Pre-order now available: Amazon, Amazon UK, Nook, Apple, Kobo, Smashwords, print
Welcome to the preview of the latest Clan Beginnings book. This week, seven-year-old Imdiko Conyod's last words to his older brother Hoslek come back to haunt him.
* * * *
“Hoslek, wait for me!” Conyod raced toward the paddock’s shimmering force field as his older brother rode chestnut-furred Ges through the opening he’d ordered. Another command closed it behind him.
At nine years old, Hoslek was already an accomplished rider of the six-legged kestarsh their parents bred, raised, and sold. He was also on the bossy side when it came to seven-year-old Conyod.
“Can’t wait. Two of the mares got loose, and I have to find them.” Hoslek spoke in a firm tone, but his gaze cut in the direction of their home worriedly, though the boys’ parents hadn’t yet returned from a trip to town.
“Let me go too, or I’ll tell them you didn’t properly close the containment when you brought them in from the pasture.”
Hoslek paused for an instant before scowling. “Don’t be a jerk, Conyod. As long as I bring them home, I won’t get in trouble. Stop slowing me down.” He shouted at the paddock’s system, though the nearest tall metal pole emitting it was mere feet away. “Corral containment, don’t unlock for Conyod. Disable his voice commands.”
Hoslek might have been only nine, but he already had a born Dramok’s command. Conyod’s first instinct at his brother’s order was to obey. By the time he’d recovered his stubborn nature, Hoslek was galloping toward the foothills of Mount Evar.
“I’ll tell!” he shouted after his brother, who’d already spurred Ges out of hearing distance. Conyod kicked a divot into the ground where the passage of numerous kestarsh had worn the grass away. Even if he’d been able to commandeer a mount in the locked corral, he wasn’t big or strong enough to saddle them alone. He was left behind. Again.
“I’ll tell. You’ll be sorry!”
* * * *
The escaped mares returned home of their own accord at their normal mealtime. It was the next morning when the first searchers found Ges, viciously clawed and shivering, between outcroppings of rocks. The evidence of a zibger’s attack was obvious. There was no sign of Hoslek.
Conyod’s mother, who’d stayed reluctantly behind while his fathers, the ranch hands, and local villagers spent the entire night until daybreak searching for her eldest child, collapsed to her knees in the yard when her Imdiko mate Sema brought the horribly injured Ges home. Sema dismounted and held her, his arms wrapped around her shaking shoulders. He was forced to remain at her side for the rest of the rescue attempt…which most acknowledged was now a recovery effort.
Conyod’s other two fathers continued the search. “We won’t stop until we find him,” Nobek Vel vowed.
Hoslek’s body wasn’t recovered. Like hundreds of riders, hikers, and adventurers who’d dared the mountains brooding over the plain, he was never seen again. In the end, even Vel was forced to admit the child wouldn’t be returned for a proper funeral.
The family descended into unrelenting grief. Conyod suffered
endless nightmares of his brother riding away and of his own angry cry, the
last words he’d spoken to Hoslek a mortal prediction: “You’ll be sorry!”
* * * *
He
needed a hero and found two. Can love rescue him again?
Nobek
Sletran never took Imdiko Conyod’s infatuation seriously when he rescued him
years before. When Conyod shows up in his life again as a strong and successful
man instead of a traumatized victim, Sletran has to reconsider the one he once
rejected and now can’t imagine life without.
Conyod has
never given up on the man he considers his hero. Sletran is all he’s ever
wanted for a clanmate, and he’s determined to win him at last. But the past refuses
to be laid to rest. When Conyod convinces Sletran to see him for who he’s
become, will who he was resurface and destroy the love they’re building?
Sletran’s
commanding officer Dramok Erybet is instantly fascinated by Conyod when the
soldier brings his love on base for a visit. However, Sletran isn’t the Nobek
Erybet feels is right for him. When he rejects the Nobek, he risks losing
Conyod too.
Against the backdrop of heartbreaking childhood tragedy, a ghost who haunts Conyod and his grief-stricken family, and military brass determined to oust Erybet from the rank he’s worked so hard to reach, three men must come to terms with who they are. When tragedy strikes, the nightmares of the past must be faced and buried once and for all. Conyod, Sletran, and Erybet must dare everything to find redemption and hold on to each other.
Releasing May 31. Pre-order now: Amazon, Amazon UK, Nook, Apple, Kobo, Smashwords, print
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