Post-Coital Design Advice

By James McGowan

 

The Late Night of Pyrene 50th, 1551

 

Ashe leaned against a window of six-inch-thick, opaque glass.  He clenched his eyes shut for moment, fighting a surge of vertigo.  Nirva lay in the oval-shaped bed behind him.  The plex hex was over.  He stared hard at the window, trying in vain to view the exterior of the villa.  Dread churned through his insides.  His bare feet writhed against the polished, stone-tiled floor.  He made a mistake.  He already knew it.

 

“Success.”  Nirva’s dark voice carried no anxiety, only satisfaction.  “I’m pregnant.”

 

He didn’t bother asking how she knew this soon.  Warm air wafted upon his unclothed body from the vents in the ceiling.  “Tell me.”

 

“Tell you what?”  Her voice carried more than a question.

 

“You fucking well know what.  Where is Retributor?”
 

She sighed in a hoarse crescendo.  “You’re in that big of a hurry?”

 

Ashe tapped the glass with the butt of his hand.  “You still want me having no part of this child’s life?”

 

Nirva didn’t immediately respond.  “It would be best if you didn’t.  I have plans.”

 

Ashe turned from the window and scowled her.  She made no attempt to cover her nude form.  She reclined on the bed with her arms crossed behind her head.  The pale light from the window touched her pale body, muting the red brilliance of her hair.  It also revealed the painting hanging above the bed.  It was one of Nirva’s many abstract pieces.  This one depicted a series of jagged, red brushstrokes on a yellow background.  Not for the first time Ashe wondered if Nirva’s skill as an artist influenced his decision to enter into this deal.  “What plans?”

 

“Personal ones.”  Her expression soured.  “You know what?  You’re right.  You should leave.”  The nude woman sat up, knees close to her chest.  “Retributor is in Corsis’s possession.  Probably in his lair, but that’s uncertain.”

 

Ashe’s stomach sank.  Corsis was on a very short list of people whom he dared not cross.  The bipedal, reptilian man possessed riches beyond reckoning, but power to match it.  The pyromancer swallowed hard.  “Lovely.”

 

She ran her hand down the length of her bent leg.  “I never said you’d like my answer.

 

His eyes locked with hers.  The passion from every previous encounter no longer showed within them, only cold contentment.

 

“The look on your face is by far the best thing to come out of this.”  A smile retook Nirva’s face.  “And a lot of good things came out of this.”

 

Ashe’s muscles tensed.  “Yes, quite a few.”  The urge to do something violent clattered at the back of his mind.  He did not act on it.  This woman now carried his child.  She also outmatched him.  Despite her deception, Ashe knew this plex hex imbued her with added might.  The risk was worth it to obtain Retributor’s whereabouts.  He now stood closer to that goal. 

 

He approached his discarded clothing, intermingled with hers in a trail from the suite’s door to the bed.  He redressed within a minute, hurriedly pulling on his hooded cloak and fastening his bandoliers. 

 

Nirva remained on the bed, watching him like a predator, a very beautiful predator.  She offered no further words.

 

Ashe reached in one of his cloak’s inner pockets and pulled out a very old cigar held within a white suede sleeve.  The soft cloth’s preservation hex kept it from deteriorating.  He bought the sleeve soon after his mother died, intending to save it for the right moment.  And this was it.  The pyromancer gently removed the cigar, exposing it to the air.

 

Nirva frowned at it.  “I thought you just smoked that ugly pipe.”

 

“Special occasion.”  He touched the brown tip with a flaming finger, lighting it.  Succeeding where his mother failed, Ashe raided the Nagus Queen’s vault and sold the gaun herb pipes.  He kept three for himself, one on his person and the other two hidden in different locations.  Ashe should have been an old man by now.  Instead, he entered his eighth decade as spry as the day he met with his mother.  He sucked in the bitter smoke.  Despite his efforts, it lost its rich scent.  His pipe tasted so much better.
 

She gestured to the door.  “That smells like a dead rat in a chimney.  Get out.”
 

“In a minute.”  Ashe lowered the cylindrical roll from his mouth.  “What are you planning on naming the baby?”

 

Nirva stood from the bed, hands on her shapely hips.  “No.  You don’t get to know anything about her.”

 

“I didn’t.”  Ashe returned the awful-tasting cigar to his open-mouthed smile.  “But now I know it’s a ‘her’.”

 

She gestured to the door and it swung open.  “Leave.”

 

He nodded to the yellow and red painting above the bed.  “One last thing and I’m gone.  It’s about your work of art.”

 

“If I have to ask again, I’ll impale your testicles on the same skewer as your eyes and eat them in front of you.”  Nirva pointed at him now, ready to call forth a hex.

 

“Your painting needs some blue for contrast.  I think our child would like that.”  Ashe departed the suite into the villa’s garden maze of thorn bushes.

 

Nirva wanted to remain true to her word.  But neither parent would have a hand in their child’s development.  The baby went missing three weeks after her birth.  Ashe made no attempt to find her when he learned of her disappearance.  For his apathy, he will one day repent.

 

 

Nirva Silv

  By

Nirva Silv

An artist who once lived in Inner Yeom, Nirva created an abstract painting of orange, black and red smears.  Within its brush strokes, she viewed a perfect reality free of strife under her control.  She initially dismissed it as a day dream, something to which she should aspire, but never reach.  However, the idea of it gnawed at her mind, the singular inspiration of the many realms perfected by her hand and the horrors awaiting every living thing if she did not act.  Nirva scrutinized her creation, finding nuances only detectable by her eyes.  She knew she did not suffer from delusion.  A path lay before her.  A lonely and dark one, but it fell to her to take it.  She alone possessed the ambition to bring her beautiful masterpiece from the canvas to all the realms.  Sufrinzon’s fragmented baronies offered her a place to initiate her grand design.

Nirva joined the Underguild and honed her dormant ethereal prowess to become a mancer.   Her drive for all forms of power intensified with each passing day.  She could not fear what she had to do, so she chose to embrace it.  Every line she crossed, every life she took, brought her closer to a perfected reality.

She met Ashe Stelfire beneath a sheen of purple light in one of the Cosm’s reality observatories.  He distrusted her.  She hated him.  Yet, they couldn’t resist one another.  They had no rational reasons for their affair, only reckless abandonment.  Nirva later discovered a reason in her studies, a plex hex that would permanently imbue her with vast ethereal power.  Among the numerous prerequisites, the plex hex required that she conceive another mancer’s child at its conclusion.  Nirva needed the power to further her goals, but she told Ashe only that she desired an heir to raise on her own.  To entice him, she promised to provide him with a vital piece of information concerning the location of Retributor, a mythical weapon lost to the ages.

The following Stelfire.com exclusive scene depicts the parting of Ashe Stelfire and Nirva Silv.  It takes place between Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of the REPENTER novel.  ADVISORY: It contains explicit content.

Post-Coital Design Advice

By James McGowan

The Late Night of Pyrene 50th, 1551

Ashe leaned against a window of six-inch-thick, opaque glass.  He clenched his eyes shut for moment, fighting a surge of vertigo.  Nirva lay in the oval-shaped bed behind him.  The plex hex was over.  He stared hard at the window, trying in vain to view the exterior of the villa.  Dread churned through his insides.  His bare feet writhed against the polished, stone-tiled floor.  He made a mistake.  He already knew it.

“Success.”  Nirva’s dark voice carried no anxiety, only satisfaction.  “I’m pregnant.”

He didn’t bother asking how she knew this soon.  Warm air wafted upon his unclothed body from the vents in the ceiling.  “Tell me.”

“Tell you what?”  Her voice carried more than a question.

“You fucking well know what.  Where is Retributor?”

She sighed in a hoarse crescendo.  “You’re in that big of a hurry?”

Ashe tapped the glass with the butt of his hand.  “You still want me having no part of this child’s life?”

Nirva didn’t immediately respond.  “It would be best if you didn’t.  I have plans.”

Ashe turned from the window and scowled her.  She made no attempt to cover her nude form.  She reclined on the bed with her arms crossed behind her head.  The pale light from the window touched her pale body, muting the red brilliance of her hair.  It also revealed the painting hanging above the bed.  It was one of Nirva’s many abstract pieces.  This one depicted a series of jagged, red brushstrokes on a yellow background.  Not for the first time Ashe wondered if Nirva’s skill as an artist influenced his decision to enter into this deal.  “What plans?”

“Personal ones.”  Her expression soured.  “You know what?  You’re right.  You should leave.”  The nude woman sat up, knees close to her chest.  “Retributor is in Corsis’s possession.  Probably in his lair, but that’s uncertain.”

Ashe’s stomach sank.  Corsis was on a very short list of people whom he dared not cross.  The bipedal, reptilian man possessed riches beyond reckoning, but power to match it.  The pyromancer swallowed hard.  “Lovely.”

She ran her hand down the length of her bent leg.  “I never said you’d like my answer.

His eyes locked with hers.  The passion from every previous encounter no longer showed within them, only cold contentment.

“The look on your face is by far the best thing to come out of this.”  A smile retook Nirva’s face.  “And a lot of good things came out of this.”

Ashe’s muscles tensed.  “Yes, quite a few.”  The urge to do something violent clattered at the back of his mind.  He did not act on it.  This woman now carried his child.  She also outmatched him.  Despite her deception, Ashe knew this plex hex imbued her with added might.  The risk was worth it to obtain Retributor’s whereabouts.  He now stood closer to that goal.

He approached his discarded clothing, intermingled with hers in a trail from the suite’s door to the bed.  He redressed within a minute, hurriedly pulling on his hooded cloak and fastening his bandoliers.

Nirva remained on the bed, watching him like a predator, a very beautiful predator.  She offered no further words.

Ashe reached in one of his cloak’s inner pockets and pulled out a very old cigar held within a white suede sleeve.  The soft cloth’s preservation hex kept it from deteriorating.  He bought the sleeve soon after his mother died, intending to save it for the right moment.  And this was it.  The pyromancer gently removed the cigar, exposing it to the air.

Nirva frowned at it.  “I thought you just smoked that ugly pipe.”

“Special occasion.”  He touched the brown tip with a flaming finger, lighting it.  Succeeding where his mother failed, Ashe raided the Nagus Queen’s vault and sold the gaun herb pipes.  He kept three for himself, one on his person and the other two hidden in different locations.  Ashe should have been an old man by now.  Instead, he entered his eighth decade as spry as the day he met with his mother.  He sucked in the bitter smoke.  Despite his efforts, it lost its rich scent.  His pipe tasted so much better.

She gestured to the door.  “That smells like a dead rat in a chimney.  Get out.”

“In a minute.”  Ashe lowered the cylindrical roll from his mouth.  “What are you planning on naming the baby?”

Nirva stood from the bed, hands on her shapely hips.  “No.  You don’t get to know anything about her.”

“I didn’t.”  Ashe returned the awful-tasting cigar to his open-mouthed smile.  “But now I know it’s a ‘her’.”

She gestured to the door and it swung open.  “Leave.”

He nodded to the yellow and red painting above the bed.  “One last thing and I’m gone.  It’s about your work of art.”

“If I have to ask again, I’ll impale your testicles on the same skewer as your eyes and eat them in front of you.”  Nirva pointed at him now, ready to call forth a hex.

“Your painting needs some blue for contrast.  I think our child would like that.”  Ashe departed the suite into the villa’s garden maze of thorn bushes.

Nirva wanted to remain true to her word.  But neither parent would have a hand in their child’s development.  The baby went missing three weeks after her birth.  Ashe made no attempt to find her when he learned of her disappearance.  For his apathy, he will one day repent.

Realms

  By

Realm: A sphere or plane of reality.

Realm Sub-categories:

Pico Realm: A plane of existence with limited space and finite borders.  Inner Yeom, the Cosm, and the Shade Lands are pico realms.

 

Planet Realm: A sphere of existence that orbits at least one daystar.  Its people are both good and evil.  Trojis, Outer Yeom, and the Macro Worlds are planet realms.

 

Nether Realm: A secluded sphere of existence tainted by evil and peopled by the lost.  Despite this, hope does glimmer within them.  Sufrinzon, Decadia, and Forboda are nether realms.

Realms of Note:

 

Trojis:  A wet, blue planet comprised of vast oceans and the super-continent of Jeea.  It is home to the ceaseless blaze of the Fire Well.  The conflicts and culture of Trojis touch dozens of interconnected realms.  New Grelland, Crystal Keep and the Holy Alliance are counted as its most potent nations.

 

Sufrinzon:  A vast Nether Realm often described as a distorted reflection of Trojis.  Burning oceans and orange-black clouds encircle it.  Despite its darkness, beauty and valor thrive among those who choose freedom over tyranny.  It’s divided into several baronies including Palle, Darbin and Velsuvia.

 

The Shade Lands:  The realm connecting the shadows of all places, people and things.  Space is folded within its perpetually-twilit environs.  If one dares to walk within the Shade Lands, vast distances can be covered in minutes and impossible to reach realms are accessible.  However, those who lurk within its dim expanses rarely make such excursions uneventful.

 

The Macro Worlds: A network of fifty-five planets all sharing a nebula-sized atmosphere of oxygen, nitrogen and carbon dioxide.  Trillions of beings once inhabited them.  The majority of the Macro Worlds are now lifeless husks after the Underguild ignited their atmosphere to end the A Pox’s first pandemic.  Little breathable air remains, all of it sterilized.

 

Outer Yeom: A desolate, hollow shell planet realm that once rivaled Trojis in cultural influence.  Its few remaining people all know the name Corsis, and fear it.

 

Inner Yeom: A verdant, inner-sphere, pico realm untouched by the strife of its outer counterpart.  The wise forest of Halonir resides within its plush borders.

 

The Cosm: The Pico Realm containing the Underguild.  A small nation unto itself, the Cosm spans only a city-sized amount of space, yet it has never been fully explored.  Its geography shifts over time at the fancy of a select few of its inhabitants.

 

Decadia:  This entirely urban Nether Realm possesses the most advanced capitalistic economy in existence.  Its weapons are rivaled only by those of New Grelland and Dread Corps.  However, it tends to covertly trade its wares with other nations, rather than overtly enter into conflict with its enemies.

 

Forboda:  Home to the Nagus Demons, humanoids with snake tails in place of legs.  Lush rain forests sprawl everywhere.  Tales of its subterranean cites’ riches has led many a raider to an untimely death.

 

Elaine Nielsen’s book, “A Century on the Trail: Ogallala”

  By

I made a very happy discovery today.  My late grandmother, Elaine Nielsen’s book, “A Century on the Trail: Ogallala” is back in print from Bison Books.  My wife showed it to me when we were at Barnes and Nobles.  I recall my aunt saying something about the University of Nebraska Press wanting to make a trade paperback of it, but I didn’t know it was this far along.  If you’re interested in reading a well-crafted retelling of frontier life in west Nebraska, you will enjoy this book.  The ISBN is 978-0-8032-3447-5 if you’re interested in tracking it down.  More than a decade after passing away, Elaine Nielsen continues to be a positive influence on me as a grandson and a writer.  When Repenter gets published, it’s getting dedicated to her.

Cigars with Mom

  By

The following Stelfire.com exclusive scene depicts the reunion between Ashe Stelfire and his mother, Jillian.  It takes place 39 years before Chapter 1 of the REPENTER novel.  ADVISORY: It contains explicit content.

 

Cigars with Mom

By James McGowan

 

The Dusk Hour of Pyrene 44th, 1511

 

 Jillian Stefire swayed through the crowded café’s narrow confines with familiar confidence.  Dim lights gleamed upon a few dozen stool-sized tables, though the majority of the patrons stood and mingled.  Most wore dress attire, dresses or suits.  A few of them glanced at Jillian’s many black tattoos with passing interest before returning to tepid conversations to match their luke-warm beverages. 
 
Ashe sat at a small table in the back of the café.  He tightly clutched his steaming, red tea in its ceramic cup.  The heat calmed him enough to repress enraged shivers, but not enough to stop his racing mind.  He hated her, yet here he sat, early for a meeting in one of the Cosm’s many social clubs with his mother.
 
She still wore form-fitting attire, a rose-hued, fiber-mesh, mancer suit.  Her fingers brushed through her thick red bangs.  A few strands of white drew her son’s notice.  Time had not stood still for either of them.  At forty-six, she was only seventeen years older than his twenty-nine.  Ashe released his beverage and gestured to the chair in front of him with what he hoped was a blank expression.
 
His mother grinned.  She pivoted the chair when she reached the table, sitting in it backwards with her elbows draped across its back.  She held a cigar in each hand.  Jillian placed one cigar in front of Ashe and pointed her finger at the end of the other in her hand.  A small flame erupted and immediately extinguished, leaving a red-orange ember.  She took in a deep drag and blew it out above their heads.  The spicy-sweet scent did not call to mind tobacco.  It smelled of autumn, of leaves burning upon cinnamon.  Ashe did not take his mother’s offering, leaving it untouched in front of him.
 
Her green eyes never left his.  In the silence, more aromatic puffs of smoke wafted from her nostrils and mouth.  Jillian sat up straighter, running a hand down her vest.  She spoke around her cigar.  “You dress in black, like your father.”
 
Ashe took a long sip of tangy and bitter red tea, his grip on the cup unfaltering.
 
“But you still have my eyes, my hair.”  She bobbed her eyebrows.  “My talent.  You’re a pyromancer on the rise.”
 
The son looked past his mother searching for anything, anyone that didn’t belong.  The press of bodies in the narrow interior limited his surveillance, but nothing appeared amiss.
 
His eyes returned to her.  Jillian stared at him with the cigar now in the center of her lips with smoke fuming from her mouth.  She removed it and tapped a few ashes on the floor.  “See anything?”
 
Ashe shook his head.
 
She rubbed an eye with one of her palms.  “I don’t expect forgiveness, sweetie.  I left you.  I knew you could die and I still did it.  I also know you don’t care why I did it.”
 
“Wrong,” he said.
 
Her brow furled for a moment.  “Dear gods you sound just like Stahn.”
 
Ashe released his tea cup.  “I guess I do.  I can’t remember Dad that well.”  He snatched the unlit cigar and examined a red and white snake emblem imprinted on its brown wrapping.   “Tell me why you left me, Jill.”
 
He got the reaction he wanted at the use of this mother’s first name, an ever-so brief glimmer of hurt in her eyes.  It vanished when she took another puff.  “Money and power.”
 
“TELL ME WHY!”  Ashe shouted it in her face loud enough to interrupt the café’s clamor.  Many eyes turned in their direction.  “Tell me why.  Specifically.”
 
She didn’t speak.  Moments passed while she smoked her cigar with a stern and cold expression.  At last, the din of conversations returned.  She spoke in the renewed privacy.  “I had a deal with Baron Jonas in Sufrinzon.  He offered me the world to come work for him.  He wanted you as a blood sacrifice to enhance our power.  I left you and told him you ran away.  I started working for him after that.”  She lowered her cigar with a plume of smoke.  “Until I stopped.”
 
“He’s after you,” Ashe said with bitter certainty.
 
She nodded.  “Nothing I can’t handle.  He doesn’t have friends here in the Cosm.”
 
“He can hire someone to find you.”
 
“We’ll be gone by then.”
 
Ashe leaned against the round back of his polished, wooden chair.  He rolled the cigar between his fingers.  “Tell me what you want, Jill.”
 
She took her first name in stride this time.  “Gaun herbs.  These cigars add a month to your life after you smoke them.  They cost me plenty.  Forboda has a stash of pipes sitting in one of their secret vaults.  Five-hundred of them.  Each worth a five million decalits in Decadia.  The pipe’s bowls continually regrow the herbs.  If you have one, you’re set for life.  A very long life.  I know where the vault is.  I need your help breaking in.”
 
Ashe ran his cigar along the bottom of his nose, taking in the strong, bitter aroma.  He then drank down his red tea in two gulps.  Its heat did not scald his tongue and throat.  No heat harmed him while he wore his cloak.  He placed the cigar in a pocket inside the black vestment.  “Thanks for the gift.”
 
“Sweetie, wait.”  Jillian reached toward him.
 
He swatted her hand away and stood.  “You’re a fool and a waste.”
 
His mother pointed her cigar’s glowing ember at him.  “Don’t let anger get in the way of this.  We are talking about billions of decalits.”  Her eyes widened to show a few bloodshot, zig-zagging lines.  “Billions.”
 
“Yes, we are.”  Ashe held up a finger.  Fire ignited upon it.  “One of two things will happen.  Either you’ll succeed in raiding a Nagus Queen’s treasure trove.  And if you do, I’ll find you and take the pipes from you by any means necessary.”  A second finger joined the first, also alight with a flame.  “Or you’ll die trying.  Then, I’ll find out the location of this vault and steal the pipes.”  He closed his fingers into a fist.  The fire around his entire hand brightened to a red hue before vanishing.  “Either way, I win and you lose.”
 
She tapped her thumb against the back of the chair.  “If I’m a waste, what does that make you?” 
 
“Someone who’s going to be very rich very soon.”  He narrowed his eyes.  “Count on it.”
 
“I’ll break in without you, then.”  Jillian rose to her feet.  “And you’re welcome to try to steal the pipes from me.”  She placed the cigar back in her mouth and blew smoke in his face.  “In fact, I dare you.”
 
“I dare a lot, Jill.  It’s how I thrive.”  Ashe pulled his cloak’s hood over his short red hair.  “For what it’s worth, I hope you succeed.  I very much want to take them from you.”
 
More smoke huffed from her mouth.  “You won’t.”
 
Ashe turned his back on her and shoved his way through the crowd.
 
He never saw his mother again.  Two days later, a Nagus Queen petrified Jillian Stelfire into stone in Forboda and shattered to her body to pieces.   When Ashe Stelfire learned of it, he shed no tears.  For his cruelty, he will one day repent.

 

word crafting

  By

A fun thing about writing this kind of stuff is making up words.  I love the way they sound when you craft a new one.  Harcruazedur is a particular favorite.  I originally started of calling him Harcru, but I decided that I didn’t have as many five syllable names, so I added three more.  It’s a fun one to say:  Har-crew-az-ed-ur

 

He’s a 100 foot tall winged demon of fire and stone.  A General in the Palle army.  He would like very much to reap vengeance on a certain woman in red armor.

Ashe Stelfire

  By

 Ashe Stelfire

The son of two avaricious fortune hunters, Ashe accompanied his parents on dozens of adventures in his early childhood until his father perished in an avalanche.  His mother supported him for another five years until she abandoned him to fend for himself.  Ashe taught himself with his mother’s discarded mancy books through his adolescence, working as non-contracted labor in Decadia’s smelting factories.  The endless hours toiling with white-hot metal sparked a lifelong admiration of the uses of fire.  The day after his eighteenth birthday, he offered his services to his employers as an apprentice pyromancer.  They did not look fondly upon his aspirations and attempted to murder him on the spot.  Ashe had prepared for this eventuality.  He ignited the air his assailant’s lungs, incinerating everything in their ribcages.  No others barred his departure.

Ashe then stabbed out into the realms on his own as a fortune hunter.  The prospect of earning or stealing his livelihood enticed him.  After a two initial, nearly fatal failures, he succeeded in thieving an unpolished, wooden wand that amplified his power.  He amassed both valuable possessions and a ruthless reputation, one so prolific that his mother sought him out to help her in a desperate scheme.

The following Stelfire.com exclusive scene depicts the reunion between Ashe Stelfire and his mother, Jillian.  It takes place 39 years before Chapter 1 of the REPENTER novel.  ADVISORY: It contains explicit content.

Cigars with Mom

By James McGowan

The Dusk Hour of Pyrene 44th, 1511

Jillian Stefire swayed through the crowded café’s narrow confines with familiar confidence.  Dim lights gleamed upon a few dozen stool-sized tables, though the majority of the patrons stood and mingled.  Most wore dress attire, dresses or suits.  A few of them glanced at Jillian’s many black tattoos with passing interest before returning to tepid conversations to match their luke-warm beverages.

Ashe sat at a small table in the back of the café.  He tightly clutched his steaming, red tea in its ceramic cup.  The heat calmed him enough to repress enraged shivers, but not enough to stop his racing mind.  He hated her, yet here he sat, early for a meeting in one of the Cosm’s many social clubs with his mother.

She still wore form-fitting attire, a rose-hued, fiber-mesh, mancer suit.  Her fingers brushed through her thick red bangs.  A few strands of white drew her son’s notice.  Time had not stood still for either of them.  At forty-six, she was only seventeen years older than his twenty-nine.  Ashe released his beverage and gestured to the chair in front of him with what he hoped was a blank expression.

His mother grinned.  She pivoted the chair when she reached the table, sitting in it backwards with her elbows draped across its back.  She held a cigar in each hand.  Jillian placed one cigar in front of Ashe and pointed her finger at the end of the other in her hand.  A small flame erupted and immediately extinguished, leaving a red-orange ember.  She took in a deep drag and blew it out above their heads.  The spicy-sweet scent did not call to mind tobacco.  It smelled of autumn, of leaves burning upon cinnamon.  Ashe did not take his mother’s offering, leaving it untouched in front of him.

Her green eyes never left his.  In the silence, more aromatic puffs of smoke wafted from her nostrils and mouth.  Jillian sat up straighter, running a hand down her vest.  She spoke around her cigar.  “You dress in black, like your father.”

Ashe took a long sip of tangy and bitter red tea, his grip on the cup unfaltering.

“But you still have my eyes, my hair.”  She bobbed her eyebrows.  “My talent.  You’re a pyromancer on the rise.”

The son looked past his mother searching for anything, anyone that didn’t belong.  The press of bodies in the narrow interior limited his surveillance, but nothing appeared amiss.

His eyes returned to her.  Jillian stared at him with the cigar now in the center of her lips with smoke fuming from her mouth.  She removed it and tapped a few ashes on the floor.  “See anything?”

Ashe shook his head.

She rubbed an eye with one of her palms.  “I don’t expect forgiveness, sweetie.  I left you.  I knew you could die and I still did it.  I also know you don’t care why I did it.”

“Wrong,” he said.

Her brow furled for a moment.  “Dear gods you sound just like Stahn.”

Ashe released his tea cup.  “I guess I do.  I can’t remember Dad that well.”  He snatched the unlit cigar and examined a red and white snake emblem imprinted on its brown wrapping.   “Tell me why you left me, Jill.”

He got the reaction he wanted at the use of this mother’s first name, an ever-so brief glimmer of hurt in her eyes.  It vanished when she took another puff.  “Money and power.”

“TELL ME WHY!”  Ashe shouted it in her face loud enough to interrupt the café’s clamor.  Many eyes turned in their direction.  “Tell me why.  Specifically.”

She didn’t speak.  Moments passed while she smoked her cigar with a stern and cold expression.  At last, the din of conversations returned.  She spoke in the renewed privacy.  “I had a deal with Baron Jonas in Sufrinzon.  He offered me the world to come work for him.  He wanted you as a blood sacrifice to enhance our power.  I left you and told him you ran away.  I started working for him after that.”  She lowered her cigar with a plume of smoke.  “Until I stopped.”

“He’s after you,” Ashe said with bitter certainty.

She nodded.  “Nothing I can’t handle.  He doesn’t have friends here in the Cosm.”

“He can hire someone to find you.”

“We’ll be gone by then.”

Ashe leaned against the round back of his polished, wooden chair.  He rolled the cigar between his fingers.  “Tell me what you want, Jill.”

She took her first name in stride this time.  “Gaun herbs.  These cigars add a month to your life after you smoke them.  They cost me plenty.  Forboda has a stash of pipes sitting in one of their secret vaults.  Five-hundred of them.  Each worth a five million decalits in Decadia.  The pipe’s bowls continually regrow the herbs.  If you have one, you’re set for life.  A very long life.  I know where the vault is.  I need your help breaking in.”

Ashe ran his cigar along the bottom of his nose, taking in the strong, bitter aroma.  He then drank down his red tea in two gulps.  Its heat did not scald his tongue and throat.  No heat harmed him while he wore his cloak.  He placed the cigar in a pocket inside the black vestment.  “Thanks for the gift.”

“Sweetie, wait.”  Jillian reached toward him.

He swatted her hand away and stood.  “You’re a fool and a waste.”

His mother pointed her cigar’s glowing ember at him.  “Don’t let anger get in the way of this.  We are talking about billions of decalits.”  Her eyes widened to show a few bloodshot, zig-zagging lines.  “Billions.”

“Yes, we are.”  Ashe held up a finger.  Fire ignited upon it.  “One of two things will happen.  Either you’ll succeed in raiding a Nagus Queen’s treasure trove.  And if you do, I’ll find you and take the pipes from you by any means necessary.”  A second finger joined the first, also alight with a flame.  “Or you’ll die trying.  Then, I’ll find out the location of this vault and steal the pipes.”  He closed his fingers into a fist.  The fire around his entire hand brightened to a red hue before vanishing.  “Either way, I win and you lose.”

She tapped her thumb against the back of the chair.  “If I’m a waste, what does that make you?”

“Someone who’s going to be very rich very soon.”  He narrowed his eyes.  “Count on it.”

“I’ll break in without you, then.”  Jillian rose to her feet.  “And you’re welcome to try to steal the pipes from me.”  She placed the cigar back in her mouth and blew smoke in his face.  “In fact, I dare you.”

“I dare a lot, Jill.  It’s how I thrive.”  Ashe pulled his cloak’s hood over his short red hair.  “For what it’s worth, I hope you succeed.  I very much want to take them from you.”

More smoke huffed from her mouth.  “You won’t.”

Ashe turned his back on her and shoved his way through the crowd.

He never saw his mother again.  Two days later, a Nagus Queen petrified Jillian Stelfire into stone in Forboda and shattered to her body to pieces.   When Ashe Stelfire learned of it, he shed no tears.  For his cruelty, he will one day repent.

Biography

  By

I live in Nebraska as an analyst for a major firm.  In addition to writing, I enjoy enticing my lovely wife with new recipes, though my chili is a favorite standby.  While writing is my passion, I also like getting out of the house to play Ultimate Frisbee in a casual league during the warmer months.

Technology’s continued evolution fascinates me, especially the proliferation of electronic books and its impact on the publishing industry.  My writing contains depictions of magic gadgetry that gets more and more real with each passing day.  I also collect graphic novels.  The flow of sequential art coupled with dialogue as a story-telling mechanism intrigues me.  I use this inspiration to create vivid and kinetic stories.  Writer’s Digest and Publishers Weekly keep me current on market trends.  The Nebraska Writers Workshop provides excellent feedback that I use to hone my craft.  I am also a proud member of the Nebraska Writers Guild.

My short story, “Sleep Talker”, appeared in the August 2007 issue of Sounds of the Night and the June 2008 issue of Aoife s Kiss, both through Sam’s Dot Publishing.  My short story, “Seeds”, received Honorable Mention in the Genre Short Story category of the 78th Annual Writer’s Digest Writing Competition.  My short story, “Escape Velocity”, appeared in the 2011 Omaha Contagion Outbreak Convention program.

Origin of a Writer

  By

I started writing when a good friend of mine went off to the Navy during my first year of college.  We enjoyed playing pen-and-paper role playing games such as Shadowrun and Rifts.  I kept running the multi-genre campaigns in his absence with rest of the gang.  I didn’t want him to lose touch with the group, so I followed the example of my grandmother and wrote a story.   Across oceans, snail mail brought the continuing adventures of our characters to him.  He enjoyed it immensely and wanted me to write more.

 

 The years passed as I chronicled the adventures of our characters.  My stories left the realms of the old role playing games and the characters no longer fit their cookie-cutter archetypes of origin.  Their epic adventures changed their universe for better and sometimes worse.  I effectively created my own continuity.  The gang went their separate ways as we entered the workforce. 

 

 Something changed within me.  I still had the storytelling itch.  Using my past writing experiences, I created new worlds, new characters and new facets to old favorites.  Then came the years of rough drafts and revisions.  Millions of words later, I came into my own as a writer.  I joined the Nebraska Writers Workshop and happily grew as a writer under their expert guidance.  Now, I embark on the latest adventure in writing.  I eagerly await the worlds to which it will take me.