An Assassin’s Accord: McFadden and Banks Book #1

Some are haunted by the monsters in their past, McFadden and Banks are also haunted by the monsters of their future. Read the first chapter here and be captivated by a world we don’t yet know.

The situation felt weirdly familiar, enough so that it triggered his instinct and demanded attention.

Taylor looked at himself. His six-foot-six frame was encased in a suit of mechanized armor, and he could feel his long red hair and beard being pushed up by the helmet he wore. He couldn’t remember a time when that felt uncomfortable, although it was probably due to the fact that he had been clean-shaven and sported a crew cut when he first climbed into one of them, and he had simply grown into the comfortable habit from there.

After years of walking and fighting in a suit like this, he wasn’t surprised that the whole feeling was so familiar. But this was a new suit. It wasn’t one of the chunky, difficult-to-operate ones that broke down more often than an Alfa Romeo. And predictably in the middle of a fight.

He looked around and narrowed his eyes as they adjusted to the darkness around him.

“Come on, McFadden, get your head out of your ass!”

He snapped his head around and a familiar face registered in his HUD.

“Davis?”

“No, it’s the fucking tooth fairy, and I’ll take those teeth out manually if you don’t scan your sector like you should, dumbass. Also, I’m a little short on quarters, so I’ll do that shit for free.”

The rest of the team laughed.

Right. The rest of the team because he didn’t head into the Zoo without a team.

And he was in the Zoo. His gaze flicked around. The familiarity settled in with more assurance as the surroundings grew steadily more visible. His eyes finally began to adjust to the darkness. He could see the trees, the vines growing around them, and the flickers of motion that his motion sensors told him were monsters on the move. The jungle denizens, for now, kept an eye on them but weren’t quite ready to attack.

Even the thought of being there had him in a cold sweat, but he forced himself to keep moving. He took his customary post at the front of the line and grasped his rifle a little tighter.

Suddenly, he froze in place, alerted by his inner sense that something was wrong. His teammates halted when he did, scanned the area, and everyone felt the ground shake even when the heavy suits had stopped moving.

“Shit!” Davis called. “We have a big fucker heading our way!”

The group knew what to do already and no one needed to be told. Weapons were aimed in the direction of the massive, dinosaur-like monster that approached as the team began to move away at an angle. Everyone hoped the creature simply wouldn’t see them and would walk past. It was the only scenario that would enable them all to come out of this alive.

Taylor had a bad feeling best-case wouldn’t happen. It never did. The big fuckers were hard to avoid when they trundled through.

As if in response to his thought, a massive shadow stepped between the trees and made it difficult to focus on anything else as it pushed through the jungle like it owned the place.

Hell, for all he knew, it probably did.

He stood immobile and held his breath as he waited for the beast to hopefully lumber past them.

His inner prediction proved accurate. He had already stiffened in preparation when the impossibly large head turned and caught sight of the group that tried to evade it. A brief second was required for recognition before the beast uttered a bone-shattering roar.

“Son of a bitch.” Davis growled frustration and annoyance.

Everyone knew what to do. They’d been through the drills in sims before and a handful had already been through the process in real life.

All that notwithstanding, they still didn’t like their odds.

“Smoke this asshole!” Taylor called and fired the grenade from the launcher under his rifle. It streaked into an arc that brought it down into the side of the creature’s head. All he saw was a flash of light and a minor annoyance on the dinosaur’s part as it shrugged the impact aside.

The series of explosions that followed was enough to throw it off balance and it collided heavily with a couple of nearby trees. The rest of the jungle seemed to wake with that and suddenly, a wave of roars, screeches, and hisses erupted from all around them.

“Formation!” Davis shouted and motioned for them to form a circle so they could watch each other’s back. “And keep fucking moving! If any of you fall behind, you’ll be left behind!”

Taylor knew the threat was far from an empty one, but they would at least try to not leave anyone behind.

Hundreds of the creatures appeared on his motion sensors as he loaded another grenade into the launcher. The bigger, badder mutant was still out there, likely circling and waiting for the rest of the monsters to have their fun before it finally stepped in.

He hated how intelligent these fuckers were. 

“We have them moving in from the flank!”

His teeth gritted, he repressed every instinct to turn and help since it was his job to keep those that tried to attack from the front at bay while the group pushed forward. He could hear the heavy steps coming in behind them as the creatures continued to press in.

A moment later, he registered smoke in the air. He needed a few seconds to realize that it wasn’t some kind of mist seeping through the jungle but actual smoke. Maybe that explained where all the sunlight had gone, and he felt the heat from it lick at his back.

Too many of the creatures rushed through the flames all around him. They didn’t seem to notice that their fur caught fire when they maintained their charge. 

The Zoo wasn’t known to catch fire, he thought with a bemused frown. Well, he wasn’t in the Zoo, was he? He was in Southern California. New beasties appeared all over the place and were driven out of the wilds and into population centers. He and Tanya needed to get rid of the creatures before they could cause any fatalities.

“Tanya!” he shouted, looked around, and saw her vaguely through the smoke. 

But where was the big fucker? It couldn’t be too far behind them.

“Tanya, get a move on!”

She moved too slowly, and the smoke parted easily as the massive dinosaur of a creature pushed through behind her, stretched its thick neck, and snapped its impossibly large jaws at her.

It missed, but in avoiding the strike, Tanya tripped over a pile of burning branches and tumbled end over end down a small hill.

“No!” Taylor roared, yanked grenades from his belt, and lobbed them in front of the lurching creature. They forced it back a couple of steps and into the bushfire it was trying to escape from.

No, wait, Tanya hadn’t met Bobby yet. And if she died on the hills of California, she never would. He reached her and skidded to his knees beside her.

“Hey, are you okay?”

She nodded and pushed up slowly. “Yeah… The fucker almost got me.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it.”

He hauled her to her feet and registered the heavy footsteps of the dinosaur cryptid coming up behind them again. With a muttered curse, he tossed another grenade behind his back to slow it while they made their escape.

“What the fuck, Taylor? Why are you throwing grenades around like that without even seeing what you’re throwing them at?”

Was that Bobby? It sounded like the man, but Taylor couldn’t be sure. He hadn’t gone on the trip to California.

Wait…no, the heat was at normal levels for Vegas. The smoke came from the exhausts in the cars. It was still too blisteringly hot to stand out in the sun during rush hour in Vegas, almost hot enough to melt the tires of the cars that usually crawled bumper to bumper in a traffic jam.

Not this time, though. They all gave the armored car a wide berth. Taylor looked over his shoulder. Tanya was gone and the weight was only the bags that carried the cash they were robbing from the armored car. She was there again in the next moment, but she carried a bag of her own with her assault rifle ready and opened fire at the creatures that ran between the cars.

The monsters had finally gotten their lazy asses to Vegas. He’d always known it was only a matter of time until they did, but he had hoped they would take a little longer. But there was no need to be afraid of the inevitable. He tightened his grasp on his rifle and watched as the creatures forced themselves through the gaps between the cars. They pushed beyond the traffic directly into the rain of bullets he let loose.

One of the panthers jumped on the armored car and waited for him to approach before it pounced. Its fangs flashed in the bright sunlight. He couldn’t tell if the creature had specifically targeted him out of the rest, or if maybe it had merely waited on top of the vehicle for someone to approach, but it didn’t matter. With his free hand, he drew his knife and waited for the creature’s momentum to meet the blade he drove up to stab into its jawline.

Blood coated the side of his suit, and he made a mental note to double his elbow grease to get it clean again and then burn all the rags he used to do so.

“Taylor,” Niki called over the comms. “You need to get out of here.”

Niki? She wasn’t on the heist with them. Maybe she was calling from the outside.

He turned and heard the sound of helicopters approaching in the distance, which made it difficult to not realize what she was talking about. They intended to clear the whole area out and make sure the infestation wouldn’t spread.

“Wait,” he protested. “I need to get out? What about you? Where the hell are you?”

“I’m pinned down,” she explained. “I won’t be able to reach the drop point. You guys need to get the hell out of here without me.”

“No fucking way!” he snapped. “That’s my move, and you know it!”

“I guess I have to take a page from your book, Taylor.” He could hear her voice cracking as she spoke. “Good luck!”

“Fucking—” His response was cut short by the noise and he scowled at the helicopters as their rockets flared, dozens at a time, to wreak destruction on the city of Las Vegas. Once the missiles were finished, they were followed by bombs that shook the ground when the explosives detonated. It made it difficult to keep his feet, even with the suit working to counteract the seismic effects.

“What?” he whispered as the helicopters banked away to leave a massive crater smoking and flaming where the Las Vegas strip should have been. “Niki, are you there? Niki, answer me right now! Niki!”

Someone grasped him by the shoulder and shook him. Taylor pulled away and tried again to contact her. He needed to hear her voice again, to hear her speak through the chaos.

“Niki!”

The shaking worsened and made him feel like additional explosives impacted around him. Someone’s hand clutched him and tried to pull him back, and he twisted to shove the hand away from him.

Vertigo filled his body as he spun into space and struck nothing until something cold and hard slapped him across the face. Hell, across his whole body. He shook violently, pushed up, and reached out for whatever had hit him. The whole place was suddenly dark, which made it difficult to see what was happening around him.

But the hands had hold of him again and pinned him in place. What happened to the suit?

Oh, right, he wasn’t wearing one.

Taylor sucked in a deep breath and his eyes opened as he looked up from the ground to where Bobby stood over him and pinned his hands down.

“Fucking… What…where…”

The other man smirked, finally released his arms, and patted him on the cheek. “Are you having a nightmare there, buddy?”

He looked around the room. It was sparsely decorated, and even in the darkness, he could tell it needed a coat of paint. A desk stood on one side and a bed on the other, although bed might have been something of a stretch. It was barely a cot, the kind used to quickly set up sometimes when he was in the field. He had spent more than his fair share of nights on one of them and in the end, his comfort needs were fairly minimal.

Still, things would change over the next couple of weeks in that regard. He merely couldn’t bring himself to part with the room he had spent so much time in. For a guy who had traveled around the world for most of his adult life, connecting to a place—any place—meant it was home.

Bobby finally pulled away and moved to one of the chairs. “What was the dream about? You shouted Niki’s name while you were under, but…it didn’t sound like a sex dream, between you and me.”

Taylor scowled at the hefty man. “Yeah, whatever, you Jet Li lookalike. And no, it wasn’t a…pleasant dream. We were…in the Zoo? I think? Then in California. And then here. There were monsters here and she…she died. I think. It’s getting hard to remember.”

“Well, first, I’m very sure I have a solid foot and a half and a hundred and fifty pounds on Jet Li, so we look nothing alike. Secondly…well, yeah, that’s kind of how dreams go, I guess. Still, it sounds like it was rough.”

He shrugged. “Right…yeah. I feel like I was in a rigorous workout. Shit.”

“And you smell like you’ve been in a rigorous workout too.”

“Fuck off, Bungees.”

“I’m not kidding. You smell like shit and honestly, I’d think about changing the sheets on that bench you call a bed.”

Taylor paused and peered at his shirt. Sure enough, it was soaked with sweat. He didn’t need to get in closer to know that he reeked of it too.

“Shit. You’re right. I’ll take a shower and I’ll be right down. Did you bring doughnuts?”

“Don’t I always?”

With a nod, he pushed to his feet and rubbed some feeling back into where the other man had held him down. “Awesome. I’ll head down to the shop in about…thirty minutes?”

“Sure, but remember that I’m your boss now and I’ll be tracking your hours.”

“In McFadden’s Mechs only. I’ll be here part-time, remember?”

“Right, right. I’ll still track your hours with Zhang and Novak—”

“Ass. At least my name wasn’t a mouthful.”

“Says the guy who smells like one.”

Bobby stood and flipped him off as he headed to the door.

“I need to put a new lock on that door,” Taylor mumbled as he yanked his drenched shirt off and threw it into the laundry bin with perfect accuracy. It was three times wider than the average basketball hoop and less than three feet away, but he still couldn’t help a small smile as he headed into the bathroom.

______

What a whirlwind… From the Jungles of California to the Concrete Jungle of Las Vegas. Will his future resemble his past. Looks Like McFadden and Banks are lucky to have each watching their back. Keep a look out for Snippet number two, and while your waiting head over and pre-order An Assassin’s Accord The First Book in the McFadden and Banks Series. The book is set to release on November 3rd and I for one can’t wait.

The Heretic Lives: Heretic of The Federation Book #1

Is this a fools errand? Was this plan built on hope and limited information? All Yes… but does it mean it won’t work? The Suspense is building for John and his renegade friends.

The city had crept right up to the edge of the Communications Center. Buildings clustered around the foot of the wall, separated by an apron of concrete and a two-lane road.

A bus stop stood opposite in front of a gym, a pub, and a take-away. All seemed to do a booming trade, and no one paid much attention to the kids who walked past.

They either lived in one of the nearby burbs or they were there for some other reason. Many worked part-time or came to party illegally. As long as they kept out of trouble, however, their IDs were never scrutinized too closely.

Predictably, no one noticed when the six friends meandered down the road and cut through a side street to reach the edge of the bushland that bordered both the suburb and the communications facility.

And if they had, they wouldn’t have cared. Kids snuck out that way all the time. Four guys and two girls? It wasn’t hard to work out what they were up to.

Which had been the idea.

Natalia had come up with it and scowled when Amy had protested.

“And what?” she’d demanded with one hand on her hip in a challenging posture. “I suppose you think we should tell them we’re all study buddies or something because for sure they’ll fall for that.”

“And it’s only in case someone stops us anyway,” Trevor had been quick to point out. “We don’t have to say anything if we get in fast enough.”

That had been the essence of the plan. The girls had to get in and find something that proved the Regime was doing things to Talents. They assumed the facility would give them access.

The boys planned to keep the security staff busy while the girls entered and made their escape again—and they had to do it fast, and avoid the surveillance cams while they did so.

When they were done—or on their way out—they had to ping the boys to let them know.

“What happens if they try to catch us?” Baron had asked.

Amy had rolled her eyes but William’s reply had been immediate.

“We scatter,” he told them. “You all know where to go, right?”

They’d nodded to confirm the different public transport locations they’d aim for. It would make it more difficult for the Enforcers to work out which suburb they called home. They’d meet at the shop a week later.

If they could.

Now, they walked through the dark like a group of locals out for a stroll until they slipped through a gap in the fence surrounding the parkland. Reconvening on the other side, they huddled together and listened for any sign that they’d been seen.

When all remained as quiet as any urban street could be, they wove between the trees, careful of the thick webs strung between them.

“I hate spiders,” Jerry whispered, jerked himself clear of one he hadn’t seen, and brushed his hands over his clothes.

Natalia came to help him.

“Don’t get any ideas,” she grumbled. “I merely don’t want you to squeal like a baby if one runs up your neck.”

He shivered. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Just make sure it’s not on me.”

“You know they’re as scared of you as you are of them, right?” Amy demanded. “It hit the dirt and ran the second you destroyed its home.”

“Man, I hope so.” His heartfelt reply drew a muted chuckle from his teammates.

“As long as it didn’t run this way,” Trevor muttered as they hurried forward.

They all breathed a sigh of relief when they reached the edge of the trees.

“They’re down here,” William informed them and led them down a brief escarpment to the edge of the creek.

“Where?” Amy demanded and Trevor hushed her.

“Along here.” William’s voice was equally hushed as he led them down a narrow dirt trail.

They fell silent and crept forward to where concrete met the creek line. Six dark holes marred the gray surface and reddish-brown stains marked where the water fell.

“What the heck do they need those for?” Amy whispered.

William’s face was lit by his mobile as he checked something.

“John said they were emergency stormwater drainage.”

He studied the walls of the Communications Complex.

“I don’t see why they’d need it.”

Trevor made a scornful sound. “All that concrete? Water’s gotta go somewhere when it rains.”

They all thought about that before William shrugged.

“Well, that’s how you girls will get in.”

Amy exchanged glances with the other girl and they moved closer to the pipes.

“You are kidding me,” she whispered and her eyes widened as her voice bounced away from her. She moved back a couple of feet and pointed at the nearest pipe. “In there?” she demanded in hushed tones and gestured to herself and Amy. “Are you sure we’ll fit?”

“John thought so,” William told her smugly.

Unaware of John’s bus pulling up in front of the pub, he added, “You saying he didn’t have your measurements? We all know how the man liked his ‘research’—”

Amy slapped his shoulder.

“You’ve got a dirty mind. Besides, you know he never let anyone get that close.”

“Not after Lucia,” Natalia grumbled, and Trevor snickered.

He caught her glare and stopped. William stepped into the gap.

“He said the pipes got a little narrower but he was sure you’d fit because you were smaller than we were.”

While this was true, neither of the girls looked impressed.

“So, what? We’re small and female so we get all the dirty work?” She jerked a finger at the pipe. “Do you have any idea what’s coming out of there?”

Trevor shrugged. “Should be rainwater run-off,” he said. “Nothing nasty.”

“Have you smelled it?” Amy hissed.

He shook his head. “I don’t go around sniffing drainage pipes.”

“Well, maybe you should before you send people up them.”

Amy pouted. “I still say it’s not big enough—especially if it gets ‘a little narrower’ farther in.”

William sighed impatiently. “Are you suggesting one of us can fit?”

Natalia glanced at the pipe. “I’m not saying John was wrong but I’ve got big hips.”

Baron chuckled. Unlike his mates who’d all reached the six-foot mark and had shoulders to make a Rugby star proud, he’d stopped growing at five-foot-eight.

“Tell you what,” he said, “I’ll strip my shirt off to compare the width of my shoulders if you’ll strip your jeans off to compare the width of your hips.”

The girl studied him from head to toe and her expression said exactly what she thought of his idea.

“Fat chance,” she said with a sniff and glanced at the pipe again as though measuring it with her gaze. After a minute, she looked back. “Fine, but if we see rats, we might blow this whole effort.”

“Well, now that’s settled,” William told them, “the boys and I are gonna head around to the other side and see if we can make them look that way, while you get up through the pipes and find whatever John thought was here.”

“Access.” Natalia hissed her impatience. “It was access, you idiot. We get in. Amy works her hacking mojo, and we get proof that re-education is merely a myth.”

She swallowed and her face went pale because if re-education was only a myth, there would inevitably be riots.

And they’d better not get caught because if they were, they’d be—

The girl pushed that thought aside. It was far better that she didn’t think about it. Someone had to bring the Regime down and stand up for all the people they hurt.

This was only the beginning.

Once people knew what they were doing, they’d retaliate. They wouldn’t simply stand aside.

She watched as the four boys hurried along the creek, then moved uphill to where the parkland stopped and the suburb began. A parking lot and the entrance to an underground garage made a convenient location for them to wreak some havoc.

Amy giggled softly as soon as they were out of sight.

“You have a pet rat,” she pointed out, and Natalia smirked.

“I know, but I wanted to make sure they weren’t taking diversionary ops so they could simply blow stuff up while we took the boring part.”

“You think they’d have allowed us along if John was still here?”

Natalia pursed her lips, then shrugged.

“It’s hard to say. He was the one who was supposed to go in to see what he could find.” She paused. “If he’d stayed, I was gonna ask him if we could go in with him.”

“Because of my ‘hacking magic?’” the other girl teased and poked her with her elbow, and she blushed.

“You know you can give John a run for his money, any day. No. I merely assumed three hackers were better than one. We could pull more data that way and maybe watch each other’s backs.”

“Uh-huh. Sure you did,” Amy teased. She studied the pipes. “Those look very snug.”

“John was much thinner than the other guys,” Natalia reminded her, not aware that he had left the bus stop and now hurried through the back streets behind two warehouses on the opposite side of the parking lot.

“Pfft. Whatever.” The other girl turned and approached the first pipe. “You want to give this one a go or see if any of the others smell better?”

____________

I wonder how many events in history actually went down like this. If we could look in on the dangerous mission from the past I bet we could see some teasing and snarky comments among friends. I can hardly wait to see if their mission is a success or not. I already pre-ordered my book, and you can too! This Halloween treat, The Heretic Lives, can be unwrapped first thing October 31st.

The Heretic Lives: The Heretic of the Federation Book #1

Sometimes the world around us ends up looking like something we never thought possible. It’s in these moments we must decide if the chance to make things better is worth dying over.

Paint peeled on the walls and the carpet underfoot was threadbare. John sat on the edge of the old couch left by previous tenants, careful to balance on the frame and not rely on the cushions.

Things moved in those and they stank of age—not to mention a pet that hadn’t been toilet-trained.

He rested his chin on his hands and his elbows on his knees and stared at the broken television. Despite his fixed gaze, he didn’t see it, nor did he see the wall or register the stench rising from the couch. His mind was a long way away.

At the top end of the city and in the foothills, to be precise. It seemed to have somehow returned to an upstairs room above a row of derelict shops from which he’d stormed out. He hadn’t been thinking all that clearly when he hurried down the back stairs and headed swiftly but cautiously into the night.

When he reached the alley behind the shops, he made sure his route was clear, bolted, and sprinted to prevent his mates from catching up. He knew they would try to change his mind.

They needed him, they said. The mission couldn’t go on without him.

Well, good, because he wanted them to live. The mission shouldn’t go on. It couldn’t if they were to survive. With him gone, their plans would hopefully fizzle and come to nothing.

He sighed, scrubbed his face with his hands, and ran his fingers through his hair to massage his scalp. It did nothing to ease the tension.

With him gone, he had honestly hoped they’d give up on the idea, scrap it, and forget he’d ever raised it.

John’s stomach churned and it had nothing to do with the burrito he’d lifted off an unattended plate at lunchtime.

His friends didn’t have the…the strategic know-how? The savvy? The… He hunted for the word and couldn’t find it. Well, whatever it was they needed to succeed and come through the mission alive. That was what they didn’t have.

They’d always relied on him for it. Without him, they should have given up on the idea and simply gone back to secretly wishing ill on the Regime like everyone else. They would have been disappointed and unfulfilled but safe.

He left and they abandoned the plan. That was how it should have gone.

Unfortunately, it hadn’t.

John stayed on the move for three weeks and in doing so, had effectively abandoned his final school year as he’d left before the exams. He had Talent. If he’d stayed, the Regime would have known for sure, so he’d put an end to all plans for the raid and left.

His friends should have settled into school again and would be close to graduation if they had kept their dumb heads down.

By now, he should have been gone long enough for the Regime to lose interest in them, but that wasn’t what he’d heard the last time he’d checked the underground grapevine.

Rumor had it that a group of kids from the North Shore were about to do something crazy. The news had stopped him cold but try as he might, he couldn’t pin down where on the North Shore they were from or exactly what they intended to do.

All he had was that it was crazy and he recognized Natalia and William from the descriptions.

“Fools,” his informant had confided and shaken his head. “There’s one born every minute, right?”

One of the others had snorted. “Yeah, and one dies every minute or so too. The Regime makes sure of that.”

That had changed the course of the conversation.

“But they’re only kids!”

John had faded into the background and moved carefully away.

That kind of talk in an open space?

Like the man had said, one died every minute.

The words that followed the protest still haunted him. “The Regime doesn’t care how old they are. They won’t put up with anyone who stands against ʼem. That girls’ choir a few years back—you know the one…”

Memory made the nausea stronger.

While he would much prefer not to, it was impossible to forget the girls’ choir. Rumor had it that a Talent had sung with them—or maybe more than one. Either way, they’d all been sent for re-education, his girlfriend among them.

And it had been two years before, not a few. He knew that because he’d looked forward to his girlfriend coming back and the Regime saying it had all been a mistake, but it had never happened.

They were always on the lookout for more Talents.

He shuddered.

The Regime. He’d grown up under it and he hated it. When he was little, he’d admired their Enforcers but that hadn’t lasted long.

His parents had been deathly afraid of them, and once they’d started taking kids out of his school, he’d learned to be afraid of them too. Anyone with Talent had an instant place in the Regime’s Navy—or instant death.

The Regime didn’t mess around and his friends intended to raid one of its facilities—the one he’d chosen—and probably used the plan he’d outlined.

John rested his head in his hands and stared at the floor. The churning turning into a lump at the base of his throat and the nausea grew worse.

This was all his fault. He should never have left them unsupervised.

Finally, he pushed to his feet and dragged his hands through his hair before he retrieved his jacket and pulled it on. Memories of their last conversation still haunted him.

He’d tried to get them to give it up and when they’d refused to listen, he’d told them he was out. As in gone, quitting, and good luck to them living through it on their own.

While he hadn’t meant it to be a challenge, at least one of them had taken it that way.

If he were smart, he’d leave them to it. There wasn’t anything he could do. Like everyone said, “You can’t save the stupid, mate.”

Except there was a difference between the stupid and his friends. Even if they were the same, he couldn’t simply leave them to face the Regime on their own.

The problem, however, was that he couldn’t work out what he should do. It wasn’t like he could defeat a Regime enforcement patrol on his own, not even with the Talent he’d hidden thus far.

John groaned and slung his pack over his shoulder. It was time to move.

He’d gone to the meeting ready to do whatever it took to keep his friends out of trouble and extended it into running away from home and the final round of Regime testing. Now, he would have to go back.

Concern for them helped to keep his frustration under control. He hoped he could come up with a plan to save his friends before he got there. While he was Talented, they were not.

However it went down, he knew he’d be fine. The Regime wanted to control the Talents. It gave them a choice when it caught up with them. Anyone else?

A shiver whispered involuntarily up his spine. Anyone else, not so much. Not from the rumors he’d heard. If those were true, he hoped trying to negotiate would buy his friends enough time to escape.

The idea made him snort. “Yeah, and maybe the Regime will let us all go and live in peace if we promise to be very, very good from now on. Give it a rest.”

His choices would be to join the Regime Navy or die, and they wouldn’t mess around. He’d be free, all right, in the Navy with a solid career and a gun to his head every remaining second of his life.

An uncomfortable churning in his gut contracted to form a heavy lump, and he swallowed to keep it down. Since they hadn’t given up, he hoped they had stuck to the plan.

At least that way, he’d know where to find them.

They would target the Regime Communications Center.

Before the Disaster, it had been open to the public. Now, the whole facility was surrounded by concrete walls some twenty feet tall and ten feet thick. The Regime had added guard houses on the hills overlooking it like it wanted to make sure no-one could take a peek inside.

That was what had drawn his attention to it. It became even more intriguing when he heard the rumors that destroying the center would do more than screw up the Regime’s communications capability for Australia’s east coast. He’d heard losing it would damage their international communications too.

John had found the idea appealing. Maybe if their communications went down, people would be able to—

He shook his head to cut off the wishful thought. The idea had sounded good the first time he’d bounced it off his friends but then he’d done some digging.

That was what the argument had been about. Destroying the Snake River complex would do jack to the Regime’s communications. There were back-ups.

All that would happen would be the Regime launching their retaliation with a vengeance and people in the northern suburbs would lose their Internet access for a couple of months.

He’d told the guys this, but William wouldn’t hear of it.

“You’re wrong, John,” his friend had said. “Dead wrong.”

“You’ll be the one who’s dead,” he had retorted, “and they’ll be able to phone home and brag about it.”

“You’re simply chicken.”

John remembered being shocked speechless. Chicken? Like, how old are they?

He set his pack down at the door, took the bottled water and an energy bar out of it, and shoved them into a jacket pocket. Leaving the pack on the floor, he looked around the room to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything.

A small box of tinned food stood on the table with a six-pack of water, and he’d left his blanket rolled beside it. He thought about taking them with him, then shrugged.

Even if he reached his friends in time, the chances that he could come out of this alive were slim. It would be better to leave it for someone who would get some use out of it.

Quickly, he felt in his pockets to make sure he had his keys. While the tenement was officially abandoned, someone made sure people paid to stay there and a couple of extremely big someones enforced it.

The keys were a passport in.

With his fingers curled around them, he headed to the door. The last time he’d seen his friends still played through his head.

Natalia had stepped in.

“Are you sure, John?” She’d sounded disappointed, but he couldn’t tell if it was in him or in the news he’d brought.

He’d nodded. “As sure as I can be. Even if we get in, all we’ll do is annoy them. They’ve got contingencies—”

“And you know this how?” William had challenged.

“It’s called research,” he had snapped.

“That’s not what you said when you first raised the idea,” Trevor had argued.

He was the sidekick, the one who was supposed to keep William in check and be a voice of reason if John’s ideas got too ambitious. That time, he’d challenged the safer path.

William was quick to follow his lead. “Yeah, man. You said it was the best plan you’d thought of so far.”

“And it was,” he agreed, “right up until I looked into it and discovered how many things I hadn’t known.”

“So why didn’t you look into them before you raised it?” Amy, Natalia’s friend had demanded.

“Because it might have drawn attention and I didn’t want to risk it unless you were interested.”

“So you got us interested without knowing all the facts?” William’s voice had risen and his face flushed with anger.

That was the moment when he had known the argument was lost, but his friend hadn’t finished.

“And when I say you might be wrong again and that there’s only one way to find out, what are you gonna do about it?”

That had been when he’d left. He’d honestly thought that would save them.

John sighed and pulled the apartment door closed behind him. He knew now that what he’d assumed had been dead-wrong. His friends were good kids but they didn’t think much before they did something.

All heart and no head, as his dad once said. He couldn’t remember why now, but it still rang true.

His mates were hot-headed and the girls weren’t much better. If he didn’t get to them fast, they’d vanish exactly like Lucia and he didn’t want to think about what it might mean.

The fact that they’d surfaced in the underground news was a sure sign of that. Everyone knew the Regime had agents everywhere. In addition, all kinds of people made money by selling what they heard.

His friends were in more trouble than they knew.

He took the stairs two at a time and pushed out the side entrance into a narrow street. A guy huddled in the doorway and scowled at the rain.

“Do you live here?” John snapped and the stranger jumped and looked guilty.

Before the man could say anything, he held his room key out.

“Apartment Twelve. It’s open. I’ve paid until the end of the month and left food on the table. It’s yours. I won’t be back.”

The vagrant hesitated like he was looking for a catch, so he tossed him the key and kept moving. He heard the jingle as he reached the narrow sidewalk and assumed the man had caught it but he didn’t look back.

A bus was about due.

He flipped his jacket hood over his head, thrust his hands into his pockets, and hurried to the bus stop.

_________

The Federation can’t be that bad can it? John wouldn’t have suggested the plan if he didn’t think it had a possibility to work, right? Stay tuned to see what plan John and his friends have come up with to disrupt the Federation.

Get the jump on downloading the First Book in The Heretic of the Federation Series: The Heretic Lives. Pre- Order is available NOW and the book will be fully ready to devour on Kindle Unlimited, October 31st.

Snippet #2 For The Unforgiven: Skharr DeathEater Book 1

Only two snippets in and already so many mysteries are building. Who is this old’un? Why is this DeathEater pretending to be something he’s not. Maybe a farm life is the better option…

In a forest as densely packed as the Druums Woodland, it was quite clear when one began to approach the perimeter. The trees began to thin, which allowed more sunlight to filter through the leaves and made it a brighter walk.

The old man’s knees and ankles continued to tell him that it was time to settle into a pleasant life of retirement in a location where there was enough civilization to protect him from the elements. But it was still a pleasant walk. Admittedly, it wasn’t the kind he made very often—not these days—and it was enjoyable despite the aches and pains that came with his age.

Turvall could see the edge of the forest ahead and he realized that his step had become a little more sprightly. Too much time spent in the murk and shadow of the woodland had left him desperate for clear sunlight. Of course, he would grow tired of it a few hours later, but it would be nice to feel the sun on his cheeks again, especially as the cool temperatures seemed to make things ache that hadn’t ached in years.

As the trees cleared, he needed to shield his eyes and allow them to adjust to the sudden brilliance. It was only a couple of hours past midday by the looks of it, which meant there would be a few hours of light before he needed to stop to set up camp.

When his eyes did adjust, he froze in mid-step and stared ahead with a puzzled expression that brought his bushy eyebrows down over his eyes.

“Who in the fiery godsforsken hell would try to farm this close to the Woodland?” he asked aloud.

Yern simply snorted, made no attempt to guess, and instead, chose to nibble the fresh green grass that grew beyond the tree line.

Nothing about the scene suggested an answer. A rough house made from hewn wood stood near a barn of similar construction. Beside the outbuilding, a few acres of open land had been cleared of grass and brushes to reveal rich, dark earth that had been tilled in anticipation of a crop being planted.

A man stood in the distance with his horse, but he could make no further details out.

“He is either an idiot or someone comfortable with violence.” He answered his earlier question and patted Yern’s rump. “I suppose we should find out what kind of man would risk taking up farming this close to the forest.”

There was nothing left to do but continue on the path that would lead him directly to the barn since the rich earth meant the grass grew thick and tall. Walking through it would be almost impossible. They continued with no attempt at haste before Turvall turned aside and walked over the soft, tilled earth.

Yern had no desire to follow him. The donkey simply came to a halt on the path, turned to the other side, and nibbled the grass nearby.

As the old man drew closer, the answer to his question became a little clearer. The man beside the horse was easily head and shoulders taller than he was. His broad shoulders were well-muscled, but the wide scars that marred his skin were difficult to ignore. They weren’t those that had been carefully tended by the caring hands of a skilled surgeon. He had seen scars like that. More importantly, he remembered the screams of pain from those who had been healed that way.

The stranger hadn’t heard him approach, likely because he berated the horse that pulled a crudely built plow. The language itself wasn’t unfamiliar to the old man, but the precise meaning was lost on him.

Still, their nature was not difficult to discern. The man made no attempt to strike or abuse the horse in any way but verbally. The animal seemed to pay no attention to him. Instead, it stood motionless and stared ahead like he wasn’t even there.

The beast was smaller than most farming horses, although larger and more powerful than those used for simple riding. This was a warhorse, which identified the man more than his size and scars did.

He paused in his verbal tirade, likely to breathe, and turned quickly, his hands raised and ready for a fight.

“You have keen hearing, warrior,” Turvall called before the stranger attacked him. He raised his hands in a placatory gesture, although he left his staff planted in the soft earth for easy recovery. “Have no fear, however. I did not intend to approach unheard, but your voice is quite deafening and the soft earth does make it difficult to hear footsteps.”

The man stood his ground but his fists lowered slowly to his waist. His eyes narrowed but his expression didn’t change as he studied the old man suspiciously. His hair had an odd, reddish-brown hue and was long enough to require being tied loosely with a strip of leather. A scar over his left eye made his appearance look more ominous than it was probably intended to, although the deep scowl and the tense muscles—seen clearly as his well-tanned skin was coated in a light sheen of sweat—left little doubt that he wasn’t to be trifled with.

Oddly, though, Turvall noted that he could discern no scent from the man. The horse was easy to identify and a man working hard in the afternoon should have been equally easy, but his olfactory sense found nothing.

“Do you speak the common tongue?” he asked, not comfortable enough to move until he was sure the man would not attack him. “Spriken gurral doves tiak?”

The stranger smirked as he tried to speak the tongue of the Western Clans to him and shook his head.

“Common,” he said simply.

“Excellent,” the old man answered and relaxed. “Do you mind? I think I can help with your horse troubles.”

A moment of consideration passed before the warrior took a step to the side and gestured for him to approach.

Turvall bowed his head slightly in thanks before he moved closer to the horse, avoided the range of the beast’s hind legs, and approached from the front.

“There now, greatheart.” As he moved closer, he realized the animal had almost as many scars as his master. These turned his gray coat white in crisscrossing patterns. He looked calm and his were ears up and attentive but otherwise, he showed no sign that he was bothered by the stranger who approached him. The old man reached into his sleeve, withdrew a bright red apple that he had been saving, and offered it slowly on his open palm.

The horse’s interest was immediately aroused by the sight of the fruit. He turned his head and his ears faced fully forward as his thick neck arched to reach the fruit and pluck it whole from his hand.

“You see,” Turvall said, speaking in a calm, quiet voice, “one attracts the bees with honey rather than vinegar. The secret to working with anyone is to give them a treat to move them in the direction in which you want them to go. Once momentum is achieved, alacritous work is easier, wouldn’t you agree?”

The warrior’s expression did not change and his sharp green eyes watched him carefully before he snorted and shook his head. “Large words, old’un. Speak simple.”

“Yes, they were,” he muttered and spoke under his breath. “But not too large for you, I think.”

The warrior showed no sign that he had heard what he said and continued to watch him. He resembled a drawn bowstring, ready to spring forward. 

It was time to change the subject. “What has you farming out here? You know the Woodlands is dangerous for all those who live in its proximity.”

The large man smirked. “Open lands near forest cheap.”

He wasn’t wrong, of course. No farmer in his right mind would willingly elect to earn a livelihood this close to the woods, no matter how fertile the soil was.

“Yes, well, there are ways to make a living that bring a great deal more coin than simple farming.”

“Not thief,” the warrior rumbled after a moment of thought. “Not guard. War over and need food. Winter comes soon.”

Another good point, the old man conceded silently. The stranger undoubtedly had a barbaric appearance, but that wasn’t all he could see in him.

“It’s spring.” He tugged his beard gently before he retrieved another apple from his sleeve, which again caught the horse’s immediate attention. “Winter won’t arrive for a good while yet.”

The barbarian raised an eyebrow. “Winter always comes sooner than expected.”

He noticed immediately that it was a complete sentence. It seemed as though the man tried to hide his intelligence behind a hard and brutish exterior.

“You don’t want to farm.” Turvall made an assumption but one that had too much evidence supporting it to ignore. “It’s not the life you would have chosen unless you felt you had to. If I were to give you another choice—one that would give you the means to live out the winter without needing to till the soil—would you take it?”

The man’s massive shoulders bunched into a shrug. “Depends on choice.”

“It always does. How does mercenary work suit you?”

“What kind?” 

He felt a twinge of exasperation. There was nothing in the warrior’s expression that provided the slightest clue as to whether he was willing to accept the offer or not. No hint of desperation lurked in his eyes, only suspicion of the man who had appeared at his farm and begun a conversation with him.

The old man had hoped to not have to share all his information yet, lest he be of similar mind as the brigands he had dealt with the day before.

But there was no way to avoid it now. “I have a contract from the Mercenary Guild in Verenvan to clear a dungeon of all dangers found within. It is worth a great deal of coin to any man brave enough to accept it. I would be willing to trade it with you in exchange for your farm and the horse. The house and barn are your work, yes?”

The barbarian nodded. 

“And the barn is full of seed for planting?”

Another nod was followed by, “Barley. Oats.”

“Perfect. What say you to the offer, then, my friendly giant?”

The man paused to think, and after a few seconds, extended his hand. Turvall couldn’t believe that it had been so easy, but as he reached out to take it, the man snatched it back. The barbarian growled, shook his head, and extended his hand again.

“Ah, yes, the contract,” Turvall muttered, fumbled in his coat, and drew the scroll clear. “It is wise of you to wish to inspect it before taking the deal, of course.”

Without so much as a word in reply, the barbarian plucked it from his fingers. Unlike the brigands—whose eyes had been drawn to the silver lettering on the side—his fingers immediately moved over the seal and brushed the wax lightly. There was no sign of the pain the other man had felt, but the furrowed brow vanished. It looked almost like the barbarian hadn’t expected him to tell the truth.

He handed the scroll to the old man. “Mark it.”

Turvall was no longer surprised that the stranger knew how to deal with contract scrolls. From his appearance, it seemed likely that he’d been employed by the guild at some point in his life. The old man scowled but did as instructed, pricked his thumb with the pin on his coat, and pressed it to the scroll. The bloody mark remained for a few seconds before it faded almost immediately, the sign that it had been given up voluntarily while he was still alive.

“Inside, you’ll find a map that will lead you to the dungeon and enable you to navigate its depths. If you can reach the bottom, there will be enough gold for you to live in any city in Rhuengeld for three years without having to lift another finger to support yourself. There will also be the bounty on the contract to collect from the guild, as well as enough of a reputation for you to gain any work you choose from this point forward in your life. It won’t be easy, of course, but nothing worth having in this world is.”

The wind brushed across the open farmland and made the only sound that could be heard for miles as the barbarian paused to think about what he’d said. The fact that he wasn’t one to rush into an engagement of this nature and away from the farm he had built showed more wisdom than most others the old man had met from the Western Clans.

Finally, the large man cleared his throat and brushed his fingers across his brow to clear the sweat that dripped into his eyes. “The farm. But not the horse. DeathEaters do not walk.”

Turvall’s eyebrows raised sharply. The name was familiar, of course. It would have been to any man, woman, or child east of the Youran mountains. Of the fifty Western Clans, DeathEaters were the most famous for the warriors they produced in the northern mountains where a living was unlikely to be made any other way. 

“I thought your people mostly raided or sold their services to the highest bidder to sustain The Clan.”

The man’s face softened. Not many people knew to address the DeathEaters correctly and in their chosen fashion. All other clans had names but theirs was The Clan—above the rest.

“Myths. DeathEaters farm as well. Difficult to farm in the mountains. Easy here.”

“Interesting. It is quite cold up there. They produce good food, though. The Clan certainly know their spices.”

“Summer sun shines all day. Food grows quickly. Winter is time to war and raid. Planting here is easy. For food and spice.”

Old memories returned to Turvall of the last time he’d seen the DeathEaters raiding. Battle cries had echoed chillingly through canyons while arrows the size of spears rained from above and men scaled the rocks like scorpicores. 

Winter was certainly not a good time to travel among the Western Clans.

“And what about the forest?” Turvall asked finally and shook the memories off like a bad dream.

“I hope something comes out. I can fight. If they stay in, I go after them myself.”

Which explained a few things about the uneventful nature of his trip through the woods—regarding the beasts that generally prowled there, at least.

“Well, then.” He nodded and folded his arms in front of his chest. “Do we have a deal, barbarian? The farm for the contract and you keep your horse, of course.”

The man nodded and extended his hand to take the scroll. “Skharr. To activate?”

“Simply break the seal. If it is broken by another without your mark, it will disappear and make it appear to be a fake. If you retrieve it, all you need do is seal it again and the map will show once more. I’m sorry—your name is Skharr?”

“Yes. Very well. I will collect my things and the farm will be yours.”

Again, the deep voice and foreign accent made it difficult to place him as anything but a brutish barbarian, but the clear and concise sentences spoke otherwise.

The easy slide from one to the other was intriguing, but it would have to remain a mystery. He had already unhitched his horse from the plow and clicked his fingers. Now free, the beast followed him willingly to the house and waited when he went inside. Turvall meandered after them, if only to get out of the heat, and Yern did as well to graze happily under the shade of the farm. 

It wasn’t long before the warrior exited the house, carrying a few packs. One looked like it held all the food he had, along with a few sacks of oats. Everything in the barn was to remain, of course, but the rest belonged to him.

He had weapons and armor too—a war bow almost as tall as Turvall himself while unstrung along with a quiver of long arrows were items he almost expected to see among the man’s possessions. A simple leather and bronze helm, as well as a leather gambeson, a battle-ax, and a simple wooden shield were all strapped to the saddlebags he slung expertly over the horse’s back once a plain saddle was in place.

The bridle and reins were neither elegant nor expertly made but simple and effective—as long as the horse and rider knew each other well.

Turvall could see no sign of the scroll. It was most likely tucked into the shirt or traveling cloak the man had acquired while inside.

“You think you can survive the beasts from the forest?” the barbarian asked while he strapped his belongings to the saddle. “Old’uns prefer living where no fighting is required for survival.”

He scowled and tried yet again to reconcile the image of the massive, curt barbarian with the sudden verbosity he displayed.

The seemingly effortless changes from one to the other remained intriguing, but he resigned himself to the fact that he would never know the story behind it. The scroll was out of his hands and into those that looked exceedingly capable, which left him little else to do but to see what else he had to live off.

“I can take care of myself,” Turvall answered and snapped his fingers to call Yern closer. “I’ve learned a few tricks over the years to keep myself safe without needing to engage in violence, even with beasts from the woodlands.”

The expression on the barbarian’s face revealed his doubt, but he seemed to decide that whatever happened next had little to do with him. If the old man had a mind to try to succeed against the beasts of the forest, so be it.

“Fare thee well on your journeys, Skharr,” Turvall called as he watched him and his horse leave.

________

I’m so ready to follow the DeathEater on his journey, I’m already rooting for him! I’m also hoping we will see more of Yern… he is stealing the show. My Advice, head over to Amazon and pre-order your copy of The Unforgiven. Then first thing on October 26th when the book is released you can jump right in.