an imperial legend saves a whore’s daughter –
and ushers in the end of the world.
CHARACTERS | ILLUSTRATIONS & MAPS | EXCERPT 1
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ASADA
“Innocence is not a virtue.”
Avestine (Asada) and her brother, Avestar, are children and heirs of the Architect, the legendary emperor who established Darklaw and brought half the world under its dominion. They are twin flames, burning with ambition and arrogance, but she is the brightest light and the true Emissary of Arujan. She is also a fugitive, pursued by bounty hunters greedy for gold and spiritual warriors compelled to serve. Her brother sits on the throne, having murdered their father with the belief that the gods would grant him all the powers of life and death. But the gifts of the gods belong to the Emissary. As long as she lives.
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KAMI
“Truth, not a person, is the spring from which duty flows.”
Raised in a brothel, Kami has seen more lust and violence in her childhood than most people see in a lifetime, and she is more confused about the difference. She has always found solace in the forest — not because it is safe, but because it is honest. The beasts live without the need to lie because they live without the burden of pride. They experience life in an immediate and often terrifying way. The “lower order”, as others describe it, runs hot-and-cold, and Kami knows it is only man’s world that wallows in tepid waters. To consume, to create life, to be consumed. These are the essentials for Kami and any Essanti of Instinct — those spiritual warriors who serve the Emissary through powers of the beasts. But can the Wild be tamed, even by the might of Darklaw?
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ROOK
“Love is a wound, and only the Emissary can heal it.”
Rook is an Essanti of Justice, whose prayer of judgment can kill the undeserving. A man of profound faith, his focus shifts in a blink from what he sees to what he believes without the burden of recognizing the difference. Like the structure of a solemn temple, his face nuances severity in each scar and promises an answer for every hope. Although many wonder how he came to lose both hands, they wonder even more how he manages to survive without them. He has served Avestine since they were children and no conscience interferes when it comes to protecting her. His single act of disobedience was a refusal to die at her command, a refusal to leave the Emissary unprotected.
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(Click thumbnail below for the larger image)
MAP OF THE WORLD
“Kingdoms of the World in the Age of Imperial Darklaw”
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MYSTICISM OF THE ESSANTI
“Pah Gol: Revelations of the First World”
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Excerpt 1
Kami Discovers Asada
The dim sunrise filtered through red glass, but the gloom haunting the temple’s vestibule didn’t deter Kami. She entered the sanctuary, passing through curls of sooty smoke from an oil lamp before stopping at one end of the altar. A wooden statue sat on the floor, dozens of sacrificed pigeons at its feet, and kneeling before the statue of the Unsetting Sun was a pious silhouette. The silhouette finished its prayer with a touch to its forehead before turning like a bull facing a tormenter.
Kami tensed as she stepped close enough to see the woman she had been tracking for nearly a year. Cords of muscle twitched in the woman’s bare arms. Her sleeveless tunic hung belted over her trousers. Ties cinched the frayed hem of each leg around the auburn patina of her boots. After a moment, a satchel slid into a heap on the stone floor, and the woman stepped toward Kami as if she would attack. She turned instead and vanished behind the altar.
Although Kami had lost sight of her quarry, she heard the rush of angry breaths through a wet mouth and smelled the sweat of a body’s hard labor. Once she fixed on a quarry, every sense took on a consciousness of its own. The scent embraced her, sinking into her skin like the damp air of a cave, like something mysterious and powerful.
The hunt drew Kami from the city into the forest. In the land of the Unsetting Sun, night came only in the thick of the trees, and she found it suddenly when she stood alone and lost. Like twisted snakes, the verdant growth blocked all but a few rays that lit the air in sparkles above her. The pungent musk enticed her, stealing her attention and leaving her with an ear-pounding silence. In her distraction, she stumbled against a moss-covered trunk and slipped from its support. She lost her balance and leapt off a ridge. The ground rushed up at her until her boots hit the dirt, and the violent impact buckled her knees. A boulder stopped her tumble down the embankment.
Angry hands seized her and shoved her face into the cold current of a stream. She flailed until her chest burned for the relief of a single breath. In a last moment of strength, she twisted free. Too desperate to look back, she crawled away, grasping at the water as if it could pull her to safety, but the hands seized her again and dragged her through mud. She heard the wet slap before she felt the sting from the woman’s hand.
“He sends children!” The woman clutched Kami’s hair in one fist and shook her. “Is coin all your pitiful life’s worth?”
Kami tried to catch her breath as she peered up into two slivers of blue ice, eyes as cold as the water that had nearly taken her life. When the hand dropped her, she fell into the leaves, relieved to be alive, relieved to have completed her journey.
The woman hopped onto a large rock and squatted on her heels, one hand on her knee, the other on the stone, keeping herself lightly balanced, as if she were a panther ready to pounce. Kami propped herself against a tree, but when the tree strangely shed its bark, she slid, stopping only after she thudded against the rock where the woman crouched.
“You should find different work.” The woman’s voice was deep. She fondled her queue of golden hair as the fierce blue of her eyes calmed into the aquamarine of a sun-drenched sea. “The Trade Empire is no place for a child alone.”
“I’m not a child.”
“Are you alone?”
“My knee hurts.”
“You’re no bounty hunter.”
“You’re Avestine of the Hunt.”
“My name is ‘Asada’.”
“You stopped Darklaw at Agate Bay ten years ago. You led my village into battle when Darklaw soldiers came. You drove them back into the sea. You saved us.”
Asada’s eyes narrowed several times as she looked over Kami. “What do you want with Avestine?”
Kami didn’t know what she wanted, exactly. “Darklaw has returned. The legions burned Elderwood again, and there was no one to stop them from taking Featherwood, too. Agate Bay is cut off, and I don’t think they’re leaving this time. I think they’re coming to the Trade Quarter. Avestar will do what his father couldn’t.”
Asada pulled Kami to her feet. “You’re lucky I didn’t kill you.”
Kami took a few steps to test her knee, which was weak. “I’ll need help back to Queenscourt.”
“That’s not a safe place for a girl.”
“I’ve already been there for three days. I know who to avoid.”
“You can’t even avoid confusing a villager buying supplies with an outlaw.”
“You didn’t buy supplies. You bought a two-day whore at the worst tavern in town.”
Asada’s eyes narrowed again as she seized Kami’s arm. “I’ll take you to Riverside. Your knee can heal, and then you can go back where you came from.”
…
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COPYRIGHT NOTICE
DARKLAW
Copyright © 2008 by Teresa Wymore. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be used or reproduced in any form without permission, except as provided by the U.S. Copyright Law. http://www.teresawymore.com
Feel free to delete this, but when is this (or any) book being published? I want to read everything you write… Even that lesbian erotica book you gave me… your story kinda threw me a little (it’s like thinking of mom and dad.. you know… together) but it’s a good read. So when do I get to read all your stuff? LOL
Too funny, J
… Darklaw should be out late 2009, and I’m looking forward to seeing it, too! Can’t wait to share Asada & Kami with readers, while I’m getting busy on the sequel, Darklord.