Each boat’s departure became cause for celebration, a new kind of festival. People flocked from villages far and wide to make the pilgrimage over the mountains and watch it set sail. No longer the edge of the world, Little Pond grew into a booming port, with a road built from the village to the sea to ease the passage of freight.
Long after the boat had departed and the crowd dispersed, Nathaniel and I would climb to the peak of the watchtower and wait until the topmost sail dwindled to a speck on the horizon and disappeared.
When nothing was left to see, he’d head for the stairs, but I would linger, staring through the archway that housed the giant candle, and gaping at the vastness of the ocean. Here lay a new world to explore, and I’d think about all the creatures living beneath the waves.
With the advent of spring, my twenty-third birthday arrived, a day I’d often worried I’d never live to see. Six tumultuous years had passed since my coming-of-age. To celebrate, I started a new tradition—with each passing year, I promised to gather those I held most dear and head for a feast at the grist mill, a place with special meaning for me.
As Nathaniel, Thomas, Zachariah, and I sauntered down the moss-strewn path, the sound of splashing water filled the air, and I paused to take in the scene. The setting seemed smaller now, less imposing than the one in Riverbend, a town now celebrated by all as the birthplace of peace and enlightenment, where the people had erected a large obelisk that overshadowed the wheel.
As if to join in our party, the world came alive with the welcoming chirp of birds. Sprouting leaves and newly budding flowers brightened our way.
We spread a blanket on the ground by the stream, opened our basket, and laid out before us cheese and smoked ham, and freshly baked bread with a variety of jams.
After we’d partaken our fill, I turned to Zachariah and pointed toward the wheel. “When I was little, even at your age, I’d never dare peek behind to where the shadows lie.”
“Why not?”
Nathaniel laughed. “Because she imagined demons of the darkness living there.”
The boy’s eyes widened. “Do they?”
Thomas grinned at the boy. “We never found out. She was too afraid to look, and so terrified she’d never let us go near. Why don’t you go check it out?”
As I slapped Thomas on the arm and glared at him, Zachariah scrambled to his feet and inched toward the stream, but not too close. He braced one hand along the mossy wall bracketing the wheel, bent low, and peered into the shadows behind.
Thomas crept up behind him, pretending to peek as well. “Well, what do you see?”
Zachariah skipped back to us. “I don’t see anything. It’s too dark.”
“So what do you suspect lives there?” I said.
He shrugged. “Maybe rats and bats, or most likely nothing at all. Maybe the wheel is like the carousel back home, another symbol of the earth mother’s circle of life, always cycling between darkness and light.”
“So no demons?”
He beamed at us, a beautiful trusting smile. “I don’t think so, but even if there were, I wouldn’t be afraid, because I’m here with the best musician in the world, and a prince and princess. Your magic would be more powerful than theirs.”
Thomas nodded in appreciation, took out his flute, and began playing a tune that seemed to harmonize with the flow of the stream.
As he played, I recalled my vision of the future in a place like the hall of winds. I had considered destroying my log because of that dream, but decided against it. The story of our efforts to make a better world deserved a kinder fate than to be burned in a Little Pond fireplace.
Yet now this boy gawked at me through the tangled locks of hair the wind blew across his face, stubbornly persisting in speaking of magic.
The light of reason indeed.
Nathaniel must have read my thoughts. He grasped my hand and, with the slightest tilt of his head, calmed me without words, his eyes alone insisting all would be well.
I wasn’t as sure.
Perhaps Zachariah spoke more truth than he knew—that for all our efforts, we’d merely managed to spin the wheel a half turn and emerge for a brief while into the light.
I prayed we’d find the wisdom to end the cycle and never return to the shadows.
The boy came and nestled beside me, and I wrapped an arm around him and squeezed. For the moment, his future seemed bright; for now, the light of reason reigned.
But for how long?
Had we driven the water wheel out into the sunlight, only to have the darkness in our souls rise up again one day, or had we finally learned to master our demons?
As I admired the sparkles flashing off the water, I recalled the words of the earth mother: “We are the stuff of stars.”
Perhaps, but stars shine only when surrounded by night. Maybe someday, we’d cast off the darkness that lurked in our souls and shine with our own light, always and forevermore.
---THE END---
Acknowledgements
From start to finish, a novel is an enormous amount of effort and would not be possible without a great team. It starts with my beta readers, including the members of my writing group, The Steeple Scholars from the Cape Cod Writers Center, and continues with Lane Diamond, Dave King, and John Anthony Allen. It finishes with the wonderful formatting and cover art of Mallory Rock. Through it all, the encouragement of others kept me going, my friends and family, including my dear wife, who has put up with my writing aspiration through the good and bad years. Finally, I want to acknowledge my readers, who are, after all, the reason I write, and especially for prodding me to make the first book into a trilogy. So many of you wanted to know what happened to my characters, that I was compelled to give them life once more. Orah and Nathaniel are grateful.
About the Author
The urge to write first struck when working on a newsletter at a youth encampment in the woods of northern Maine. It may have been the night when lightning flashed at sunset followed by northern lights rippling after dark. Or maybe it was the newsletter’s editor, a girl with eyes the color of the ocean. But I was inspired to write about the blurry line between reality and the fantastic.
Using two fingers and lots of white-out, I religiously typed five pages a day throughout college and well into my twenties. Then life intervened. I paused to raise two sons and pursue a career, in the process becoming a well-known entrepreneur in the software industry, founding several successful companies. When I found time again to daydream, the urge to write returned.
My wife and I split our time between Cape Cod, Florida and anywhere else that catches our fancy. I no longer limit myself to five pages a day and am thankful every keystroke for the invention of the word processor.
You can find me at my website (www.DavidLitwack.com ), where I blog about writing and post updates on my current works. I’m also on Twitter (@DavidLitwack) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/david.litwack.author). If you’d like quarterly updates with news about my books, my works in progress, and my thoughts on the universe, please sign up at http://www.subscribepage.com/davidlitwacksignup.
More from David Litwack
THE DAUGHTER OF THE SEA AND THE SKY
This literary, speculative novel examining the clash of religion and reason is now available. For more information on this book, please visit the Evolved Publishing website.
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After centuries of religiously motivated war, the world has been split in two. Now the Blessed Lands are ruled by pure faith, while in the Republic, reason is the guiding light-two different realms, kept apart and at peace by a treaty and an ocean.
Children of the Republic, Helena and Jason were inseparable in their youth, until fate sent them down different paths. Grief and duty sidetracked Helena’s plans, and Jason came to detest the hollowness of his ambitions.
These two damaged souls are reunited when a tiny boat from the Blessed Lands crashes onto the rocks near Helena’s home after an impossible journey across the forbid
den ocean. On board is a single passenger, a nine-year-old girl named Kailani, who calls herself The Daughter of the Sea and the Sky. A new and perilous purpose binds Jason and Helena together again, as they vow to protect the lost innocent from the wrath of the authorities, no matter the risk to their future and freedom.
But is the mysterious child simply a troubled little girl longing to return home? Or is she a powerful prophet sent to unravel the fabric of a godless Republic, as the outlaw leader of an illegal religious sect would have them believe? Whatever the answer, it will change them all forever... and perhaps their world as well.
More from Evolved Publishing
We hope you loved The Light of Reason, and the entire “The Seekers” series, as much as we did, and that you’ll take a moment to post an honest, heartfelt review at your favorite retailer site, and at Goodreads if you have an account there.
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You’re sure to love the 3 books listed below, too, so scroll down and check ‘em out!
For lovers of dystopian sci-fi, this young adult adventure is suitable for readers 13 and older:
RED DEATH
Book 1 of Red Death
By Jeff Altabef
This YA dystopian science fiction adventure will take you to a world fraught with excitement and danger. For more information on this book, please visit the Evolved Publishing website.
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Every child of Eden fears the Red Death. All those afflicted with the plague die young, their souls stripped away as punishment for ancient sins long forgotten. For centuries, Guardians have protected Eden from the Red Death by killing outsiders who stray too close. They must keep Eden a secret if they are to survive.
Seventeen-year-old Aaliss is a highly-trained and dedicated Guardian, but when her rather odd thirteen-year-old brother discovers a cure to the plague, her world is turned upside down. The discovery is a miracle, yet miracles are dangerous in Eden.
The corrupt, all-powerful High Priest brands Aaliss and her brother Wilky as traitors, forcing them to run. They seek refuge in the last place Aaliss thought she’d ever go—beyond the boundaries of Eden, and into the land of the Soulless. Here they must navigate a medieval world filled with witches, magic, and warrior kingdoms run by Elders who are only a few years older than her.
Aaliss yearns to return home to Eden, but she must protect Wilky at all costs. And when her heart tugs her deeper into the world of the Soulless, she questions everything she once believed, everything the Priests had taught her about those who live outside Eden—they are forever cursed, savage, soulless.
Has her soul been taken? Will she and Wilky fall victim to the Red Death, or might they die sooner in the center of a battle that threatens to tear apart the Soulless world? Or... might Aaliss finally find, against all odds, what her heart has yearned for all along?
For fans of hard sci-fi adventures, this book is suitable for readers 13 and older:
SHROUD OF EDEN
(Panhelion Chronicles – Book 1)
By Marlin Desault
This military sci-fi adventure, the first book in the Panhelion Chronicles series, features time travel, alien wars, and more. For more information on this book, please visit the Evolved Publishing website.
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While on maneuvers as part of the Panhelion Defense Command fleet near the moons of Jove, Scott Drumond, captain of the Strike Cruiser Targelion, finds his promising career unexpectedly blighted by events that nearly destroy his starship and dramatically change his fortunes.
Scott’s nemesis arranges his court martial on trumped-up charges, and the court finds him guilty. They order him demoted with the stipulation that he is forbidden to hold a command assignment. His one chance for redemption comes when a sympathetic admiral transfers him to Exploration Command, and offers him a seemingly trivial mission to investigate an anomaly in the Hyades star cluster.
Scott accepts temporary captaincy of the scout corvette Pegasus with the hope of restoring his honor and permanent rank. His assignment turns out to be anything but routine when, upon reaching the anomaly, he and his crew encounter a startling distortion in space-time that creates a barrier to material objects. With the first part of his mission complete, he opens sealed orders and learns of scheming and deception in the highest levels of the Panhelion.
By means of a clever gambit, Scott finds an opening in the barrier and chances passage to the far side, where he uncovers the truth about a legendary ghost ship and a lost colony of humans. As he comes to know more about this society of refugees, their strange customs intrigue and baffle him. But his most important find comes when he discovers they hold the secret to a long forgotten weapon, which can defeat a despot at home and turn the tide in battle against alien invaders swarming out of the Coma Bernices star cluster.
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Praise for Shroud of Eden:
“...the writing style is crisp, the book is well edited and contains a healthy splash of hard science mixed in with a nice story line (new discoveries, alien aggressors, a military in need of leadership and a bad guy you’ll love to hate).” ~ LawBoss
“Shroud of Eden has plenty of action and a gripping storyline, and delves sincerely but not preachily into the interplay between vastly divergent cultures. What’s more, for a science fiction novel, the science is accurate and descriptive more than it is speculative and fanciful. I would classify it among the best science fiction works I have read. The cultural aspects are reminiscent of Heinlein at his best.” ~ David Sampson
“So interesting I had a hard time putting it down. Excellent plot, interesting characters, believable science and edge of your seat action make this a great read. A true sci-fi fan delight, this book has a strong “Star Trek” feeling to it. Mystery and deception unfold throughout this novel, you won’t want to put it down until you discover the ‘truth’.” ~ ARaY
For lovers of cyberpunk sci-fi, this young adult adventure is suitable for readers 13 and older:
THE JAKKATTU VECTOR
Jakkattu – Book 1
By P.K. Tyler
This series of cyberpunk sci-fi adventures offers a look at what happens when humans and aliens collide, and humans become... something more. For more information on these books, please visit the Evolved Publishing website.
~~~
They came as saviors to a deteriorating Earth.
Julip Torne questions whether there is more to life beyond the barren dirt, acidic seas, and toxstorms her people work and die in. Living in poverty on the withering Greenland Human Reservation, she wonders if the alien Mezna goddesses are truly as holy as the temple preaches.
Meanwhile, Jakkattu prisoner Sabaal suffers constant torture and heinous medical experiments as Mezna-priest captors seek to unlock the key to her genetic makeup. She escapes captivity but ends up alone on the hostile alien planet of Earth. If she is to survive, she must work with the same Mezna-human hybrids she’s loathed her entire life.
When humans and Mezna collide, will Sabaal turn out to be the genetic vector the Mezna have been searching for all along, or will she spark the flame that sets a revolution ablaze?
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