Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Chapter 5 – Respite of the Ravens

Kathri’s head was throbbing when she woke, waves of pain pulsating through it like tides upon the shore. A light filtered down from above, mostly blocked by the slab of stone above her. It had been too large to fit fully in the chasm and had instead become lodged in it just above her. She reached up with a shaky hand and touched the surface of it, her fingertips just able to reach. A little smaller and it would have been the end of me.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.6

Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Chapter 4 – The Crown of the Emperor

Total darkness enveloped Kathri, along with a chill that sleeted through her, piercing skin and flesh and bones. She could feel herself seeping through the wall, as well as the wall seeping through her, all at the same time. In some way it felt like swimming through water, if water was pitch black and flowed through you. Her heart skipped a beat and a moment of panic began to rise in her throat.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.5

Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Chapter 3 – The Emperor and the Raven

Kathri did not see the explosion when it occurred, not directly. The searing flash of light that accompanied it pierced even through her closed eyelids. Rather than seeing it, she felt it and heard it. A blast of pressure swirled over and around the crystal, slamming into her. Dust picked up by the blast swept across her, stinging exposed flesh as it struck. Her ears were riven by the explosion, the sound of it bouncing through the chamber, deafening in its intensity, a cacophony of noise that assaulted the senses and seemed to go on and on without end. The intensity of it rolled over her, battering at her. She clung on tight, waiting for it to come to an end.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.4

As I have just started the Echo of the Ages of the serial, I felt I should discuss it a little, of how it is structured and what it is all about.

Echo the Ages is a sprawling epic fantasy, with all that that entails.  Added to this is a lot of delving into ruins and tombs for lost relics and treasures, as that is what the starting POV character, Kathri, does for a living.

As for the structure of the story, it is in the form of a serial.  For comparison, consider a TV series that has lasted several seasons, one with an overarching plot that encompasses the length of the series..  Each book in the series is the equivalent of a single season, with an ongoing arc.  Each part is like a single episode.  It ties in with the arc mostly, but the events within it are mostly solved by the end of the part.  The chapters are like scenes in the episode.  Hopefully that makes sense.

Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Chapter 2 – Among Crystal Sarcophagi

The journey down the rest of the corridor, cautious due to the need to be mindful for any further traps along its length and slowed by the need to clear the webs from along it, proved uneventful. No matter how many times Kathri had descended into tombs, Hajanri or otherwise, she had never got over the nerves of half expecting a trap to go off at any moment.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.3

Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Chapter 1 – Traps and Pitfalls

The rope snapped taunt. Kathri, hanging from the end of it, swung into the stone wall of the pit she had tumbled down, hard enough to drive the breath from her lungs and numb her shoulder. She bounced off the wall, spun about on the end of the rope and hit it again, her knuckles white as she gripped on tight. Coming to a halt, her feet dangling over open air, she peered down to where the smouldering remains of her torch could be made out. It lay on the ground a few metres below her, among serrated rows of rusty spikes that thrust upwards. The broken remains of a skeleton lay down near the torch, impaled on a number of spikes, all flesh long since having been stripped from the bones.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.2

Echo of the Ages

Book 1 – The Crown of Fire

Part 1 – Shadow of the Raven

Prologue – Magefire

The searing burst of magefire crackled as it lashed through the air of the high vaulted, round chamber, hot enough that it left a glowing trail behind, a lingering after effect that faded only slowly. It arced about and latched onto one of the pale green crystals set high up in the red stone walls, there to be caught tight in an arcane grip. It whipped about in a frenzy, searing at the walls and leaving scorch marks behind as it struck them, flailing with a frenetic impotence. A smell of burning metal suffused the air, growing stronger with each passing moment. The crystal glowed with an inner light, growing stronger as the lashing of the flames faltered and failed, draining away.

Continue reading The Crown of Fire Part 1.1