True North

by S.M. Winter

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  Dear Reader,

  Thank you so much for reading my book. I really hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Please leave me a review at your favorite retailer! Read a little bit farther and see the Sneak Peak for South of Redemption.

  Yours Truly,

  S.M. Winter

  An excerpt from:

  South of Redemption

  An Elemental Series Novel

  By

  S.M. Winter

  Copyright 2016 S.M. Winter

  Smoky fog crawled across the muddy field. Shadowy figures stood just out of my line of visibility and moved to circle me. I felt the earth shift just before I saw a shadow move quickly through the thick curtain of mist. Drops of water gathered where the wet fog touched. I smiled, welcoming the challenge and distraction of a fight.

  I used my newfound knowledge and skills to aid me. I shielded my mind from any possible psychic breaches and focused on creating a mental barrier, as if there was a wall around me. It was something I had been practicing for what seemed like an eternity. After months of practice, the wall was steel. The only problem with creating that barrier is that when shielded it is nearly impossible to influence my element. Closing my eyes, I listened.

  Watch out!

  A wet squish to my left had me lunging to the side as something whistled by. And so I stood, waiting for any other sound. My legs began to quiver from holding the same stance. Opening my eyes, I looked around and saw that the shadowy figures had moved on. Crouching, I moved as silently as possible through the muddy ground. As I passed by a puddle a hand shot from the ground and grabbed my ankle. Yelping, I fell and rolled to the side. My attacker burst from the ground, and would have landed straight on top of me if I hadn’t continued to roll. A solid punch had his fist sinking so deep in what had just been solid earth that he struggled to pull it out of the sucking mud.

  Get to your feet, I commanded myself.

  I rolled to my stomach and gained my knees, but not quickly enough. He was already right on top of me. He placed pressure on my back and I was pinned.

  “Dead,” he said. Then he stepped off and eased back a few feet.

  I woke panting.

  Time is abstract. When you do nothing, or when you are forced to do nothing but stare at walls, eat, and use the restroom, trivial things like time can take on a fluidity. One day you can be staring at the wall and the next you are staring at the ceiling, seemingly without moving. Food comes, empty plates leave, nothing breaks the monotony. So you practice the things you know.

  Though it was just a dream, I knew that I needed to improve my fighting skills and my mental protections every day. I’d lost count of how long I’d been kept here. The only reason I knew the fighting was just a dream was that I always woke the same as when I’d gone to sleep. One time I found dirt under my nails, but I hadn’t been sure if it was there before or not.

  You bring something back, Good or Bad, his voice whispered through my head. I missed him. Thinking of him reminded me that projecting was different from dreaming. If I was projecting I would be bringing something back with me, and all I’ve got is dirty fingernails.

  It was torture. I wasn’t even allowed a book. How had it come to this? My faith was slipping. The certainty that someone was coming for me was fading quickly. How long had I been in here? The same four walls surrounded me. In the beginning I had a tiny barred window. When they’d found me staring out into the yard at the plants growing outside I had been moved. The window had been “too stimulating”, I’d been told. Perhaps when I was better I could earn the privilege back. I was uncertain how they expected me to get better when no one came to see me any more. No doctors. No nurses. The only interaction I had was with the plates that came and went through a tiny trap door, and the flickering fluorescent lights that were embedded in the ceiling. I couldn’t even count the days by sunlight anymore. I was completely cut off.

  I laid back on the tiny wire framed cot shoved unceremoniously in the corner of the ten by ten room. I knew it was ten by ten because I paced it constantly. I also knew that there were five-hundred-seventy-six divots in the ceiling, one-hundred rubber tiles on the ground, fifty-eight breaks on the padded walls, one tiny tankless toilet with a recessed button on the side of the bowl and I had decided the color of the room was definitely eggshell. I was willing to defend my opinion to anyone who would talk to me. Unfortunately, the only people that wanted to talk to me were in my head and they tended to be just as passionate about their opinions.

  How had I gotten here? I had graduated from high school at twelve-years-old. I earned my PhD by nineteen. I closed my eyes. This had all started because of my sister. She was killed in a hit and run. I’d been weak and had thrown myself into traffic.

  No, a fading voice reminded me. You chose life. You found magic.

  The problem was that this voice was getting easier to disregard. Had I been delusional? I hadn’t been able to influence my Element since I woke at the asylum. That in itself was making me doubt my entire experience. I walked myself through the events of that time again. It played like a movie.

  My life had been simple, if not easy. I’d grown up with my baffled, and sometimes borderline abusive, parents and my loving older sister. She had been my driving force during a lot of my formative years. She was my biggest supporter when I’d graduated high school at twelve, a full year before she did. She had been there when I’d graduated from Yale and pursued my Doctorate. She had been the one to throw me a party when I’d received my PhD by nineteen. She had provided me with two beautiful nephews and the family I’d always wanted. Then she’d been ripped away. That was when things began to get weird.

  While I was grieving I’d briefly played with the idea of killing myself. Of course I’d decided firmly against it, but then I’d been pushed into traffic and time had stopped. Laughable right? I’d been essentially kidnapped and taken to a floating island. Hysterical. I’d learned that magic was real, at least to an extent. Doubtful. I had found love, hadn’t I? Unlikely. This was one of the things that made my chest hurt the most. Remembering the way, he’d made me feel, the kisses we’d shared.

  Alexandar. A single tear ran a track down my face, my throat felt raw and it was hard to swallow. Where was he now? He’d made me believe, so where was he? He was the entire reason for my unrelenting belief in magic.

  The clanging that preceded my meal’s arrival startled me, shattering my thoughts into a million pieces. I wasn’t hungry but I’d been eating out of habit. The tiny swinging metal door creaked back and forth until its movement stilled. I threw my legs over the side of the cot. My bare feet touched the cold rubber floor and I stood. Retrieving the hard plastic plate, I sat back on the cot to peruse my fare.

  A brown lump with a heavy dressing of ketchup sat as the main entree. Sad, wilted brown leaves stood as the vegetables, and a poor excuse of an overly sugared, syrupy pear half, the fruit. If I could gag, I would have. Using my hands, I poked at the meat colored lump and it jiggled revoltingly. I sighed and wished for the hospital food I had turned my nose up at in what seemed like another lifetime.

  The smell of the mystery food made my stomach clench. It was the stench of day old meatloaf gone sour. I picked up the soft, round plastic card they gave me in lieu of utensils. Using my thumb I folded it to use like a shovel. As soon as the plastic pierced the fleshy mound and I lifted the scoop, my stomach revolted. The aroma was worse up close. I let the shovel drop with a splat back on the plate. My hands were shaking. I was just about to throw the tray across the room, damn the consequences, when something in the splattered lump caught my eye. A razor blade.

  I took it carefully between my thumb and forefinger. It was the size of an exacto-knife, small enough that if I hadn’t been paying attention it would have at least cut my mouth. I shuddered. How could someone let this happen? It was bad enough that the food was nearly inedible, why would they want me to hurt myself? Unless that was the point. I sighed and closed my eyes. T
hey wanted me to kill myself. I was embarrassed to admit that it seemed like a great idea. A vacation. An escape. The dark abyss of oblivion in this moment was preferable to the conditions I was currently living. I shook my head and set the blade back on the tray with shaking hands.

  I took the tray and put it down carefully, getting as close as I dared. I picked through the mess to see if they put anything else in the “food”. Lying in the goop was part of a crushed pill. It was tiny, perhaps an eighth of a normal sized headache pill. I laughed.

  They’ve been drugging the food. Of course they had. I felt stupid. This should have occurred to me long ago. I shoved the tray away and hung my head between my knees, breathing deeply. No doubt that was why I’d had a hard time concentrating. Why when I reached for the Air around me, my Element slipped through my fingers like a bar of wet soap. I felt... relieved. It looked like I wasn’t going to be eating for a few days to test this theory.

  I lifted my head as a thought occurred to me. I needed to hide the food. I frowned, looking around the room at my lack of hiding places. I did have a toilet and that seemed the best route at the moment. I stood, picked up the tray and walked toward the stainless steel bowl. None of