Fire and Blood

By John Robin

Azzadul, the god-king, the Lord of Light revered by many. When the darkness corrupted him, he became the Dark Lord, feared the world over. His magic, once a gateway to immortality for his people, delved instead into horrors as he sought ever deeper levels of mastery. Children were stolen from their beds, coveted for his blood-rites. When he vanished, it all ended, and the people of the world tried to forget, to move on...

Jak Fuller is an orphan who has wandered from town to town as long as he can remember. He's never tried to find a home. He's only tried to escape the memory of a burning woman, to keep moving. Born ten years after Azzadul's disappearance, rumors of the Dark Lord's horrors have never mattered to him, until he comes to Fort Lasthall...

A legendary town on the outskirts of the Dark Lord’s former kingdom, Jak has felt called to it ever since the day he's heard of it. And now that he's arrived, he can't help but notice how easy life has become, as though he's meant to be here in this place before the mountains, where magic and stories of dragons abound, the one place Azzadul's power never could touch...

Where blood rites are practiced in secret, and conspirators who have never forgotten the Dark Lord's ways are everywhere, even among those most trusted...

And they have been waiting for Jak a long time.

Fire & Blood is the first part in the 5-part serial publication of A Thousand Roads.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dreamsphere Books
• Release date: Oct 31, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463717639

John Robin

It all began when he was an eight-year-old boy, when he discovered Tolkien’s map of Wilderland tucked in the pages of an old, beat-up copy of The Hobbit on his grandmother’s bookshelf.From that point onward, John Robin knew he was destined to make his own world and tell stories about it. Over a period of twenty years, he read the great fantasy epics, learned the craft of storytelling, wrote three novels just for practice (unpublished), and all the while his fantasy world and unique vision as a writer ripened. Growing up in the 80’s and 90’s, the fast change of technological advancement was also a heavy influence on his world-building and magic system, an analog of how mastery over environment can change the human condition. A teenage addiction to horror movies and gritty comic books also added its touches to his work. The result is an epic that channels the same deep, mythic epic notes of Tolkien, but more contemporary and dark.After working for many years in academia and adult education, John left his job to pursue his dreams as a writer. Having cut his teeth as an editor at a small publishing company, John decided that, while he worked hard to prepare his debut novel, he would build a book production business to help connect self-publishing authors with editing, cover, design, and marketing services based on the traditional model. He presently is the creative director, senior editor, and production manager for his company and oversees a team of twelve.When he’s not writing, John enjoys reading, listening to educational podcasts, playing chess, recreational mathematics, drawing trees or maps with pen, creating vector graphic artwork (mostly fractals), working with textiles, playing classical piano (especially Beethoven and Chopin), long distance running and strength training, gardening, long walks, serially watching his way through TV series’ in the evenings, board game nights with friends, and of course...pandering to the whims of his cat, Wizard, who is the true muse behind his stories.

Book preview

A Thousand Roads

Part One:

Fire & Blood

John Robin

Copyright © 2018 by John Robin

Cover design copyright © 2018 by Story Perfect Dreamscape

Cover art copyright © 2018 by Ave Basilio

Interior art copyright © 2018 by John Anderson

Map copyright © 2018 by John Robin

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Dreamsphere Books

Ebook published October 2018 and paperback published June 2019 by Dreamsphere Books, an imprint of Story Perfect Inc.

Dreamsphere Books

PO Box 51053 Tyndall Park

Winnipeg, Manitoba R2X 3B0

Canada

Visit http://www.dreamspherebooks.com to find out more.

Acknowledgements

Many thanks are in order for those who helped me turn this book into the stellar work it has become.

To Dr. Robert Runté, who told me to put the first draft away and write something else. In following this advice, I realized what this book had to become. My thanks for his eye on the opening chapters of the fourth draft, the fifth draft, and the sixth. The clarity and flow there is largely due to his thorough edits.

To Lizette Clarke, who coached me week by week as I wrote the second draft and the third. Lizette’s passion for the story helped me push to create a true ending, then from that, a true beginning. Most importantly, she inspired me to believe in this book, and that it is a story worth reading.

To Dale Lui, who helped this book cross the Rubicon. I will not forget the red revision, wherein Laira emerged as a leading character, Talamus the Red became more menacing and his regime more ubiquitous, and chapter 23 became the surrealist nightmare it only dared to be in the initial drafts. Dale’s deep insight on character helped me push well outside my comfort zone to understand, and truthfully render, Jak’s conflict. For this I am grateful.

To Brenda Clotildes, whose perseverance and commitment to this book helped me in the 7th draft iron out some 7000 issues of grammar, logic, choreography (a lot of that) and other typos.

To Tim Haughian, whose eagle eye helped me eliminate further errors. (Any remaining are mine.)

And to the team at Story Perfect Editing Services, Dreamscape Cover Designs, and Dreamsphere Books who handled other important aspects of production:

To Ave Basilio, who designed an amazing cover that channels all the dark magic this book promises. To Elan Samuel, who helped with the copywriting.

To John Anderson, who met regularly with me on matters of Necromancy, of the pen-and-paper variety. He created the interior designs, including custom headers for each chapter, which appear in the print book. He also went over every pixel of the map, to prune my linework. Most importantly, his passionate interpretation of my work fuelled in turn numerous creative touches in my revision, a true symbiosis.

To Cameron D James, my loving husband, as well as business partner, who formatted and published this book, and who kept me in line the last seven years I have been working on it.

To early readers who lent me further help: Susan Hamilton (author of Shadow King and The Devil Inside) for her expertise on horses, Malkuthe for his expertise on magic and world-building, Tyler Sparrow for his fantasy reader wisdom, and Jessica Collins (author of Stealing Beauty and Finders Keepers) and her beta reader group for their further input to help me ensure good enough is no substitution for done.

And lastly, to Wizard and Shyger, the two cats who are my true muses. Several typos (mostly removed) are the result of creative cuddle sessions at the keyboard.

A Thousand Roads

Part One:

Fire & Blood

1

An End to Wandering

The moment Fort Lasthall appeared at the far end of the dirt road, Jak halted with his barrow full of books.

For all his childhood, Jak had drifted from village to village. He’d slept beneath trees or in haylofts or sheltered ditches. He’d been a helper to a bootblack, a fetcher, and a costermonger, and all that before he was ten winters. He’d stayed in so many places, but he’d never thought of them as home. His books were his only possessions, and with them he’d wandered.

Then he’d heard about Fort Lasthall.

The town of good fortune, some called it.

A relic of the old world, a kindly hag had told him once, untouched by the god-king’s Curse.

All roads lead there, said many. It’s the best place to live.

Every time Jak heard about it, something stirred in his heart. It was like a whisper from deep within him. Fort Lasthall, it said. Go there. Go.

His childhood was coming to an end, and Jak was frustrated with having nowhere to stay for longer than a quartermoon. So he’d listened to the call. He’d traveled the smaller roadways and lanes, and all the while that stirring in his heart grew stronger. He journeyed even in the rain and went to bed wet, feeling for once that his path was leading him somewhere.

Finally, he was here. Yet now that he saw Fort Lasthall, he hesitated.

From this distance, the town was an indistinct jumble at the foot of the mountain called Tharrannor, a hidden world shimmering behind a veil of morning mist. Higher up, its outer wall curled along the mountain’s slope, into a forest thick with Northwood trees so dark their green looked almost black. Higher still, a stone cliff marked with holes seemed a hundred eyes…watching him.

Jak stopped. He was certain something from within those holes was beckoning—was the very thing that had called him here.

It was a ridiculous thought. Jak forced himself to keep moving. The day was yet young, and if he was quick, he would still have time to find work and, if he was fortunate, a roof over his head for the night.

A measure of dawn had passed by the time he arrived at a gateway in the thick outer wall. He passed through it, studying the buildings that towered around him, taking in the stillness of the morning. Birds wheeled in lazy circles above the rooftops. At the highest point of the Fort, an old castle with two towers rose up within an inner wall, joined by the wings of newer, abutting palaces. On the west, it was divided by a river called the North Thistle. Jak tried not to let his eyes wander higher, but they did anyway. Dark caves, opening into the white-capped mountain peaks beyond…Jak thought of the stories in his books.

How, beneath these mountains, they said, there was magic.

Jak passed through the huts and thatch-roofed houses of the outer town, toward a second wall where many squat buildings of stone huddled close. Here he could expect to find the smiths and shopkeepers, the most likely ones who would give him work as a helper or fetcher. Yet, as he moved—upward to the higher parts of the Fort, upward and closer to the mountain—there was energy in his limbs, an urge to turn and run.

Run, Jak! There’s no time. An image flashed into his mind, a woman’s face, melting like wax, her expression calm the whole time. A scream that was not hers, loud and shrill, coming from somewhere far away. It was an old memory, one Jak had tried to forget over the years.

He ignored it, just like he ignored the urge to run. He turned his attention to the buildings and the second wall that loomed closer.

He passed through a gate capped with a hammer-shaped keystone. A wide lane wove between high buildings that crouched together like bunched cloth. Jak gawked at the stone buildings here in the second ring, some of them four stories high. The air smelled wholesome, clean and mixed with the scent of hops and fresh baking. Children ran in the side alleys, laughing, and there was neither a beggar nor a thug in sight. Jak passed deeper into the Fort, sinking into a dreamy state as he followed the winding lane up and up.

He came to a large square, crowded with merchant huts and peddler tables. In the middle, a statue of some Annon lord held a double-bladed battle axe. The angle of its long shadow told Jak it was half a measure before noon. Beyond, where the lane continued, a building dominated the far side.

The high innermost wall rose up behind it. Jak imagined the royal quarters somewhere beyond, but from this angle he could only see the snowy white tips of the mountains. Yet the building that gathered here before the innermost wall, though not elegant, was lofty enough to seem like it belonged inside the wall instead: it rose three stories, with many wings, capped by a wide, sloped roof of varnished wood shingles in the Pikeland style.

Here, it seemed to tell him. That call, so strong now, froze him where he stood. The busy square and its late morning bustle receded and the building grew larger in Jak’s mind. Its many windows, small and intricately framed, and dark…they became eyes, just like those of the watchful cliff.

Run, Jak! the voice of memory urged.

The dreamy state was gone. Jak smelled not just baking and hops, but body musk, the brine of salt fish, the stink of midden. The hubbub of trade carried on in its clatters and drone of low conversation, but the eyes of many traders were on him. They seemed all lords in their cloaks lined with ermine or fox fur, their jackets of satin or leather, some even trimmed with velvet. Their hollow stares could have spoken: A foolish boy with a barrow full of books—who is this strange thing among us?

But the building loomed up above them all, still beckoning him. Jak pushed his barrow forward, ignoring the stares, ignoring his fears. He hadn’t come this far to let imagination get the better of him.

A fenced yard led to the far side of the building where a single story of plainer wood abutted it. The stable, most likely. This would be a good place for Jak to start. With the sheer size of the building, this had to be the home of someone wealthy. And where there was someone wealthy, there was always something to do in the stables.

Jak stopped before a varnished door. He knocked twice and got no answer. He almost knocked again, but across the lane, two men were watching him. Jak didn’t want to stand out as a troublesome beggar and attract the local patrol. He turned back to his barrow.

The door creaked open partway. A fat, sandy-haired boy peered out. He looked about thirteen winters. Round to the left. The door’s open.

Jak did as instructed, finding a large stable door that swung open with a slight creak. He wheeled his barrow onto the hard-packed dirt floor, met at once by the soft wicker of horses, the stomp of hoofs, and the scent of manure. On the left and right, the slatted stall doors were painted green, their marching line broken only once by an alcove full of buckets and sacks.

There was no sign of the boy who had opened the other door. Jak wheeled along slowly, taking in the beamed ceiling and its row of burning lanterns, the loftiness of just the stable itself. It could have been a palace for horses.

Jak stopped at the far end, before a short flight of stairs leading to the rest of the house. A wiry Pikelander descended, keeping his impressive height bent until he cleared the stairwell’s low ceiling. He had salt-and-pepper hair and a bushy mustache, and he wore tan trousers and a green vest with bronze buttons.

He took in Jak, then the books stacked in the barrow. You seem lost, boy.

I’d like to find some work, Jak said. The man lifted an eyebrow. I can do anything you need, and I learn quickly.

How many winters do you have? Thirteen? Fourteen?

Twelve, Jak said.

The Pikelander fixed Jak with an unreadable expression.

I’m almost grown up, Jak added. Please, give me a chance. I won’t let you down.

Many breathspans passed, the Pikelander’s expression one of deep concentration, as though the man were working out every detail about Jak.

I’m Barrik, he said at last. He nodded toward the stables. The Prince of Axes arrived with his escort a candle inch before you, and now I’ve got a hundred steeds under my care. That’s a lot of horse shit, and plenty of work to get you started.

Barrik directed him to the alcove with the buckets, pointed out a chute to the waste pit at its far end, then left Jak to his work.

Jak began right away. He rolled his barrow into the alcove, then fetched two buckets and a spade and started at the end near the stable door. There were dozens of stalls. In each he found dividers and two, sometimes three horses. Most were the common riverbred variety—bay or dun or buckskin. Some were the rarer black-red Mountain Chestnuts prized by travelers for their endurance.

For a building so large, Jak was