Blue Fire (Toraun Part 14)

In the long history of man there have been many travelers. Some of them traveled no more than a few feet while others have traveled light-years and still others have traveled in time. Musaafir had only recently started to travel. His mother had given him the computer as a gift and told him that his father before him had used it. His father passed away several years before and so when he received the computer he quickly learned to use the ancient device. Once he learned what it could do he had quickly moved it out of his home and up to his cabin. The cabin did not compare in the least to his own home in the city, but he never had visitors drop by expectantly either. To those who asked why he left the city so frequently, he told that he found solace in the mountains.

Now, while he lay on the ground in Toraun, in a window sill he figured that his mountain cabin would be the perfect place for these two young women to stay. Besides, who wouldn’t want to help them out, especially since they had just saved his life? So, at this very moment Musaafir’s life changed forever. Some might say for the good and others would say for the worse. I’ll let you decide for yourself.

Alex chewed on her lip for a moment while she stared at the object in Sarina’s hand. The steam hound had a heart that ran off magic and as long as the magic continued to flow the heart would continue to beat. “Alex, you need to try and put magic into it or it’s going to go out,” Sarina said sternly. Alex looked at the bloody heart and nearly lost her stomach. Sarina wouldn’t have anything of the sort happen at this time and held the heart even closer. “You will do this or the entire town will be destroyed.”

The heart stunk. Seriously, it smelt bad and Alex had a right to lose her stomach over it. In fact I’m about to lose my own stomach as I write this, but since she had to be strong, I’ll be strong as well. And quite frankly so should you. Alex stood up and wiped her mouth and said slowly, “I’ll try.” She put the tips of her fingers on the heart and jerked back quick as it beat. She even yelped a little. Sarina glared at her. Alex shrugged then reached back to the heart and placed her fingers on the heart again. She closed her eyes and breathed in deep and almost choked on the stench. She shook her head and tried again. This time she turned her head from the heart and breathed in again then out. The magic in her had been unique to her and only a few others.

The origin of magic came from an unknown source or origin for that matter. It had come to Alex when she had only been a little child. The magic manifested in people in different ways. For her it had come in the form of blue fire. Now, as she held that heart in the tips of her fingers a funny thing happened.

See magic tends to react in odd ways depending on what’s happening at that moment and of course on how the writer wants the story to go. And at this particular moment both of those things happened, simultaneously. Yes, you might call fowl or something like that, but let’s face the facts I’m the writer and I’ll write it however I like. Wait, hold on that came out really bad. What I meant to say is that I will make sure that as I write the story I will follow the rules and hold true to the magic as I create it and yadda, yadda, yadda. Truthfully, though magic does act strangely and at this moment a very odd thing happened. You see, just at the very moment that Alex pushed her magic from her own being into the heart of the steam hound the heart died. When the heart died it released its magic and because Alex’s own magic had already started to enter the heart the channel between her and the heart opened. Kind of like a straw. Yeah that’s it just like a straw. Only this straw didn’t have milk or pop or some other kind of liquid running through it, it had magic running through it. Alex jerked back as the magic entered into her soul and fell to the ground unconscious.

The Tear (Toraun Part 13)

“Listen to me,” Sarina said. “We need to act quickly.” She shook Alex. “Are you listening to me?” By this time the realization of what they had done sunk in and Alex zoned. She just stood there and stared threw her sister at the steam hand. Its leg twitched. Alex lifted her hand the fire returned, but before she could release the fire, Sarina knocked her hand down. “Alex, we can get out of this. I promise you.” The tension left Sarina’s body and she relaxed. “We can do this.”

“Help,” Musaafir moaned.

Alex looked back at him her face went from white to red almost instantly. “This is your fault.” She stomped toward him. “You did this and now we’re all dead.” Musaafir could only look up at her as he lifted his hand up in front of his face. When she stepped inches from his face she leaned down low. Even though she whispered, the force of her words hit hard. Like a tornado. “You have doomed me, my sister and all of our people. Because of your carelessness you’ve destroyed an entire people.”

The trembles that ran up and down Musaafir’s body stopped. Now, Musaafir had gone on adventures before. He would walk through the lands and occasionally meet new people, but he had never done anything more than talk to them. He thought of himself as a good person and really tried to do his best to help those around him. He never wanted to harm others. Especially those he visited. Now, the realization of the damage that he may have caused distracted him from the pain. Thoughts of his past adventures flashed through his mind and he realized how careless he had been. He moaned again, but this time he moaned not for himself, but for all the people he may have hurt. “I’m sorry,” he said softly.

“What? You’re sorry. That doesn’t cut it. You need to fix this,” Alex whispered. Her whisper changed and grew even softer, but it cut even deeper. Musaafir’s heart broke completely as a tear dropped out of Alex’s eye and end its journey on his cheek. He couldn’t stop the tears that came to his own eyes.

Sometimes, even in comedies a message needs to be taught. Hopefully, we can all learn from Musaafir’s lack of thought for how his actions affect those around him. Now, of course I would like to add caution to this. We can also put way to much thought into our actions, but we must take responsibility for those actions. Thankfully, there are always consequences for actions. Those that bring greater happiness and those that bring greater sadness.

Sarina put her hand softly on Alex’s shoulder and said gently, “It’ll be okay. We can still protect our people.” She held out her hand in front of Alex’s face. “As long as we hold onto this and keep it alive. He’ll continue to search for us.”

Musaafir’s face brightened and he said, “You can come with me. He’ll never be able to find us where I’m from.” His face screwed up when he realized he didn’t know who the he was.

Death and Life (Toraun Part 12)

Toraunians pride themselves on their loyalty to their society and find that above all else community comes first. This is why, at this moment, Alex’s and Sarina’s faces drained of all color as they stared at the almost dead steam hound. They had just about killed one of Toranis’ hounds.

Toranis loved to tinker with metal, steam and a little bit of magic. He made some of the most amazing creations, but of all of them his favorite creations were those patterned after animals. He generally did not allow them near the Toraunians, because he did not want to cause too much trouble. However, on occasion he did let them loose on those who dared to leave his tiny flock. You see Toranis really isn’t that powerful of a God. In fact other Gods didn’t even recognize him as a God, because of his small following. This is why he came to Toraun in the first place. To establish a following. He has one small problem though, he cares more about his steam/metal/magic creations than he does of his followers. This of course is a problem when the way to recognition of Godhood is qualified by the number of your followers. So, Toranis continues to be rejected from the other Gods, uninvited to the Godly parties and balls, and completely left off all the other Gods birthday lists. Birthday lists? Yes you heard me right. The birthday of a God is the great day that they get added to the Birthday list and are recognized as a God. Goal: To be added to that birthday list. Problem: Enjoys playing with his creations more than gathering his followers.

This leads us back to a very important point. Toranis cares a lot more about his steam hound than he does little old Alex and her sister and even less about Musaafir. Here the two sisters stood dumbfounded that they had killed his creation. Well not killed but mostly killed. You see it still whimpered and whined as its gears whirred and its water and oil leaked all over the ground. “Maybe we can fix it,” Alex said. Sarina just gave her one of those, you’re an idiot looks, then looked at Musaafir still trapped in the window. This did help her mood a little. Alex, on the other hand,  threw her hands in the air and stomped back and forth as she muttered to herself, “Why did he have to knock on my door?” That really is a fair question to ask in her case and could use some explaining. But, not at this time.

Instead, let’s talk about an amazing opportunity everyone has at this moment. Yes, at this very moment. That is, if you are reading this on December 10^th – 11^th of 2014. Book one in my amazing, awesome, wonderful, spectacular trilogy is available on Amazon.com for free. Yes you heard me right folks. It’s free for the next couple of days and will give you hours of enjoyment and pleasure. You will be swept off your feet into a magical world.

“Not as magical as my adventure,” Musaafir interjects.

Hush Musaafir. I’m the writer and of course it’s more magical and exciting than your adventure. Otherwise, I’d be making money off your story and not the story of Tom.

“Tom. Tom, that’s all I hear about and of course that whiney Aithnea. I mean seriously the whole story doesn’t make sense. Have you ever seen those short films called How it should have ended?” Mussafir asks.

Stop, stop. You know I can completely destroy you. The next seen could go something like this; Alex in her wrath shoots a fireball at Musaafir frying him nicely. Musaafir grumbles and leaves the scene. Okay where was I? Never mind. I’m completely off kilter due to the interruption, so just go pick up book one of the Order of The Rose trilogy, Forsaken Petal, for free by clicking on this link. Yes the orange word that says link.

Let’s get back to the story so Musaafir doesn’t feel too bad. I guess I should feel sorry for him considering he is lying on the ground in a window right now.

Thankfully as long as energy continues to flow through the steam hound its life beacon stays on, but once that dies all bets are off. Sarina stepped in front of Alex and puts both hands on her shoulder. “You might be onto something.”

NOTE: I did notice an error on the last post and have corrected it. Please, keep in mind that I slave all day at a school and then come home to write for a few hours. Wait a minute I don’t need to explain I’m the writer not you you’re just the reader. On the other hand hopefully you will be buying my book so I better be nice. I’m so sorry for any errors I really try hard, but occasionally will miss a few. Wait, wait, wait. If there are errors then you are mistaken not me. Remember I’m the writer not you.

Silver Moon (Toraun Part 11)

Blood drizzled down Musaafir’s cheek and dribbled onto the ground below. He moaned. You know, one of those moans that tells everyone how hurt you are and that you really don’t care if you ever move again. That kind of moan, Musaafir only reserved for the most painful of times. He wouldn’t just let a moan like that escape his mouth for any little reason. Well, actually as you are starting to get to know Mussaafir you can probably guess that he moans more than the average guy. But let’s give him the benefit of the doubt this time. I mean really, did you just dive through a window? No, I didn’t think so. So here’s Musaafir lying on the cold, hard ground outside a window, while Alex and her sister are wondering at the noise. Alex rushed to the kitchen where Mussafir had a fight with the window. Her sister, on the other hand, ran to the outside of the house and peered around the corner. Alex’s sister just stared at the hapless Mussafir as he laid on the ground. He moaned a second time and she did the unthinkable. She burst out in laughter. Not the little spiff of a laughter. You know the one that embarrasses you because it sounds like snort. No, not one of those laughs. One of those laughs could have been mistaken for something else and saved Mussafir a world of embarrassment. No, this laugh made her fall to the ground and roll back and forth in uncontrollable laughter. Alex on the other hand, gave one of those spiff laughs and thankfully, as you will find out sometime down the road, Musaafir didn’t hear her laugh, at this, his time of unbearable pain.

Now, before you get all upset at the sisters laughing at Mussafir in his time of pain, you need to understand he looked pretty funny. In fact, as I write this I can’t help but smile at the predicament that Mussafir got himself into. Here he is in an unknown land with a steam hound howling in the night and he jumps out the window and traps himself. You see this window had some crossbeams that ran across it and divided the window into four parts. Mussafir broke the middle vertical board. This allowed for his right arm and head to go through the window so that when his chest squeezed through the frame it squeezed back and popped out of the house. This stopped his momentum, which left his head and forearm resting on the ground while his bottom half hung inside the house. This sight would have left both sisters on the ground laughing if it hadn’t been for the howl.

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The howl came closer and Alex shouted, “Sarina. Hurry.” The blue flame reappeared in the palm of her hand and Sarina jumped to her feet with the shotgun in hand. Sarina swung around and fired just as the hound lunged at her. The shotgun blast sounded off the house and echoed through the valley. The steam hound reacted just as quick and in midair changed angle to avoid the pepper of steel balls that raged toward it. Sarina swiveled and fired again. Mussafir answered the bang with a moan of his own. Steam hissed from a torn hose on the steam hound. Sarina screamed out as hot liquid sprayed her legs. She jumped back and at the same time whipped out a pair of pistols. Bang. Bang. The shots rang out as fire flashed from the barrels. Seconds later a ball of blue fire streamed past Sarina. It exploded into the ground a second after the steam hound jumped and landed in a heap. The howl now a whimper as its metal surface reflected the silver moonlight.

The Window (Toraun Part 10)

Let’s see where were we? Oh Yeah, Alex is getting chewed a new one by her sister, while Musaafir is. Wait a second, where did he get off to. Oh yeah that’s right. Now, you wouldn’t have known this since I’m just barely telling you, but Musaafir didn’t just sit there as Alex went for the door. You see, as Alex reached for the door Musaafir took this opportunity to jet through the only opening he could find, which happened to lead into a small dining room. After he realized that he could only escape through a small window. He jumped clear through it, glass and all. Now you might ask yourself. How smart is Musaafir? I mean how long does it take to open a window anyway? Well the answer to question number one is a question in turn. How long would you stop and think about opening the window when you could just dive straight through it. After all, I just got through scaring you to death two days in a row between the howling steam hound and the pounding on the door? You have plenty of time to think about how stupid it would be to jump through a window. That’s all right take your time. You have all the time in the world as you sit in your comfy chair and eat who knows what, while you read this amazing story.

Speaking of which, how many friends have you referred to this amazing story? I sure haven’t seen any new likes or follows. You see this writing stuff really is hard, and it takes quite a bit out of a person. My fingers are raw, (not really) I cry myself to sleep over the lack of follows (only sometimes) and my brain hurts real bad (well tonight it does anyway, because of the massive headache). But I keep writing. Trying to lure you to my blog so that you’ll notice over on the right hand side the real reason….

Hold on just one cotton pickin minute here. I write because I enjoy it. I want others to feel good and get a good laugh out of this amazing, wonderful story. I could care less if they took the time to write comments, email their friends about it, or buy my books that are only $2.99 on Amazon.com right now. That’s right only $2.99 is all it takes to have countless hours of enjoyment. One simple….

Wait, wait, wait this is not a commercial. Let’s just get back to Musaafir, Alex, her sister and of course the steam hound. By the way the answer to question two really does depend upon several factors such as: how is it closed, is it painted shut, is it too heavy to lift, is it being held down by anything (I don’t know maybe an elephant or something. Don’t ask obnoxious questions) etc…etc…etc….

Anyway Musaafir dove through the window at the exact moment that Alex’s sister started to accuse Alex of bringing down the entire destruction of their people. The loud crash of course stopped her and she quickly pulled the shotgun from her back. Alex, didn’t miss a beat either as she focused on the inner energy within her. Within seconds, no nano seconds, a small ice ball formed in the palm of her hand. Musaafir on the other hand, immediately realized his mistake as he lay bleeding on the hard, cold ground. How did he think it would end? Seriously! I’ll tell you how. You see Musaafir had seen plenty of movies where people dove through windows and were just fine afterward. So, he figured that he would be just fine as well. The problem with his thinking is he forgot one very important thing. Movies are much different than real life.

The Sister (Toraun Part 9)

The knock on the door sounded hollow as everything stood still within the small house. Alex's mouth dropped as she stared at the door. Musaafir held his breath. Thud. Thud. Thud. The knock came again. "Open the door or I'll knock it down." The voice that sounded through the door sounded much to high pitch to really instill any fear, but given the circumstances, Musaafir's knees knocked together. "Alex," the voice came again. "I know you're in there and I'd rather not knock in your door." Now you would think that once a face had been drained of blood that it couldn't get any whiter, but in this case it did. She pushed herself up off the ground and slinked toward the door.

"I'm coming," her voice squeaked. Now, at this point Musaafir had lost all courage and he found himself sniveling on the ground. She reached for the doorknob. It shook as she clasped the knob and then twisted. She pulled the door open just as a flash of lightning streaked across the sky illuminating the most...

This is probably the most obvious point to let you know about one of our commenters.  April is one of the most amazing people in all the world. I know this on good authority. She has always been a great support for my books and has edited and read everyone of them even before they were released. This is one reason my books have done so well!! So if you ever get a chance to meet her consider yourself very lucky.

Alex fell backward as the door swung open and slammed against the wall. The bang of the door made the entire house shake like jello. The woman's glare would have scared a ghost away due to its intensity. She stood in the doorway with her hands on her hips. A sword handle and shotgun butt stuck up from behind her back while a bracer of pistols hung at her side. Her white blouse stuck to her black undershirt forming around her physique body. Her brown, leather pants shimmered as another lightning strike slashed across the sky. Great drops of rain water dropped of her hair and created a puddle beneath her brown, leather boots. "Alex, what have you done."

"Nothing, it wasn't me. Sister, you have to believe me."

"Sister," Musaafir whispered.

The Chow (Toraun Part 8)

Steam hounds are a mix of machine and an ancient bit of magic. The creator of a steam hound takes bits and pieces of steel, tubes, flesh, springs, more flesh, and gears. The creator will then fashion the steam hound into, well, honestly however he wishes. I mean he is the creator, and so he can do whatever he wants, right? He will then use a mix of necromancy and golemancy to create a rotting heap of pure nastiness. The steam hound has an internal burner that boils water into steam which in turn turns several different gears that makes it move. Its brain and muscles bind to the metal, springs and gears holding it all together nice and neat. This Steam hound has often been mistaken for a hell hound. They have similar names and are both mean as… well mean as anything I know. So if I were you and I saw one of these hounds, either a hell hound or a steam hound, I would run as fast and as far as I could.

Speaking of which, one time when I served a mission in California I had an experience with a hound. No, no, not a hell hound or a steam hound. Those are fictional creatures and really don’t exist, at least not that I know of. On the other hand they may exist in another dimension. You know steam punk is the idea that instead of coal our world turned to steam to power its way through… well, history. So, I guess there is always the possibility that a steam hound could exist in another dimension. Anyway, back to my story that’s real. My companion and I sat on a nice cushy sofa while our host sat on a chair closer to me. He had just finished telling us about how his dog, a chow, had just clamped down on a friend and they had used a pan to beat it in the head until it loosened its grip; when his friendly (not really) chow walked around the corner. I looked at his dog and it looked at me. My face went white and it charged. Now thankfully the dog’s owner was quick. I still remember the slobber on my pants leg. The moral of the story: run from steam hounds, hell hounds and any other kind of hound.

Oh yeah this isn’t about me, but Musaafir.

“I didn’t do anything,” Musaafir said a little too quickly. His eyes widened as he heard the howl pass through the wall like paper. The howl actually helped him think a little bit about the short time he had been on Toraun and he realized that perhaps, just maybe he had done something.

Alex, still close enough to smell, leaned in even closer. Now, even though Alex looked like an elvish Goddess from Musaafir’s dreams he could tell that he didn’t want to cross her, much less lie to her. So, when she said, “Tell me everything that you did since the moment you arrived here.” He spilled his guts without hesitation. By the time he reached the part about shooting the bird Alex’s face had completely drained of blood. “You…” She looked at him in astonishment unable to finish.

The howl sounded even closer and Mussafir jumped out of his skin. “What?” His voice sounded much louder than he wanted it to. He put a hand over his mouth and said much quieter, “What did I do?”

Alex shook her head and mumbled, “We’re all dead.”

Now you might be thinking this is the end of the story, because there is no way I can get Musaafir out of this mess. Let me tell you something though. Musaafir is rather handy and remember he may not be the bravest man alive, but he has age on his side. See just because he’s young here doesn’t mean his mind is young. Wait that may count against him….

So while you contemplate the fate of Musaafir you might take a moment to check out an amazing blog (http://positiveletters.blogspot.com/) where Hillary really knows her history. I can guarantee you that she will support my claim that in all of our history, in this dimension, there has never been report of a hell hound nor a steam hound, so you can sleep easy tonight. However, there really are chows and they are just as mean. Don’t let the picture fool you. I repeat don’t let the cute cuddly picture fool you. You’ve been warned.