Rowan: The Aeon Chronologies

By Taylor Caley

"Secrets Have the Gravest of Costs..."

Even with the shadows of war and bloodshed nothing more than a thing of the past, how could she be expected to move on?

These were scars that ran far too deep, yet as the young Ravennite called Rowan struggles to bask in her people's hard-won victory against the Domineers, she soon finds herself haunted by endless night terrors, visions of her past, and the inescapable suspicion that her own loved ones may be keeping dark secrets from her.

For Rowan, this will mark a trial far greater than she has ever faced before...and it may cost her everything.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Taylor Caley
• Release date: Dec 19, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386253013

Taylor Caley

I am a science fiction author living in Pennsylvania, working on a new series of fantasy novels for young adults that will keep you spellbound!

Book preview

One

It was a cool and gloomy summer’s night. The dark overcast produced a never ending rain all day and the sound of the many droplets was all that could be heard as they fell upon the roads and flowed down into the sewers. A single man was walking along the muggy sidewalk in the outskirts of the city of Albany, New York. He stood well over six feet and was clad in a hooded cloak that allowed him to blend in with the shadows of the buildings around him.

The sun had set hours ago, leaving the city in the darkness of the rainy night. Very few cars passed the man along the way. The glow of their headlights barely illuminated his hooded face, revealing him to be around his mid thirties with a short, dark beard and a stern and cautious expression as though he was in a world to which he did not belong.

The man scanned warily around as each vehicle passed him on the road. He waited until he was sure that there was nobody around to see him and slipped away into one of the many alleys, disappearing quickly from the faint street lights. It was dark and quiet in the alleyway, but the man was completely unfazed by such surroundings. He stopped about midway down the narrow back street, standing under one of the many scaffolds and fire escapes along the side of the building to keep out of the rain. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, losing himself deep in thought.

He could not help but question what he was doing here so far from home. The cities of these people appeared magnificent as he gazed up toward the top of the buildings around him; their abilities to create structures as tall as the mountains often filled his mind with wonder, but nevertheless, this had always been an alien world to him. If his own people knew where he was right now and what he was doing, he was not sure how they might react.

As a sudden creaking noise quietly rang in his ears, followed by the sound of a startled stray cat leaping out of a garbage can, the man whipped around to see a battered screen door opening up nearby. He froze where he stood as another dark figure leaned ever so slightly out of the doorway and looked around. As their gaze soon caught the sight of the cloaked man standing against the building within the shrouded alleyway, they hesitated briefly before raising a rather shaky hand up as if to get his attention. The man sighed to himself as he knew that he was in the presence of precisely the person he was here to see.

Glancing toward each end of the alley to ensure that they were indeed alone, the man stepped toward the figure still standing inside their doorway. It was almost as though they were afraid to come out. There was hardly enough light being cast into the alley, but as he approached he could clearly see that it was a woman standing before him. She appeared to be around the same age as him but much more ragged. Her clothes were just as poor as his. Her darkened hair was dirty and messy and her face was marked by a large bruise along the side of her eye. As the man extended his hand out in greeting she immediately clasped it as if she was grateful that he had come.

In the dim light shrouded by the dark and rainy overcast, the ragged woman looked up into his eyes and gave him a serious look of trust. She leaned inside the open doorway as she gently picked something up wrapped within a thick, gray quilt. She cradled the object in both arms, and for a moment she held it close and rested her head against it as though she did not want to part with it. After a moment that felt like an eternity, the woman finally turned around to face her visitor once more. She took a few deep breaths before carefully handing to him her possession. After a brief hesitation, the man took the bundle of cloth and held it close, covering it slightly with the sleeve of his cloak to keep it out of the rain.

He could not believe what he was doing. He was well known by his people for his stern and serious composure like that of a leader, but he could not help but feel softened by compassion as he gazed down at the object in his arms. The woman rubbed her eyes, trying to suppress the persistent tears of sorrow. She did not say a word; she felt that there was nothing she could say, but simply looked into his eyes once more as if to thank him for what he was doing. The man nodded his head, and without dragging their meeting on for another moment the woman retreated back inside and shut the door, locking it on the other side.

Once again, the man was left alone in the darkness of the alley. He cradled the roughly eight pound object in his arms, and for a moment his heart sank. It was a feeling that seemed to dissolve his very being; his sense of pride, assurance and fortitude beginning to fade as he stared down at a whole new responsibility. For a moment, he did not have the strength to move, but he knew that he would have to face the consequences of his actions later. He was far from home right now, and he had less time to return the more he lingered here. It was time to go.

The man held firm to his new possession as he made his way out of the alley. The rain was slowly beginning to recede. Looking around at the immense structures on either side of him as he headed briskly down the muggy street the way he had come, he could not help but feel increasingly miserable the longer he remained outside of his own world. He knew very little of the world that the people such as that woman called their home, and neither did he wish to learn anything about it. The object carried in his arms was a constant reminder to him that this was nothing more than a world from which to escape, and he would soon be making his own escape.

Beyond the outskirts of the city, a lone horse was awaiting the man’s return. In the dark cover of night he had rode for miles to the city of Albany where the ragged woman was waiting for him. Now that their meeting was over, the man hurried back to find his horse right where he had left it; hidden behind the shadows of a large cluster of bushes. Much like the horse, he was in the dark and had to remain that way. He was not supposed to be out here and he knew it.

Behind the bushes, the horse had been all but motionless until at last it saw its master approaching. The man reached up and gently stroked the horse along its snout, and he reached into the pocket of his cloak and took out a piece of a carrot. The horse graciously took the carrot from his hand as he carefully mounted the saddle upon its back with the bundled quilt in his arms. There would still be hours of riding ahead of him, and he knew he would have to be extra careful with his new cargo. The sooner he made it back behind the borders of his home, the better for everyone.

It was tiring and stressful to hold the object wrapped in quilt in his arms the entire way, especially without disturbing it. Fortunately, it did not present an issue, much to his relief. The hours were ticking away as he rode nearer to the base of the great Appalachian Mountains. His home lied deep with the Adirondacks of northern New York. It was a place that nobody from outside the mountains would ever enter, their newly implemented laws now saw to that. Despite all of that, the man knew very well that his current actions would be considered a deliberate violation of those laws if his people were to ever discover them. He would find a way around it if he had to, for he was following his heart right now. He could only hope that his choices would not reap repercussions for his people.

The rainy overcast had passed over long ago, and the sky was beginning to lighten as dawn would soon approach. This had been a long and arduous night, but the man let out a sigh of relief as he found himself coming upon familiar territory at last. These hills within the central regions of the Adirondacks were especially rugged and taxing to traverse, but that was not the case for him. Having been born and raised in these mountains, the man knew every path very well. Every rise and every fall, every valley and every stream, he knew them all as if they were a part of him, and in time someone new would come to learn them as well.

Following a single, narrow path through the darkness of the woods, the man soon headed into the opening of a large valley at the foot of one of the tallest hills. The sun had yet to make its rise, but it cast its morning light upon the crimson cirrus clouds. Many structures making up a village could be seen resting near the center of the valley, and as the man rode into the stone pathways he did his best to avoid making eye contact with the sentries patrolling and watching over their homes. Several of them called out to him, and some attempted to salute, but he simply continued past them, holding his object close to him as if to conceal it from view.

As the man came to a large cottage situated near the middle of the village, he was quick to dismount his horse and tie it off to a post out front. He would return later to escort the horse back to the stables where it belonged,