Weighted (The Neumarian Chronicles)

By Ciara Knight

The Great War of 2185 is over, but my nightmare has just begun. I am being held captive in the Queen’s ship awaiting interrogation. My only possible ally is the princess, but I’m unsure if she is really my friend or a trap set by the Queen to fool me into sharing the secret of my gift. A gift I keep hidden even from myself. It swirls inside my body begging for release, but it is the one thing the Queen can never discover. Will I have the strength to keep the secret? I’ll know the answer soon. If the stories are true about the interrogators, I’ll either be dead or a traitor to my people by morning.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ciara Knight
• Release date: Aug 11, 2012
• ISBN: 9781939081001

Ciara Knight

Ciara Knight writes to 'Defy the Dark' with her young adult speculative fiction books. Her most recent Amazon best-seller, Escapement, book I of The Neuamrian Chronicles, released to acclaimed reviews securing a Night Owl Top Pick and five stars from InD'Tale Magazine.When not writing, she enjoys reading all types of fiction. Some great literary influences in her life include Edgar Allen Poe, Shakespeare, Francine Rivers and J K Rowling.Her first love, besides her family, reading, and writing, is travel. She's backpacked through Europe, visited orphanages in China, and landed in a helicopter on a glacier in Alaska.Ciara is extremely sociable and can be found at Facebook @ciaraknightwrites, Twitter @ciaratknight, Goodreads, Pinterest, and her website ciaraknight.com.

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Weighted

By

Ciara Knight

Copyright 2012 by Ciara Knight

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Cover Art by Jeanie Ruesch

Copyright 2011 All Rights Reserved

ISBN: 978-1-939081-00-1

CHAPTER ONE

Subject: Raeth Arteres

Date: March 8, 2185

Species: Neumarian

Status: Captured

Tick-tock…tick-tock…I clutch the sides of the steel bed in my cell and push up on my elbows.

The clock, with its bronze rim, hangs high on the wall, taunting me. The long black arm of the second hand struggles up the side of the enormous disc, ticking away the last few moments of my life.

Tap…tap. Footsteps, two by two, march to the cell door. Sucking in a long breath, I embrace the rhythmic sounds of the airship, with the occasional interruption of an engine sputtering.

Tap…thump.

The Queen’s unmistakable gait interrupts my dream-like state. It matches the sounds of the ship, as if she is an extension of the heap of metal propelling us across the desert wasteland.

Open the door. Her voice echoes down the narrow hall.

Tick…

The hand struggles to reach the twelve. If it doesn’t make it, maybe the door won’t open. It teeters and shakes, then slides straight up in unison with the door.

…Tock.

Be quick, before the parasite uses her curse on us. Her raspy, artificial voice sends a quiver to my core.

A guard races in with a handheld device and points it at my neck. I’ve been collared like a dog. I clutch the slick metal ring around my neck, pulling it from my skin, but current zaps through my shoulders and my arm juts out to my side, shaking. Searing pain runs along my veins.

After all these years of my brother hiding me, it was inevitable I’d get caught.

Darkness swirls deep inside, brewing a storm. I can’t remember what it will do if I release it. Is it a gift, as my brother told me, or a curse, as the Queen believes? All I know is that if I unleash it, the Queen will have what she wants, so I push it down deep, keeping it hidden from her.

A man in a grey coat approaches with a syringe in his shaking hand. His left eye

Reviews for Weighted (The Neumarian Chronicles)

[cathy_keaton · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a short story prequel to a series of steampunk novels coming out in 2013 called The Neumarian Chronicles. From this story, I can gather some aspects of the world building and that there are two types of people against one another, Slags and Neumarians. I don't know why they fought a war or why they hate each other so much, but what happens to the protagonist, Raeth, happens because of these feuding societies.Raeth is a Neumarian and seems to be around 12-years-old. She has some sort of ability that she needs to keep hidden from the Slags who captured her in order to find out what it is. The Slags are people with bionic body parts—cyborgs, basically. That is so cool, but they are the bad guys and they are very not cool, not even towards each other. The Queen is execution-happy and everybody smacks everybody's faces all the time. Raeth suffers torture and near death at the hands of the Queen of the Slags who is completely evil and one-dimensional, but successfully strikes fear in you.Although, a lot of the story is confusing, it still has elements I usually am drawn to: cyborgs, a mad scientist (Raeth gets tortured by a man in a gray coat at the behest of the evil Queen), sci-fi technology and even a fantasy element in Raeth's supernatural ability. It's quite an intense read for all it's worth and really gets your appetite whetted for the future subsequent novels.*I received a copy of this title from the author in exchange for my honest review.

[sarikap8_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Author Ciara Knight gifted me a Kindle copy of Weighted that I won in a giveaway form Anagha @ BookSpark. I was interested in reading the book, which is 31 pages long, and I finished it in one sitting. The synopsis itself caught my attention, since the story is set in 2185. Raeth is a Neumarian and possesses a power that the Queen believes will annihilate the human population. Hence, she is captured and tortured. Some of the scenes were quite cruel, but I think that makes it more real. I liked both, Princess Semara and Bendar, who seemed genuinely nice people and help Raeth. I did feel bad for Raeth for everything that she's been through. I hope we get to see more about her family and her life before the Great War in the coming books. Overall, Weighted was an interesting and good read, though I wish it was longer! But then again, it is a novella, and I am waiting to read the first book in The Neumarian Chronicles. I love the word "Neumarian", by the way!

[gengenbookblog · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When I started reading Escapement, I felt like the story had a Branded/Divergent feel to it. While it does has some minor similar aspects, it is entirely different from this book. This is the first book I have read that has a lot of action in a Dystopian book. It is very suspenseful and has just moved to the First Place on my favorite Dystopian books.Semara has lived with her mother, the Queen since she was six years old. She used to live with her dad but one day she got handed over to her mom and she didn?t like it one bit. She was treated horribly by her own mother, to the point of almost torture. Each year, Semara has to pick a Neumarian, people with special gifts that the Queen hates, to be killed. The day of her sixteenth birthday is the day she has to pick once again in order to be part of the council of where they live. As she?s looking all over the place, she notices a familiar face?one that belongs to a person she never thought she would see again, considering she had sent this person to be killed but had helped escaped, not knowing what the future held for this person. Once the Queen noticed what was going, she sent Semara to be put as a slave to the General (evil incarnate) but Semara is rescued and her journey begins with betrayal, sadness, and new powers she hadn?t thought she had.The covers of the whole series caught my attention a lot and, while I struggled whether or not to sign up for review, I am so glad I did! I entered a new world where everything is raw and a little gore-y. I finished this book in two days (basically in 1 day because I only read 2 chapters the first day). I ate it all up once I started reading.Ciara Knight has brought it all with this new series.

[ogrezed · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Although a good story, I wish I were as enthusiastic about this book as other reviewers seem to be. I did find it an interesting diversion, but it never really engaged me. And, given the nature of the story, it did get a bit repetitive. Ultimately, I gave it a 3 because I'm not chomping at the bit to read more of the Neumarian Chronicles...

[isisunit · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This 36 page novella tells of Raeth Artere time aboard Queen Mandessa Valderak's airship. A 12 year old Neumarian, or a 'parasite' according to the Queen and her terrified entourage. In an attempt to uncover the plot against the Queen they have been subjecting Raeth to hideous torture. Her first major surgery was to remove the majority of one leg and replace it with a metal one - without anesthesia. With one vicious cut young Raeth has been turned into a Slag, making it so that she no longer belongs anywhere. Not that this will be an issue unless she should miraculously survive her time on the ship, and somehow escape before they kill her. . . **Personal note - I feel this book should have come between Escapement and Pendulum.

[westkayla1221 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

After my experience with the first book, well, actually before reading the first book, I found this one for free on Amazon. Like most free books on Amazon, I bought it. Hey, can't argue with pricing like that. This is stated as #1.5 in the series, but can actually be read before the series, since it is merely the telling of Raeth's ordeal on the queen's ship four years before the events of the first book in the trilogy. I wasn't sure what I was going to get with this book. In fact, I hadn't even read the blurb, so I wasn't sure what part of the story it would be telling. And I'm kind of glad it was a surprise, because it allowed me a pleasant "Oh!" when figuring out it would be in Raeth's point of view. The layout of this novella is really nice. I love how each new chapters is headed with information about Raeth, or at least information about how Raeth will be in the chapter. I also love how well it flows. I mean, I saw no problem with it. And it was nice to see Semara from her eyes, and how she kind of double crosses the queen, using her need for followers and people to agree with her against her. This part of the story just builds upon Raeth's strength. Many Neumarians would have probably died long before her, and seeing Ryder save her just marks them both as amazing individuals. This is, without a doubt, one of the best parts of the Neumarian Chronicles, at least in my eyes.