A quick excerpt from THE TALL PRIEST, the fourth book in The Martuk Series, Vol. 1, A Collection of Short Fiction (available now for pre-order):
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I was blood.
The taste of it raced ‘round my teeth and flooded my throat. The warmth of it fell from my eyes and stained my cheeks. The red of it dripped off my chin to wander along my neck and down my chest.
I’ll give you my son, she’d said, the Seer from the Mountains. Leave me here to do what must be done and I’ll give you my son.
Her words the darkest of shadows clouding my calm, I’d returned to Uruk that morning, the Seer’s son, an unexpected charge, in hand. Soon I’d stood in the Temple, my explanations useless, The Elder’s rage quiet and terrifying. Moments later, I, a powerful priest in a land of powerful priests, had been dragged across the stone to face my fate.
Now I kneeled, a powerless man in a prison of wood and stone, broken and bloodied in the dead of night.
By morning I’d be a corpse.
I’ll give you my son.
Those words, heavy with heartbreak, had come from the Water first.
Days ago in a small room hidden far beneath the Temple, I’d stood with my beloved, The Elder, as the shimmering pool had whispered
Blinded…
Silent…
Bleeding…
“Don’t. Please,” The Elder said as I’d waited, gripping the edge of hollowed stone, my face dipped low as I silently called to the Gods.
The Veil…
The Darkness…
It comes…
the Water whispered, answering me, the words caressing my cheeks.
He’d begged and pleaded, the Elder, this most powerful man in a city of powerful men. Implored me to turn away. Allow the Water to hold its tongue. Keep its secrets. “It’s dangerous and I can’t bear to lose you,” he said, his voice thick.
“I need to speak with the Gods,” I said, braced with uncommon courage. And I’d ignored him, leaning forward, blade in hand, to slice, to watch, to see. To listen and hear, the blood dripping from my wrist the key unlocking my fate.
And the Seer from the Mountains had appeared in the shallow bowl, the words
Take my son
falling from her lips.
These words, these three syllables, soon to be spoken a three nights walk from Uruk where she, the Seer, and I would stand, watching, under the shade of trees.
Take my son
Hearing her, I’d pause.
For that the guards put me in chains.
More words would be spoken on that path a three nights’ walk from Uruk, a darkening sky above. Of dangerous shadows and ravenous demons. Of monsters and magic. Of battles being fought and wars being lost. Here. Now. Unseen yet all around.
My heart, my gut, trusting her, I’d listen.
For that I lost my eyes.
Days later, now days ago, the tears wetting her cheeks as she stood, silent and waiting, her story at an end, my heart heard
my son
and, against logic and reason and rules, braced with yet more uncommon courage, I’d relent.
For that the guards cut out my tongue.
Learning I’d heard and listened and trusted, my secret beloved, The Elder, had grown dangerously quiet. Discovering I’d acted against logic and reason and his rules, he betrayed me. In response to my misplaced courage, he ripped out my tongue, robbing me of my words, my knowledge, my secrets. And then, my eyes dug out and tossed to the hounds, those two words
my son
finally took from me the pleasure of seeing the sun, the moon. The once-adored face of the love who betrayed me.
The Water in a small, secret room far below the Temple had spoken of that, too.
As had the sky, the earth, the forest, the stones…
Days ago.
Now I turned. My long legs tucked under, I rested on my knees, the cold stone of the cell burning my shins. In the dark of blindness, I heard them. Other prisoners. Their sighs and whimpers, tears and whispers. Heard the shuffling of thin fabric and the shivering of bare flesh. Felt the Silent Other, a stranger to me, waiting, watching. Drawing near, slow and patient, from the other end of the earthen hall.
A Silent Other I’d glimpsed when my eyes could still see, though I stood in the shade of trees under the gathering grey of relentless clouds. He haunted me still, this Silent Other, this stranger. His dishonest smile cutting through the terrifying darkness. The leather cloak falling from his shoulders hemmed with the clattering clank of tiny bones.
I swallowed the memory away, the blood from the still-bleeding root creeping down my throat. It still stung, that stolen tongue, though the burn in my missing eyes had given way to an exhausted thump, thump, thump.
Had I tears, I would have wept. For all I’d lost. All I’d never have. For mistakes and regrets. Lies. Betrayal. The ache of a broken spirit.
For my stupid willingness to abandon reason and peer into an endless wall of black.
But I’d been warned.
Days ago.
Silence
the earth had whispered.
Darkness
the trees had echoed.
Death
the sky had promised.
I’d been warned.
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Martuk ... the Holy 