Here it is: the first chapter of Choronzon Chronicles Book 4: Shadow in a Strange Land. It’s not available for pre-order just yet, but I wanted to get this preview out there anyway.
If you’d like some background on the writing of book 4, you can check out my last blog post here.
So, without further ado…here’s Chapter One.
SHADOW IN A STRANGE LAND
by Tess Adair
ONE
The first thing she felt was cold. A cold, wet wind on her skin, and the sound of waves. The next thing she felt was the sand beneath her. It was cold, too.
Wake up.
With a start, H.C. Logan opened her eyes. The sky above was dark and gray, but it wasn't a nighttime sky. She was sure it had been night only a moment ago. Somehow, she had traveled from night to day. Her hands were empty, which struck her as wrong, but she couldn't articulate why. With a soft grunt of effort, she sat straight up, her empty hands pressing against the cold, damp sand.
She was on a beach, facing what appeared to be an ocean. In the distance, a few miles out, she could see a rocky island holding its own against the turbulent waves. She stared at it for several seconds, willing it to anchor her as she got her bearings. Everything here felt wrong. It was familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.
Volkov was nowhere to be seen. In fact, there was no one, anywhere, to be seen. She was alone. But how could she be alone?
What did she remember?
There was a fight. She'd been fighting—demons, the Bound men, Casimir Volkov. But it was a trap. He was trying to activate the Choronzon Key—the arcane artifact with untold power that had melted into her skin years ago, forming a giant tattoo on her back. And he'd succeeded, in a way. He had activated it. But she'd taken control of what happened after that.
Or had she? Was she really in control, if she didn't know where she was? And where was Volkov, anyway?
She scrambled to her feet, half expecting some unknown demon to come lunging at her at any moment. But as her boots settled unsteadily in the soft sand, she saw no other living creatures at all. No demons, no Volkov. She didn't even see any birds in the sky. On one side of her there was ocean, extending as far as the eye could see. On the other side stood a sheer cliff face several hundred feet high, and it stretched in both directions, disappearing only with the curve of the land. And between the sea and the cliff, there was only sand.
Volkov was nowhere. And neither was anyone else.
What was this place? For a moment, she wanted to entertain the possibility that somehow they'd been thrown clear to the other side of Fort Worden, where Volkov's ritual had begun. But she knew that didn't make any sense. It had been night there. And these cliffs...this didn't look like the other side of the Fort, which should have been dunes and smooth gray rocks and a small beach. She knew enough to know that.
Besides, though she didn't want to admit it, she had this sinking feeling that she knew exactly what had happened. This place felt so wrong, so eerie to her. There were no animals anywhere. And had she ever seen a place that looked just like this, with a perfect black cliff face running all the way around, and nothing but clear gray sea and sky and a single solitary rock island to keep it company? It looked more like a doctored photograph than a real place.
No, they hadn't been thrown down to some beach on the peninsula. They hadn't been thrown anywhere on Earth. That wasn't what the Key could do.
She reached back, like she had so many times before, and touched the Choronzon Key where it lay on her back. She couldn't see it, but she knew what it looked like: a labyrinth set in the shape of a teardrop, deep red on her back. Even through her leather jacket, she could feel its warmth. Volkov had figured out a way to activate the Key. He'd gotten it to do something she'd had no idea it could do.
In front of her, over the water, the gray clouds began to part. She stared at them absentmindedly, her mind reeling with a million other things. After a moment, she gave herself a small shake and narrowed her eyes at the scene before her, at the light now peaking through the gray. She didn't want to believe it, but she already knew it was true.
There were two suns in the sky.
If she'd had any lingering doubts, they were gone now. She wasn't on Earth. Not anymore.
Her knees began to wobble, and after a moment, she let them give. She fell back down to the sand, wet and cold as it was, and she stared at the two suns. They emitted a faintly bluish light, and they didn't hurt her eyes the way her own sun would. She stayed that way until the clouds shifted again, obscuring the suns, one after another. At long last, she blinked and looked away, belatedly wondering if she'd done damage to her retinas.
As her gaze drifted off to the right, she saw something glinting in the dim light. Scrambling to her feet again, she went right for it—and let out a small sigh of relief. It was her ax, slightly buried in the sand. It had made it with her to this new world after all. She pulled it out and wiped the blade on her pants, and then stored it in the sheath on her back.
Okay. Let's think this through. I'm on another world. I don't know where, and I don't know how to get home. And I've been fighting, so, when my adrenaline fades, I'll be tired. Maybe hungry. So, what do I do next?
A voice in the back of her head told her she should look for Volkov. He had to be here, somewhere. But she didn't know if she wanted to find him. After all, she was only here because he'd kidnapped Jude Li from her own backyard in order to lure her into his plans.
Surely if he managed all that, he'll be fine by himself for a while. She took a short breath. Better to look for shelter, I think.
She surveyed the area around her again, and this time her eyes lingered on the cliff face—on a spot some ways down the beach that looked darker than the rest. Stepping carefully, she headed for it. The sand here was relatively compact, but it was still sand, and she was still wearing heavy boots. Walking took a little more effort than normal.
It took a few minutes for her to get close enough to make out the spot in greater detail in the low light. Sure enough, it was a small cave. It was short and relatively shallow, not quite tall enough for her to stand at full height, about five feet wide and ten feet deep. Just like everything else on the beach, it was damp. And it would have to do.
Glancing around again, she realized she could see almost no vegetation around. There was, however, plenty of driftwood, including a few whole uprooted trees, their shallow roots long since bleached white. She jogged a little away from the cliff so she could look up at it, where she observed, at the top, a whole forest. That explains the trees on the beach, she thought.
The driftwood would have to suffice for her primary resource for now. She went over to the nearest fallen tree and, bracing herself for the effort, grabbed the root end and pulled as hard as she could. It took longer than she would have liked, but eventually, she'd dragged it over to the front of the cave and dropped it, letting it form an informal doorway to her new camp site. After that, she snapped off a few medium-sized branches and moved down the beach, to about halfway between the sea and the cliff, and started shoving the sticks into the ground in a haphazard pattern. Eventually they formed a little pyramid.
It's not much, but it will have to do.
She walked a few feet down the beach in the direction from which she'd come and studied the loose tableau she'd made. She had no idea how much time she had left until sundown in this world, but she knew she needed to get a lay of the land. So she started walking.
Apart from the constant sound of the waves lapping against the shore, this world was uncomfortably quiet. She kept glancing up at the top of the cliff, thinking she would see movement indicative of an animal running through the underbrush, or maybe even a bird. But she didn't. The trees swayed with the wind, but nothing else. No calls traveled down to her, no footsteps sounded anywhere. It was like she was absolutely alone in the world.
Would be nice to be alone with drinkable water, she thought, glancing forlornly at the saltwater ocean. Yet almost as soon as she'd had the thought, she heard a change in the water sounds. Just around the next corner, she could hear the crescendo rush of a waterfall.
Her pace picked up automatically, and she practically ran to meet the sound. Sure enough, just around the slight curve of the cliff face, there was a waterfall. It was only six or seven feet wide, and it let out into a creek that bled directly down the beach and into the ocean.
As relief washed over her, Logan stepped right up to the creek and knelt down, plunging her hands into the water and splashing it all over her face. The water was ice-cold, but she didn't care. She placed her hands on slippery rocks to brace herself, then dunked her face right in, drinking as deeply as she could. It was several seconds before she came up for air again. When she finally did, she sat back on her heels and laughed quietly at herself.
I'm on an alien world. In a whole different universe, most likely. Why would I assume that a creek in an alien world would be freshwater? Hell, why would it even be water?
She sat that way for a full minute, waiting to see if she was about to keel over from some kind of poisoning. Nothing happened. And the longer she sat, the more she thought about how perfectly fresh it had tasted...
In the end, she bent to drink again. She was fairly certain the last liquid she'd consumed had been on the ferry out to Bainbridge Island, and that had been hours and another world ago. She drank a third time, then went on her way. One good jump got her clear over the creek with ease.
As it turned out, the waterfall was the most excitement the beach had to offer. She walked for hours, her eyes peeled for anything and everything. As she went, she gathered a small pile of driftwood. She could feel and see the beach curving slightly to the left at all times, and before long, she was convinced that the body of land she traversed was an island.
The final dregs of her adrenaline wore out soon after she passed the waterfall. In less than half an hour from the start of her journey, her body began to feel all the aches and pains from the injuries she'd sustained during the fight. She knew her demon traits would gift her a much faster healing process than most humans got, but she was still in for an uncomfortable night.
And yet, on she walked. She wasn't always sure what she hoped to find. Perhaps it was Volkov. Or signs of civilization. Or maybe she simply hoped to see some animal life.
In that last case, at least, she was successful, after a fashion. The ocean was clear enough that she could eventually see shadows moving just beneath its surface. How close any of them looked to the kind of fish she knew was anyone's guess.
Still, on she walked. She walked for hours and saw no sign of Volkov, nor any intelligent life. The sky eventually began to lose its limited bluish-gray light, and she started to worry that she'd made a mistake. Maybe she hadn't been travelling a circular route around an island after all...
But just as her aching limbs threatened to give way, she at last saw one thing that she knew she'd been looking for. It was the pyramid made of sticks. She'd been travelling for hours, and she'd finally come back to where she started.
With a small jolt, she realized that not only had she seen no other people, but she'd seen no other landmasses, either. As far as she could tell, this island and the small rock island was all there was.
So it is, she thought.
She brought the driftwood she'd been collecting over to the cave and placed it inside in a neat little pile. She picked up the pyramid sticks and added them to the pile, too.
Every muscle in her body hurt. She'd come all that way, and there had been no break in the cliff. No significant change in the beach, except eventually a second waterfall on the other side of the island. There had been no land animals, no birds. There were creatures in the water, yes, but she had no idea what they were. And by the time she'd realized that sea life might be her only viable source of food here, it was already too dark to chance a first foray into the waves.
Besides all that, she was exhausted. For a moment, she'd thought she would build a fire at the edge of her cave and sleep by it, but now she realized there was no way she could force enough motion out of her body to get it done. Instead, she picked the spot where the cave wall met the end of the dead tree and settled into it. It wasn't particularly soft, but it was relatively protected. That would have to be enough for now.
Before she could let herself fall asleep, however, there was one last thing she had to try. She closed her eyes and got ready to reach out—then paused.
Hours ago, when she had first woken up here, she'd had the odd feeling that here was familiar. Suddenly, she realized why. This island, this beach, was almost an exact replica of the quiet place she held in her mind. It was the place she went to whenever she wanted to connect psychically with someone using eira. Jude's quiet place was a field in a forest. Logan's was a cold beach surrounded by cliffs. It was this place.
What that meant, she could not say. So, she set it aside for the moment.
With a sigh, she closed her eyes again and cleared her mind. She went to her quiet place, which looked quite similar to where she was, and she reached deep into her connection with eira. She had done it a million times before. Her strongest psychic connection recently had been with Jude, and so it was to Jude that she called. She called once, then twice. A third time. A fourth.
Something felt...off. She was doing the same thing she always had—clearing her mind, reaching deep within herself. And yet...she felt nothing. She couldn't feel Jude, for starters. But that wasn't enough to bother her. It was always possible that Jude simply wasn't in a state where she could be reached. No, this went deeper than that.
It was eira she couldn't feel. It was as if...it was simply gone. There was no eira in this world. There was nothing for her to connect to. Perhaps there was no magic here at all.
After several minutes, she gave up. Her brain had grown as tired as every aching muscle in her body. She suspected she would still be sore the next day, but perhaps she'd have a little more energy. With a sigh of resignation, she settled into her chosen corner with her back against the cave wall. Within moments, she was sound asleep.
So there it is! Hope you enjoyed. There isn’t yet a final cover for Shadow in a Strange Land, but I’ll let you know as soon as there is. There will also probably be a few more previews in the lead up to launch, so keep an eye out here for more of that!
-TESS
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