The PriZin of Zin
Page 1
I love God.
I love words.
I love God’s words.
Come with me on a journey of growth and imagination. See you at the end. ~Lori
Part 1 – Hunter
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Part 2 – Ian
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Part 3-Aeryn
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Epilogue
Book 2: Darkness RiZing - Preview
The PriZin of Zin
What is your prison?
Can you set yourself free?
How far would you go
to help free another?
Hebrews 13:2, NIV
Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for in doing so, some have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. †
Zin: A Biblical middle-eastern desert, a wilderness,
a barren wasteland, an unsettled area
thought to be uninhabitable by humankind.
Loretta Sinclair
Sinclair Publishing
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Loretta Sinclair ©2014
Sinclair Publishing
P.O. Box 2052
Rancho Cordova, CA 95741-2052
Email me at: Lori@sinclairinkspot.com
Clan Sinclair motto, origins to 1068 a.d.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise—without the prior permission of the copyright holder, except as provided by USA copyright law.
ISBN 13: 978-0-9916159-5-7
ISBN 10: 0-9916159-5-6
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: pending
Sinclair Publishing
P.O. Box 2052
Rancho Cordova, CA 95741-2052
All of the persons contained within this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to any persons, either living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No giant spiders, sea monsters, or bigfeet were harmed in the writing of this work.
Chapter 1: Hunter
hunt·er - noun ˈhən-tər: One that searches for something.
His finger twitched on the trigger, but didn’t pull. Morgan stared through the scope mounted on his rifle and into the brush at his prey standing on the other side. There he was. The biggest eight-point buck he’d ever seen. The animal stood in the glen, tall and proud. It had no idea its head would end up as a trophy on some human’s wall, stuffed and staring through glass eyes for all eternity; a testament to one man’s hunting ability.
“Quick! Hide! Maybe we can lose the little pain-in-the-butt.” Ian burst into the thick brush and crouched behind a large bush. He peered through the dark green leaves back at Hunter. Raising his index finger to his lips, he motioned for his friend to be quiet.
“No,” Hunter said. “We can’t leave her.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s my little sister— she’s only ten.”
“So?” Ian shrugged at Hunter’s lack of response. “I don’t know why she had to come along anyway. She’ll just ruin everything. Girls always do.”
“Hunter! Ian! Where are you?”
“See.” Ian jumped back out. “Shut up, stupid! You’ll scare all the animals away.”
“I am not stupid!” Aeryn turned to face her brother’s best friend. “And if you had any intelligence whatsoever you would know that, if you hadn’t run away from me, I wouldn’t have to call you to stop, therefore not scaring the animals away.” She stood her ground, feet firmly planted, unmoving, face upwards toward her taller opponent. “It’s all your fault.”
“And if you,” Ian loomed over her, “had any intelligence whatsoever, you would know when you are out in the woods hunting, you have to be quiet. Stop screaming!” Ian inched closer to her, bulking up his height as much as he could.
“Don’t leave me again,” Aeryn demanded. “Or else.”
“Or else what?”
“Or else, Ian. I mean it. I will not play your childish games. And if you think - - -”
“Stop it!” Hunter snapped. “You’re both making too much noise.”
“Shut up Hunter. You’re not in charge.” Ian turned on his friend now. “You don’t even know what you’re doing.”
“Yes, I do.” His face flushed.
“Oh, really? Then where’s your dad?”
Hunter squirmed. His eyes darted from the trees to the ground and back again, searching for any sign of his father. His palms began to sweat, but he dared not wipe them. Ian and Aeryn could not know they were lost. Hunter could feel his heart racing. Dizzy, head spinning, he staggered, but just one step. What had he gotten them into?
“You’re no big game hunter, you just think you are,” Ian laughed. “Just ‘cause your dad can hunt deer and elk doesn’t mean you can.”
“Yes, I can.”
“Yeah? Then do it.”
“I will.”
“Go ahead and find one— just one. I dare ya.”
Hunter looked around, trying to decide which way to go. He hesitated just a split second, but it was too late.
“Go ahead,” Ian taunted. “I’ll just wait here with the little sissy.”
“I am not a sissy! I’m warning you, Ian.”
“Shut up!”
Morgan blinked hard, trying to focus his blurred vision through the thick morning mist. Wait. He’s gone. He shifted slightly from his hiding place in the low brush. Was that real? Did I really see— Yes, there he is. He took aim again. Morgan kept his gun trained on his trophy, his finger still twitching on the trigger.
It was unseasonably warm. His nose filled with misty morning dew with each breath, making it run. He dared not move to wipe it. There was a slight rustle in the bushes to his side, but Morgan remained taut. He kept his gun trained on his eight-point prize.
The deer heard the rustle, too, and froze. It raised its head, huge rack hoisting in the air, and turned toward the noise. Nervous eyes darted from one spot to another in the dense brush, then settled on the spot where Morgan lay, staring straight at him, unmoving. Morgan stared back, stunned. He couldn’t believe his eyes. He released the trigger, pulled back from the scope on the rifle, wiping his nose and rubbing his face. He put his eye back up against the scope again, and stared back into the impossible; purple eyes. It was a deer with dark, royal purple eyes. What kind of genetic mutation was this, he wondered, taking a firm grip on the trigger again. Bracing the barrel against his shoulder, Morgan tried to contain his excitement. The cr
osshairs of the gun scope trained on the chest of the large deer, centering near its heart. It’s one of a kind, he thought, a purple-eyed, eight-point buck; one of a kind. He squared his shoulder and seated the rifle hard against himself.
One deep breath, and hold—
The rustle to his side turned into a crash. Morgan swung the gun to his left and tried to take aim at the noise, but saw nothing clearly.
“Stop,” someone squealed— a female voice; a small female voice.
“Shhhh,” shot the harsh reply, but it was too late. The buck bolted from its feeding spot and disappeared in a flash into the dense underbrush.
Morgan turned in his fury toward the intruders who took from his grasp his once-in-a-lifetime prize. “Who’s there?” he demanded.
There was no reply.
“Come out!” The brush rustled and parted as three young figures emerged.
Morgan looked down into the faces of his two children, and their friend.
“You said you were going to get a Bigfoot,” Hunter said. “I’ve never seen one, Dad.”
“That’s because there’s no such thing. Bigfoot isn’t real.” Morgan clicked the safety on his weapon and lowered it.
“They do so exist,” Ian huffed. “I saw one once. He was watching me through my bedroom window.”
Morgan glared at Ian, but said nothing.
“Then why did you say you were going to get one?” Hunter turned away.
“Why do you have to shoot animals, Dad?” Aeryn looked up at her father. He hated those pleading eyes. She didn’t even need to say what was on her mind. He could see her disappointment written all over her face.
“I hunt for meat, Aeryn. You know that.”
“Can you eat a Bigfoot?” she asked.
“Yeah, sure. I hear they taste like chicken,” Ian snickered. “Hey, if there’s more than one do they call them Bigfeet?”
“There’s no such thing as a Bigfoot.” Morgan shot a sharp glare at his son’s close friend. “Does your father know you’re out here?”
“He knows I spent the night at your house.”
“And you don’t think he would be upset about you wandering around the forest with hunters shooting all around you?”
“Oh, not at all, Mr. Welch,” Ian smiled. “He trusts you to always take good care of me.” The lilt of sarcasm and glint in Ian’s eye was unmistakable.
Morgan turned back to his own two children, Hunter and Aeryn. “You three should not be out here. It’s dangerous.”
“Then why are you here, Dad?” Aeryn was pouting now.
“Because, I’m a trained outdoorsman.” Morgan sat down and beckoned his daughter to his side. He put his arms around her. “I’m perfectly safe out here because I know how to take care of myself in the wild. You and your brother don’t. You shouldn’t be out here unless you’re with an experienced hunter.”
“I do so know how to take care of myself. I took the hunter’s safety class last summer.”
“That’s for gun safety, Hunter, not safety in the wild. You still have a lot to learn.”
Hunter clenched his jaw and turned away, eyes flaring. Morgan could see he was incensed. He would have to deal with this later. “Come on,” he motioned to the kids. “Let’s get back home. The sun’s almost up. It’ll be breakfast time soon.”
Morgan turned back to the clearing where the buck had stood only minutes before. “I’ll be back later,” he whispered. “I’ll see you again.”
“Did you see that big buck, Mr. Welch?”
“Yes, Ian, I did.”
“It had huge antlers. How many points were there?”
“Eight,” he sighed. “It was an eight-point buck.” Morgan looked back at the kids. “It’s starting to rain. Let’s get back before we’re all soaked.”
“I like the rain, Daddy,” Aeryn smiled. She threw her arms straight out to her sides and twirled in the drizzle, batting the droplets away like tiny baseballs. Morgan kept walking. He didn’t want them to see his disappointment about missing his prize. The small cloudburst in the distance began to turn dark. Lightning broke free and tore open the sky, but it was still a ways off. There was time to get home before the storm got too bad.
“Did you see its eyes, though?” Ian pressed. “There was something strange about them.”
“This slope is very slick,” Morgan said, reaching back to help his daughter. “Be careful, those leaves are wet.”
“What do you think spooked it, Dad?” Hunter asked.
Morgan turned and looked into his son’s face. “I don’t know, son,” he lied, trying to spare Hunter’s feelings. He started to inch his feet down the slope, then stopped. Reaching out, Morgan put his arm around Hunter’s squared shoulder. “Let’s come back for him later, together.” Hunter smiled and nodded. Seeing his only son’s smile somehow lessened the blow of losing the prize. There would be another day.
Morgan planted his feet firm on the ground, then turned back to help the kids. “I want you all holding on to each other going down the side of this mountain. It’s very slick.”
The three kids all looked at each other. Aeryn reached out to take her brother’s hand. He batted it away. At his father’s sharp glare, Hunter grabbed the back of her jacket left-handed and held tight instead. Ian grabbed Aeryn’s jacket, and Hunter, right-handed, grabbed Morgan’s. Morgan took the lead.
He stepped out. Lightning tore open the sky once again, directly overhead. Thunder roared on its heels, shaking the ground below. The flash of light was so bright it stunned his eyes. Morgan blinked to focus. The rain pelted them harder now, running in a torrent beneath their feet and down the mountainside like a small river. The earth rumbled beneath their feet, but this time there was no lightning or thunder to accompany it. The rumbling continued, rolling the mountaintop, first one direction then another.
“Earthquake!” Ian screamed as another violent wave of the ground hit beneath him.
“Look out!” Morgan yelled jerking his son toward him as a tree fell behind them. Hunter lurched forward, pulling the other two along with him toward the edge of the mountaintop. Hunter teetered on the edge, staring down at the world giving way beneath him, but Morgan’s strong grip held him tight. More trees toppled and crashed around them, some of them slipping over the edge and sliding, like a swift toboggan, out of sight down the steep embankment.
“Nobody move!” Morgan yelled through the driving rain. “Stay tight.”
“Is it over now?” Aeryn asked. “Daddy, I’m scared.”
“I don’t know,” Morgan answered. “Everyone stay close.” The four huddled together in the rain. Morgan felt his son’s hard grip against the back of his jacket. He held the rifle tight against his body. Lightning and thunder ripped the sky open as the four clung together in the storm perched atop the cliff’s edge. The earth shook again with the booming force of the thunder. Aeryn squealed and pressed closer to the others, inching them toward the precarious edge. Morgan dug his heels in, keeping the group on safe ground.
The earth gave another ear-shattering roar accompanied by a violent roll, causing the group to teeter on the edge again. Clinging to each other, they held fast. When the roar of the earth stopped, the roll beneath their feet continued. Morgan looked down to see the edge of the cliff where they stood give way beneath their feet. “Hold on!” he screamed as they all barreled forward, down the side of the mountain.
The four slid faster and faster, rolling over and over down the steep mountain trail in the rush of the whitewater, brush, and rocks slapping and biting at them every inch of the way. Morgan somehow managed to maneuver his body so that his feet were forward, as though he were on a water slide. Rifle lost somewhere along the path, he held tight to Hunter, with the others all clinging in tow like a human chain. The earth continued to quake beneath them violently. Through the rain and mud, Morgan saw the earth tear a giant crevasse directly ahead. They reached the bottom of the mountain and launched forward into the giant canyon.
With on
e final roar, the earth closed the hole, sealing the four in their dark, wet, doom.
Chapter 2: LOST
Lost adj ˈlȯst:
no longer known
The absolute black of the cavern surrounded them as father and children all fell spinning around and around in the giant hole. With no sense of gravity and no light to see, Morgan only knew down by the direction they were falling. His only reference for himself and the others was the sound of their screams echoing off the slick slate walls of the crater they were now engulfed in. Swallowed whole… eaten alive… the four plunged downward for what seemed an eternity, until they finally crashed through a thin, brittle landing, splashing down hard into a rapid underground stream.
Swept away in a roller coaster ride of white water rapids, Morgan barely had a chance to breathe before being sucked under water and dragged downstream. Kicking and flailing his arms, he tried to swim against the raging tide, but it was useless. Both he and the children were all swept away in the powerful current. Unable to scream any longer, he fought against the rage of nature just to keep his head above water and stay alive, each breath a small battle won in this war for their very lives.
Off in the distance, through the splash of the water and the echoes from the mammoth rock walls, he caught a faint flicker of light. It came from the direction they were headed. Wanting to call out to the others but unable to, he clung to the anticipation there might be a way out of this doom. Trying to relax and let the water carry him and the others toward the possibility of safety, Morgan hung with desperation on to the only thing he had left… hope.