BLURB CONTEST!

A complete copy of Gathering of Rain (eBook) FREE for the best blurb!

This writer needs fresh minds to structure an attractive paragraph!

The winning blurb will be used to market Rain across varied sites, with an acknowledgement. And will appear on the paperback version!

Go to http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/29882

or

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Gathering-of-Rain/Elaina-Davidson/e/2940011134791/?itm=1&USRI=gathering+of+rain

and download the free sample (yes, this will drive download numbers up- always great- but not the main purpose!) and have a read.

Listed below are a few concepts found in Gathering of Rain to help you:

Rain of the Mantle
Guardians of the Dome
Maghdim Medaillon
Ruby of Enlightenment
Infinity, the dara-witch
Margus, the Darak Or
Great Dividing Forest
Otherworld, Rift, Arcana, Lost Race, Soltakin, Epic, Seers and Sorcerers, Swords…

Post a link to Rain’s blurb below or email your entry to davidsonelaina@gmail.com

Remember to tell me where to send your FREE copy of Gathering of Rain!

Deadline: 20 December

Thanks!

Stay or go?

The city was deserted due to the ferocious storm, which was bad indeed, and a harbinger of worse to come. There was not a soul on the eerily howling streets, but lit windows everywhere signified that all was well. Of course, the folk of Galilan had to know who was in the hospital; storm or not, the streets would’ve emptied anyway. No doubt some serious debates were in progress whether to stay or leave the city.

It's good to belong

McSee watched the faces. It was good to belong once more. Because he could be regarded as a traitor, he’d expected them to turn him away. It hadn’t come to pass. He understood one or two were reserving judgement, but he hadn’t been made to feel unwelcome. He had not, after all, betrayed them, and they knew that. Vannis and Tanos had rowed out to Little Paradise on hearing their hail, and when McSee leaned over the rail and said ‘Torrullin sent us’, Vannis had smiled and simply said ‘Welcome’. Tanos gripped his hand and then he made Lanto and Raken feel right at home. Lanto’s big ears were still pink at finding himself in such august company, his freckles less evident against rosy cheeks. Raken and Vannis had stiffened at the sight of each other, an instant and mutual attraction. Both withdrew from it immediately, and were uneasy in proximity.

Prophecy or warning?

The pages settled and Teighlar squinted over the book. ‘Here…’ He pointed vaguely and started to read: ‘In time beyond measure there lies a great mystery, one no man shall uncover without the synchronisation of heart, mind and soul. Let it be known that time is dependent on these factors, but not so the measurement of it. In much the same way is past, present and future presented, for heart is past, mind is present and soul is future. It is a truth that the heart heals, the mind soothes and the soul sees the potion of forever. Yet this is a mere portion of oneness, even as they are imperative in maintaining wholeness from the outset. In time before, time after and time to come, travel was, is and will be limited by the strength of such synchronisation, although it be granted that travel is able in artificiality, more so in magic, less so in mechanics. Yet, as in most ideals, there is exception; on an olden orb be the reality portal four in ten, but be warned, the way is filled with hazards and many dangers, and no journey should ever be undertaken lightly or without extreme thought. Travel negates time and time negates travel. Listen to the heart, hear the mind and know the soul is at greatest output when wish is will and will is wish. Friend, reader, listener, wish for will seeks an eternal companion, for no sentient should be alone in time unbound and yet therein lays error and trial. No sentient is created exact and same, thus difference is challenge, danger and also greatest gift. The mystery is revealed when hearts beat as one. Oneness lies in the flight of a beating heart, borne aloft only by wings of mist. Safeguard all your futures; flee from the shadows mist brings your way.’
Teighlar fell silent, and that silence stretched on, and then: ‘Who wrote that?’ Tristan voice sounded strained.
Teighlar passed the book over. ‘It is Luvan.’

Void

They fell through Eternity, and at first it was dark.
And then there was colour.
Parallel rings of colour flashed and dimmed as accompaniment as they hurtled through. They went far too fast to hold onto specifics, yet enough burned into retinas to prove those rings were snatches of parallel dimensions, alternate worlds, times and universes…and realms. There was life, marvellous and terrible life, to each.
And in the depths of the corridor through the rings worlds floated, worlds swallowed or failed or forgotten, worlds yet to be born. Bright stars curved in patterns and red giants and blue dwarfs. The fabric of cosmic mastery. So much, and yet in the vastness it was empty.
In such vastness they were minute, a skip in memory, and memory wouldn’t light an atom in this eternity. All that they were and would be was stripped from them until only pure soul remained. All that was physical was immaterial and although they made contact in the flashing dark, they felt nothing of each other…and felt everything.
They passed through the anti-matter pull of black holes, were tossed beyond the reaches of imploding stars and swirled in vacuum, crushed in gravity, and felt nothing. A wormhole flicked an errant tail, asteroids and comets played to silent music and heat blasted while cold froze.
And then, for a moment, but a moment, all slowed…and stopped. A crossroad in eternity. They were blind and at the mercy of something so great, no understanding would ever be.
And then they were forcibly pushed, breath-sucking death, into white light.
All consciousness fled, and sentience became another’s memory.

Chaos

Chaos was a kind word. Chaos was an impenetrable smog, cloying, dense doom, persistently on the move, coming, going, reeling, spinning, agitating as if it were alive and greedy, hungry, cannibalistic, needy, with half-seen inhuman, un-humanoid shapes that flitted and taunted, reached out, tried to touch…if it touched you died you knew this felt this did not like this…unremitting sickly glow lightning sparked and did nothing to dispel the thickening gloom, instead it terrified as if the lightning were a living entity in symbiosis with the life in the smog and the life that was the smog. Vapid chameleon eyes, sickly yellow eyes, cold snake eyes danced and challenged one after the other, coming closer, too close. Reptilian scales unlike any known reptile flashed unmade in the lightning, much the worse for only seeing part of the whole. Fangs as long as a man’s arm, dripping saliva the colour of pewter, as thick as mercury…and as dangerous- death would be very slow. Snatches of sight, too little to make sense of…chaos. Chaos that could destroy worlds.

Art in the Dome

The ceiling of the Dome was similarly segmented into fourteen, creating the illusion that the vaulted arches met overhead without the support of buttress and pedentive. Being of magic, any support was illusion. Each segment was the genius of a master artist: the mosaics overhead were of incredible variety and hue, and depicted stylised scenes exceptionally beautiful and horribly grotesque. There were winged creatures soaring over mountain peaks of emerald, violet, tangerine and sapphire. There were water scenes with sleek, silvery mer-beings half leaping, half diving. Battle scenes with humanoids sitting astride amazing four-legged, winged creatures. And darker images: things black, mud, scarlet, and plutonium green; things animalistic, fanged and wading through rivers of bleached bones. By far the most frightening were hand combat scenes, the combatants of both sides committing terrible atrocity. It was art, it was honest and it was truth.