Ok, here it is...

This is brand new for me, and for right now I intend to keep it simple. This site, which is by no means intended to be permanent, is for debuting my first novel "The Black Directive." I'm going to attempt to have a full blurb finished tonight, but the basic premise of the story is based in the dark fantasy genre. There's plenty of suspense, growth, dry humor, pain, sorrow...as well as a bunch of bad ass fight scenes that center around a hard ass (but emotionally flawed) female main character with staggering anger issues. The first chapter of the completed manuscript will be posted after the jump, and I plan to put up a few sample chapters shortly. For those of you who do decide to go on this ride with me, be warned: This isn't "Twilight." It isn't "The Hunger Games." It isn't, nor was ever meant to be, some teeny bopper love novel. "The Black Directive" and all of the ensuing novels (of which there are five) is vicious, violent, angry, and fast paced. Many changes to this temporary site are coming, but for now, enjoy...

Year Eight: The Night

I remember the rain bringing me back.

Soft drops pattered across my cheeks, my forehead, my lips, as my eyes slowly opened. Hazy as my vision was, I was greeted with the sight of the clouds I was staring up at, illuminated in soft gray by the sharp cracks of silent lightening dancing behind their curtain. My vision was swimming, shifting back and forth as I tried to make sense of what was happening. Something wet and viscous shifted under the back of my head, and as I gradually regained my senses I realized that I was still lying in the mud where he had thrown me.

 I coughed, roughly, as the air that had been forced from my lungs found its way home. Head ringing, I rolled my chin to the side and looked at the shadowed buildings that made up the wide square of the Market. The torch lamps positioned around the area, sputtering from the drizzle, cast black shadows across the front of the buildings, causing them to look bigger, more sinister.

 Didn’t notice them at the time, though. As my eyes gradually focused, the only thoughts in my mind were of my mother, Alice, who braids my hair and makes dolls for me out of her old dresses, and Dail, my father, who tosses me in the air and tickles me until I scream.  The mud squelched beneath me as my eyes danced around, searching for them.

All I found, that night, was the remnants of who they used to be.

     My mother was lying on her back, her unblinking eyes staring at me, blankly. Daddy, only a couple of feet away from her, was face down in the wet earth with one arm flung out towards her as if trying to reach her hand. It probably would have looked sweet and tragic (and trust me, I know tragic) if he hadn’t had the majority of skin and flesh flayed from his back to expose the red meat of raw tissue and glistening white bone of his ribcage.

This isn’t real, I told myself as I looked at the two lifeless mounds that used to be my Mommy and Daddy. My head was still swimming as I thrashed in the mud, struggling to rise as my sodden dress tangled up between my legs. Just as I had gathered in a horrified breath to scream a massive weight settled across my body, forcing me back into the mud. The built up scream whispered between my lips in a wheezing gush as I turned my head up to gaze into the eyes of a nightmare.

I didn’t know it at the time, but his name was Marco and he was second only to Jabrom, the Lord Proctor of Oris. I’d never seen him before, but his face would stay with me for the rest of my life. He held me down with his forearms, but dragged his right leg over my stomach until he sat astride my hips, straddling me, pushing me deeper into the wet earth. I thrashed about wildly, trying to get away, but he was too heavy and held me down easily. I laid back in the mud, my chest heaving in fear and desperation, looking at the Wendingo that was about to kill me.

Long, lank, greasy white hair hung across his face and dangled about his chin, but did nothing to obscure the completely black eyes that stared back at me with a sadistic intensity. Garments that had once been fine were now tattered and covered in the mud that he had been wallowing in. Even in the dim lighting his skin was far too pale, and drooped from his cheek bones as he snarled at me, revealing teeth that were sharper than they should have been. Bloodless lips curled back over his gums in a maniacal grin as he began to cackle insanely.

“Little girl,” he began, his voice a poisonous hiss, his breath drifting across my face, “don’t be scared.”

He stopped speaking for a moment, overcome by a gale of insane, cackling laughter. The chortles trickled off, and once he had regained himself he turned those black demon eyes back on me, his face falling slack.

“I can smell you,” I mumbled with a low intensity, his words almost unintelligible as they slipped through teeth that had grown too sharp, too quickly. There was something dire about the way that he said it, and I started to thrash from beneath him, my muscles filled with the strength of fear.

My thin arms lashed out, but didn’t accomplish much more than splashing mud on my cheeks before Marco slipped forward over my torso, pinning my elbows with his knees. He gripped me firmly by the jaw with one hand, turning my face towards his in a grip that couldn’t be denied. Free though they were, my hands fell to my sides as I gazed into those black depths, the tail ends of my hair drifting across the knuckles holding my chin firm.

“Little girls,” he began, his voice soft as he straddled me, almost apologetic as he pointed over to the tattered remains of what used to be my parents, “they shouldn’t see such things.” I whimpered.

“Shush,” he continued, gripping my chin in one hand and placing a pallid finger across my quivering lips. “There’s no reason to cry; I can fix it.” His face, solemn for the moment, cracked wide in a brittle smile. The finger across my lips vanished, but reappeared immediately as he used his free hand to trace a sharp nail gently across the skin of my hairline. “I can do anything. You’ll never have to see this again.”

The jagged fingernail on my forehead paused, and a deep sense of dread filled me just before the gentle touch curled into a claw. Nails sharp as tacks dug into the skin high over my right eye, causing me to scream as they pierced deep. Marco halted, flinching at the sound of my wail and drew his hand back, the tips of his talons already bright red in the moonlight.

“What?” he asked, genuine confusion gleaming in his black eyes. “Why do you scream? This is for you, my dear, for you, so that you don’t have to be afraid ever again.” He drew his hand further back towards his head, nails already coated in my blood, and paused. The black eyes left mine as his head twisted to the side and I could practically hear the creaking of bones and stretching tendons as his nose drew level with his fingertips.

 “Oh,” he hissed, his voice distant as his nostrils flared wide, drawing the scent in deep. “This is good.”

            He paused for a moment, still as only the dead could be, and then violently shoved his hand into his mouth. Fingers disappeared down his gaping gullet as his jaw worked grotesquely up and down, gnawing at his own hand as he tried to consume every drop of my blood. The macabre scene was too much for me to watch, and my eyes flicked back and forth as I lay in the mud, searching for someone to come to our aid.

            The tears streaming out of the corners of my eyes made the streetlamps blur, and I could only see indistinct silhouettes of the many towns’ people gathered at the perimeter of the square. Blurred shadows of people, holding their loved ones close, blending into blurred shadows of buildings, staying at a safe distance to watch while the demon straddled me.

No one lifted a hand to come to our aid.

Finished with his hand, Marco lapped languidly at his own knuckles where his teeth had opened new gouges that leaked black blood. His pale tongue dragged slowly across his fingers as his eyes twitched back to me. “Oh,” he said, as if suddenly remembering I was there. “Yes, that’s right.”

“Now,” he continued as if there had been no interruption, placing his talons back on my bloody brow. His black eyed gaze bored into mine. “Remember, whatever happens, I’m doing this for you.”

I began to shriek as the claws, piercing and burning, started to drag down my face, digging into my eyes. The pain was staggering, tearing the breath from my lungs to leave me wheezing, and I could feel a toxic fire dipping into my body. My limbs began to shake and spasm as I struggled to breath.

“You’ll never see anything bad again,” he cooed before erupting in another gale of insane laughter while I screamed in agony. I don’t know what hurt worse: the pain of his filthy claws dragging though the skin of my face, or the sickening fire that was beginning to burn through my blood. The pain started to reach a crescendo pitch, causing my senses to warble, when another sound joined it. Focused on my own pain as I was, I didn’t really hear it, but the new sound was a trumpets’ herald for the man who saved my life.

My eyes clenched against the pain, I continued to scream as Marco’s laughter assaulted my ears. The new sound drew closer, louder, filled with fury and anguish so heartbreaking to hear that I felt like I was to be blamed. A deep concussion wracked through Marco, reverberating into my own body. His weight was lifted off of me, his claws coming free from my eyes although they still managed to drag deep furrows down my face.

Sobbing, I gritted my teeth against the pain, biting into the heels of my hand to stifle the screams that were still trying to force their

way out of my throat. I tried to open my eyes, but the right one wouldn’t respond. The left one did as I required of it, but my vision was awash in blood. I swiped the palm of my hand across my eye to clear it, careful of the sea of agony that was the right side of my face.

            My eye cleared, but my view was obscured by a massive silhouette standing over me. At first I thought it was Marco, but I quickly realized that the newcomer had his back to me, standing over me protectively. In the dim light, it took a moment for my addled brain to realize he didn’t have a shirt on, and that dense muscle filled a back covered with coarse, dark hair. The hair on his head was braided into a thin strand that ran half way down his naked back, and it shifted against his heaving shoulders.

I just wanted to cry.

            I rolled over onto my side as the rain grew heavier, wishing that the mud would just suck me down into its depths, and looked between the spread feet of the newcomers’ legs to where Marco sat crouched in the mud. He was propped on both hands and a knee, with one leg splayed out straight behind him like a rabid animal. Almost fearfully, I allowed my eye to trail up to his face, but those black eyes weren’t watching me anymore. They were focused on the hulking figure standing over me.

Grunting, Marco cocked his head to the side and I saw that there was only a sodden mess where the left side of his jaw used to be. Black ichor dripped from his broken teeth to the top of his knuckles as he worked his lips up and down. Horrified, I glanced up at the stranger standing over me and noticed a massive work hammer dangling from his hand.

Marco’s mouth opened wide as he hissed with hatred, dark fluid dripping from what remained of his lower jaw onto the ground and into the matted strands of hair hanging down his face. His body bunched, muscles clenching, in the split second before he leapt from the ground. He hurtled forward like a lion at a stag, arms extended at the stranger standing over me while I cowered beneath his feet.

With no hint of warning, the strangers’ free hand struck straight out, catching Marco in mid-air by the neck. A quick pivot of his legs and a vicious snap of his arm, and he’d slammed Marco on his back in the mud right next to me. The muck beneath him squelched, splashing yet more on me, as the stranger’s hand, the one holding the hammer, began to move. He held it high for just a moment, the flickering light of the torches glinting off of the dull head, before slamming it down on Marco’s thrashing head with brutal force.

The sound was sickening, a wet and sodden crunch, and I can still recall it to this day. The stranger wasn’t done yet, though. Despite the accuracy and force of the blow, Marco was still thrashing on his back, his heels kicking into the mud as he tried to force the stranger’s hand away from his throat. The hammer fell again. And again.

And again.

Over and over, the stranger’s arm worked like a rotating wheel while he roared, pummeling every inch of Marco’s now lifeless form. A slip in the mud and he fell to his knees, but the hammer continued to fall as rain splattered across his back.

After what seemed like an eternity, the arm wielding the hammer ceased its’ constant spin and fell limp by his side as the stranger pushed himself to his feet. He staggered to the side a bit, revealing what was left of Marco and to my single working eye it looked like red oatmeal housed in clothes and boots.

 His back and shoulders were heaving with exertion as he lumbered to the side, tripping over my ankle and falling to his hands and knees once more. The hammer, stained black along its length, fell to the side in the mud a few feet away, forgotten, as the stranger turned his bearded face to me. I remember how my soul shriveled in new found terror.

The huge man’s eyes were wide, the pupils dilated as far as they would go. His jaw was slack, his expression manic, and a trail of saliva dangled from his lips. His distant gaze focused on me with a dazed intensity as his slack lips worked, trying to form a sound.

“Alyssa,” he mumbled, almost unintelligible, as he stared through me with that blank gaze.

            My eye, my face, burned like a fresh brand, and the poison in my blood felt even worse, but there was something about the stranger that I feared even more. Who is Alyssa? I wondered as I tried to scoot away, the stranger crawling towards me. I was too weak, though. The pain and poison were too much to overcome, and I just couldn’t fight anymore as the stranger’s face loomed over my own. I whimpered, closing my eye as I pressed my palms once more against my face.

            Gentle arms scooped under my legs and back, lifting me easily. I started to squall, but the thick arms tightened, holding me in a firm, protective grip to his chest. “Don’t worry, Alyssa,” he mumbled into my ear. “No one’ll hurt you anymore.”

No one will hurt me anymore? I thought to myself.  I hurt now.

The rain pattered against my cheek as I whimpered against his chest.  Rolling my head over, I forced my left eye open to gaze at my mother for the last time.  She was lying in the mud, same as she had been before. Her wide eyes were blank, but I imagined that she was looking back at me, telling me goodbye as I bobbed in the strangers arms as he carried me away.

The pain and fear finally became too much to bear. With a roar like a crashing wave, blackness claimed me, pushing me away from consciousness and into oblivion.