Wow…sooooo excited!
My debut novel, White Mountain – Book 1 of The Darkling Chronicles, has had its first tantalising glimpse in the sunlight, with the worldwide release of its book trailer on YouTube!
HUGE thanks to Kim Maya Sutton & Safkhet Publishing for doing such a tremendous job. Thank you guys!
Check it out folks, my very first book trailer! :
I’m SO excited I can hardly breathe let alone speak…and for those who know me, they know that I am almost NEVER speechless!
Having met my lovely publishers yesterday, Safkhet Publishing, on a very sunny spring day, I am totally elated and beyond thrilled that my debut novel, White Mountain – Book 1 of The Darkling Chronicles, is NOW available to pre-order!
White Mountain, will be published 30th September 2012, but pre-orders are now being taken! It is all becoming gloriously real!
So, after doing an embarrassing dragon dance round my garden like a demented hopping frog, I am now trying to catch my breath and let my friends, family and supporters know…
So, to become a ‘Dragon Friend’, and get your name in print click here:
http://www.safkhetpublishing.com/books/fantasy/9781908208095/TDC1.html
A MASSIVE thank you to you all! So happy! xx
Extracts from Chapter One & Two of ‘White Mountain’ – Book 1 of The Darkling Chronicles:
The deepening sun scorched the snowy drifts turning them cherry pink, as it cast its dying rays over the peaks and popular winter resorts of the skiing elite.
Shadows of dusk lengthened, as lights twinkled in the valley below. Above the hustle and bustle of bistro and café life, chic alpine lodges, ski schools and cable cars, White Mountain loomed.
Its towering flanks gleamed in the fading light, its secret heart still safe, still undisturbed …the ancient ancestral home of an old sorcerer.
The next day dawned bright and clear. Sunlight streamed through narrow slit-like windows cut high in the mountainside. It was a cold beautiful September morning. Gralen’s cavernous room and the corridors outside echoed with the big dragon’s snoring. Mr. Agyk had had an unusually fitful sleep, full of worrying dreams and dark shifting images. He was tired and restless when he awoke and had a distinct feeling of apprehension. Belloc’s distressing cryptic message kept playing through his mind. He shook his head and carefully lifted the heavy latch of Gralen’s door. It creaked open. The dragon was fast asleep and snoring on his huge bed of willowgrass and snootledown feathers, his wings wrapped tightly round him like great leathery sheets.
The wizard stood framed in the doorway for a moment watching his old friend. A stream of autumnal light slowly crept down the walls towards the slumbering figure, igniting thousands of floating dust specks in its wake, like a trail of tiny falling stars. He loved mornings, the slow awakening of the world, the beginning of things. Gralen of course was quite the opposite. He loved the night, especially for flying, and if his stomach didn’t wake him demanding food, he could quite easily sleep the whole morning away and most of the afternoon.
“Rise and shine!” the wizard called at last. he waved a hand at the roof and part of it promptly slid back, opening the room to the sky and the pale morning sun.
Gralen stirred and opened a bleary eye.
Excerpt taken from Chapter Thirteen – The Encircling Mountains:
Korrun shifted uneasily. “King Dorrol knows far more than me. He has given you all that you need, here…” he pointed to a bundle of curled scrolls in the sack by Gralen’s side.
“I would still like to hear tales of it.”
The dwelf sighed. “I could tell you the ‘Lay of Fendellin’. It is a very old ballad, more of a lament really,” he mumbled.
The others looked keen, even Gralen. Korrun sighed again and smiled awkwardly, then twisting a tree branch in the fire, he began. His voice was low and soft and as he spoke, his eyes never leaving the dying coals, a hint of pain seemed to pass over his face.
“Pass now beyond the mountains white
Where frosted rivers leap and spring,
Amongst the golden grasses light
Where fÿrrens dwell and soar and sing.
A land as old and fair as stars
Of snowy peaks and moonlit seas,
Of darkling woods we travel far
To gaze upon its silvery leaves.
A flame that springs eternal fire
A city in the misty sky,
A beauty which shall never tire
Amongst the banners flying high.
A sheltered haven, a sacred land
An ancient place of Kings,
A shining sword, a fiery brand
Where magic dwells therein.
Far East beyond heart’s lost desire
The birthplace of the eldest kin,
Through rising sun on wings of fire
Lies forgotten Fendellin.”
“That was beautiful!” said Wendya, watching the dwelf’s eyes as he stared into the fire.
“It sounds like a wondrous place!” replied Mr. Agyk. “Perhaps you will find your dragons there after all, my old friend!”
Gralen smiled but kept quiet, his eyes fixed on the witch and dwelf.
Excerpt taken from Chapter Nine – Kallorm:
At that moment the pair were aware of a voice, thin and clear and full of sadness, singing softly in the darkness beyond.
“Beneath a canopy of stars
Its whispering waters flow,
Beneath the towers standing tall
Lies my heart and home.
A city great of dworllian past
Three mountains and a palace white,
Nine gates to pass and bridges all
To reach the secret realm of light.
A veil of silver, a thundering roar
A crystal dome, a rain bowed beam…
I hear the song of Kallorm call
Within my heart, its mists must fall.
Kallorm, Kallorm, come call me home
To dance and sing in Tarro’s spring,
Kallorm, Kallorm, come call me home
To rest amongst your sheltered stone.”
Wendya came back, picking her way through the twisted mangrove roots, her hair damp from the sea spray, her eyes downcast. She sat next to the fire.
“I used to sing that ballad as a child, but the true melody is sadder…” she murmured. 
Chapter One
White Mountain
The deepening sun scorched the snowy drifts turning them cherry pink, as it cast its dying rays over the peaks and popular winter resorts of the skiing elite.
Shadows of dusk lengthened, as lights twinkled in the valley below. Above the hustle and bustle of bistro and café life, chic alpine lodges, ski schools and cable cars, White Mountain loomed.
Its towering flanks gleamed in the fading light, its secret heart still safe, still undisturbed …the ancient ancestral home of an old sorcerer.
Within the bowels of the mountain lived the aging scholar, a practitioner and magus of the old arts. An archetypal wizard with steely grey hair and a scruffy beard, his heavy lidded eyes belied a keen intellect and appeared both sharply alert, yet ready for slumber. A powerful but rather eccentric figure, he had the bumbling demeanour of an old-world gent, a long lost uncle back from some distant travel with stories to astound and amaze. Mr. M Agyk, also known as Marval or simply the ‘Green Wizard’, had witnessed the passing of ages. A quickening of time that had brought too many great changes to the world outside; yet nestled deep within the mountain’s walls he had continued to live his life mostly unaffected by the curious comings and goings beyond.
From within this dwelling sprang many hundreds of beautiful rooms and twisting tunnels, a labyrinth of chambers, which even the wizard had forgotten or lost his way in. Its endless expanse of passages and curling staircases glittered and shimmered when touched and delicate frozen beads of water, each encrusted with crystal, hung from the corridor ceilings, swaying and tinkling like millions of tiny bells.
At the core of this strange home lay a huge round living room. Its circular walls were lined with shelves upon shelves crammed full of books and curiosities from all over the ancient world and bulged inwards as if the mountain were pressing in and. Dominating the centre of the room, stood a roughly hewn fireplace where an ever-burning fire always flickered.
Mr. Agyk, not being the tidiest of people nor able to throw a single thing away, had become over the centuries of his life a ‘hoarder’ on the grandest scale. Despite the size of his home and the vastness of its rooms he had managed to fill nearly every nook and cranny with an immense collection of dust covered clutter. The living room was no exception. Littered amongst the dozens of faded and matted rugs, their overlapping edges frayed and worn, lay little stacks of books and parchment paper piled in tumbling mounds or stuffed beneath the missing legs of tables and chairs.
Above it all, and stretching to a height of some forty or fifty feet, arched an enormous domed and vaulted ceiling of the deepest sapphire blue, set with a thousand twinkling stars that drifted across its expanse.
Mr. Agyk lived a hermit life on the whole, unknown to the outer world and isolated from others of his kind, except for a few of his closest friends. However, to the great exasperation of these friends, and despite the wizard’s own aversion to modern day man, he found himself deeply fascinated by humans and their complicated chaotic lives.
On occasions, when this fascination became too great, the old scholar would venture outside disappearing for days, weeks or even months on one of his ‘expeditions’.
Often the sorcerer could be found wandering the streets of the great industrial cities, an unnoticed elderly fellow watching the frenetic pace of humans in their never-ending cycle of work, stress and life.
So it was, that after one of these strange days Mr. M Agyk eventually returned to White Mountain to find his old friend waiting in the cold…
Gralen stood leaning against the rock face, scraping his talons down the ice covered stone, an expression of boredom and annoyance on his face. “Where have you been?”
“Sorry, am I late?” fumbled the old man, patting his friend on the back. “You know I always get my days muddled!”
Mr. Agyk and his lifelong companion, Gralen, a temperamental and rather portly green dragon with dark leathery wings and an amazing orange jewelled belly, stood precariously high upon a narrow and slippery mountain ledge. The weather grew steadily worse as chilling night winds howled and curled over the rocks, blasting a flurry of ice flakes into their eyes. The wizard looked his usual dishevelled self, his straggly beard and shock of wiry hair blowing around him like the mane of a mangy old lion. His ruddy features and profile were almost handsome, with pale silver eyes and an impressive roman nose; the bulbous tip of which reminded the dragon of an unripened or scarlet coloured raspberry, depending on the weather and mood of the old man. Today, it glowed beacon red.
Gralen on the other hand, though certainly impressive at full height or in mid-flight, was a rather overweight and average example of the near extinct North Eurasian wyvern.
Mr. Agyk pressed his hand against the rock, eager to get out of the cold. A large doorway suddenly appeared.
“This is your home too, you should have gone in,” he said quizzically, looking at the settled snow on the old dragon’s scales. “How long have you been waiting?”
“A while…waiting and watching,” Gralen grumbled, crossing his arms and making no effort to hide his irritation. He looked at the old man’s tweed trouser suit. “You’re wearing your human robes I see…you haven’t been off on another ‘expedition’ have you? I thought you’d gone off somewhere south to visit Malty, or one of the others.”
Mr. Agyk smiled. “It is cold, let us get inside. After you,” he bowed.
Gralen gave him a suspicious look and mumbled something under his breath then disappeared inside, closely followed by the wizard.
Standing eight feet tall at the shoulder and fifteen feet to the top of his head, Gralen had a broad frame and huge articulated wings, which folded flat against his sides. His long muscular neck supported a slightly outsized head with overlapping fan-shaped spikes which splayed out from behind his ears. His large amber eyes, though certainly swift to anger or laughter, displayed a depth and subtlety unexpected in such a lumbering bulk. However, Gralen’s most distinguished features lay not in the two horns that protruded from his muzzle and forehead, or even the wispy chin whiskers he had grown over the years to catch stray bits of food, but merely in the remarkable fact that in a modern world, he remained the sole surviving member of his kind. The very last of the race of dragons.
The wyvern settled himself in front of the warm glow of the fireplace. Mr. Agyk shook his outer clothes, which promptly changed to his usual green attire, and vanished down one of the many tunnels leading off from the living room like the burrows of a rabbit warren.
“Is offal sweet-cake alright?” he asked a few moments later, from the general direction of the kitchen.
Gralen stretched in front of the flames, curling and flexing his toes in comfort.
“Let me know if I can help,” he yawned, closing his eyes.
“No, no…!” came a hurried voice amidst a clatter of dishes and a faint whiff of peppery smoke.
The wizard reappeared. Floating in front of him were two enormous dishes. Gralen sat bolt upright and wrapped his tail around his huge clawed feet. The dishes gently drifted towards him, hovered for a moment, as if offering themselves for approval, then placed themselves neatly on the low table in front. Mr. Agyk sat cross-legged on the floor as another long procession of plates and dishes piled high with steaming food, glided in from the kitchen.
Gralen’s orange eyes widened, his chin whiskers already twitching wildly.
“Well, tuck in!” Mr. Agyk chuckled, and raised a large crystal goblet. “A toast…to great friends and great food!”
“I’ll toast that!” spluttered the dragon, his mouth full to overflowing.
The two friends sat for hours in front of the roaring fire talking and laughing and eating until they thought they’d burst. Finally Gralen stretched out, satisfied at last, and patted his pendulous belly. Then with a contented smile on his face he lazily began blowing tiny green fire bubbles into the air. He watched as they slowly drifted up almost out of view, floating higher and higher before exploding in little puffs of emerald smoke and sparks. He closed his eyes, rather pleased with himself.
“I couldn’t eat another thing!” he announced at last. “My scales are poking out!”
Mr. Agyk kicked his battered boots off with a satisfying thud, before resting back into his favourite rocking chair; an old wooden throne he’d ‘picked up’ in the Crusades, with delicately carved intertwining wings for a back and sinuous arms that curled each side into drooping flower-heads. He mumbled a command and instantly the wooden frame creaked into motion, gently rocking him back and forth.
“My stomach is as full as a grouchal!” he mused, remembering the giant toad like creatures from his youth and their legendary voracious appetites.
Gralen nodded, his mind drifting towards sleep. “You know, you really shouldn’t take the risks you do,” he started as he turned to face the old mage. “All these idiot trips you go on…Sometimes I don’t understand you at all!”
The wizard sighed heavily and stared down at his toes, waving at him like fat little men through the many holes in his socks. He had had this conversation before, many times, and he was in no mood for another argument.
“Must we talk about it? I will not be travelling anywhere for a while.”
“Good! I’m glad to hear it…it’s about time you came to your senses,” muttered the dragon, resting on his back and staring up at the ceiling, “…well, the stars are looking bright tonight,” he began at last.
“Yes,” Mr. Agyk murmured faintly. “They grow brighter the nearer we get to the winter solstice…”
Gralen tilted his head. “What the hell’s that?”
“The winter solstice?”
“No, that noise…you can’t hear that?”
The wizard strained to listen.
The sound repeated itself. A rumbling tone, low and muffled, barely audible to the old man’s ears, yet growing steadily louder.
“Well?” Gralen demanded. “What is it?”
Mr. Agyk shook his head. “I do not…oh, my heavens…” he laughed. “That my friend is a message! Someone is using a mimmirian to contact us!” he beamed, “I only use it to reach Wendya these days.” He closed his eyes and muttered a bringing incantation.
“Well, turn the blasted thing off!” Gralen complained.
Moments later, a large triangular mirror drifted into the room and rested in front of them. The noise booming from it was quite deafening.
“Enough!” Mr. Agyk touched it and at once it fell silent. The ancient communicator had been crafted by the old sage himself and allowed messages to be sent and received over vast distances; providing a means of staying in contact with old allies from across the globe. The knowledge and art of making such elaborate mystical instruments was known to only a few of the most learned mages. Although Mr. Agyk had made one such rarity for their good friend Wendya years before, few now still survived and the secret of how to construct them was all but lost.
Mr. Agyk passed his hand across it. “Who seeks counsel?”
The mimmirian’s mirrored surface quivered and became a diaphanous liquid before their eyes, metallic yet clear. Ripples formed across it, colliding and merging with each other until an image began to form.
“Who seeks counsel?” he repeated.
Suddenly the liquid stilled and the image cleared to reveal a faint but recognisable face.
“Belloc? Is that you Bell’?”
The figure did not reply.
Mr. Agyk shook his head. “Of course, he is not calling now…this is a message, perhaps a few days old.”
The figure started to talk but no sound came.
“What’s wrong with it?” said Gralen coming closer.
“I do not know. Something is interfering with it…”
Gralen narrowed his eyes and stared at the image. “Look at him. Something’s wrong. He looks…frightened!”
“Belloc? Never…”
“Look at him,” urged the dragon. “He doesn’t look right.”
Mr. Agyk stopped fiddling with the device for a moment and gazed at the image of his magus friend. To his surprise, Belloc appeared unusually aged and deeply troubled.
“Yes…perhaps you are right…let me try this,” he said altering a small lever, while passing his hand over the mirror. “Tell us your counsel!” he demanded.
Suddenly the device sprang to life and the figure’s voice emanated from the screen.
“Marvalla, please come quickly!” Belloc’s voice was coarse as if every breath were a struggle. “I do not know who to turn to anymore, who can be trusted. So many have been corrupted. I dare not leave, they are always watching…You must come quickly, so much depends upon you…Marval, I need your help.” He paused and lowered his voice to a whisper, his dark eyes flitting nervously around him. “Things are on the move, terrible things…A reckoning is coming, a war…it has already begun. The humans…dear gods, the humans will never be able to survive…” the image began to crackle and fade, “…urdered, countless of them! We have to stop it! You must come!” came the final plea before the picture was lost and the mimmirian turned black.
Gralen sat upright. “What the hell was that about?”
“A reckoning…a war?” repeated the old wizard, pressing his hand against the cold glass. “Against whom? How are humans involved?” He sat silently, lost in thought, the worry on his face evident.
“Well, this is a first,” Gralen jeered, “him asking us for help, but then Bell’ always had a flair for the dramatic! ‘They are always watching’…who’s ‘they’?” he scoffed.
The wyvern had never much cared for Belloc. An arrogant, ambitious and pompous idiot he thought, too interested in accumulating ‘things’, whether it be wealth or influence. In truth, Belloc had never much cared for the dragon either.
“It seems plain he’s in some sort of trouble,” Gralen pressed.
“…it certainly appears that way,” the old man muttered. “But what kind of trouble… ‘urdered’ he said…You are right, Gralen, I have never known Belloc to ask for anyone’s help…ever. He must be in great need,” he shook his head. “He looked…terrified. I have never seen him like that. Something is dreadfully wrong my friend.”
Gralen looked at him, he was taking this very seriously.
The wizard started pacing the room. “Curse me for my ridiculous antics! I have been away for far too long…If I am truly honest with myself, I have felt it. Something out of balance, a shifting of energies. I am old enough to know better. I should have listened to my instincts!”
“You’re not going?”
“Of course I am, we are,” he faced the dragon. “He needs our help Gralen, what would you have me do?”
The wyvern sighed and sucked at his teeth with an awful rasping sound before eating a large lump of food dislodged from his back molar.
“Gralen, my dear friend, it will give you an opportunity to stretch your wings and for both of us to catch up with news from abroad.”
The dragon shrugged and shifted his weight uneasily. “I doubt there’s much news to hear. Things don’t change in our world.” He couldn’t quite muster up his enthusiasm. “We could head off tomorrow I suppose,” he said, gently flexing his huge wings and wafting the fire as he did so, “I suppose I could use some long distance exercise.”
Mr. Agyk smiled. “Thank you.”
