Lastly, or maybe second to last, I wanted to mention that if you read The Death of Dulgath in print, or listened to it on audio, then I want to make the ebook available to you at no cost. Again, just drop me an email, and let me know what file format you would prefer, and I’ll send one over. A copy of your receipt would be highly appreciated, but I’m not going to make a big deal about “proof of purchase.” After all, it’s not like you won’t be able to find a pirated copy of the book.
After finishing a book, there are always little things that cross my mind that I wish I could talk about. Things like why I decided path A versus path B and of course those funny little things I thought of but just couldn’t put into the book (mainly because they just didn’t fit). Robin and I shared a great laugh about something that would have been especially fun in chapter twenty-four. In any case, we’ve collected all these little odds and ends, along with some behind the scenes stuff in a free e-book called The Making of the Death of Dulgath. It won’t be made public on e-book sites because it’ll contain massive spoilers. For this reason, I only give it away to people after they’ve finished reading. And you guessed it—just send me an email to get your copy.
Okay, I hear the music playing me off the stage, so I’m going to wrap this up. For those that don’t know, I once quit writing for over a decade, and during that time I never thought I would have anyone other than friends and family read my stories. That thought was more than a little depressing. Even when I couldn’t stay away any longer, and started writing again, I never intended to publish. It was a dream that I had considered out of my reach. I just mentioned how rewarding it is to see my wife enjoy my books. Imagine getting similar reactions from people I’ve never met. I’m a storyteller, but telling stories in the echo chamber of my own empty room isn’t much fun. Well, it actually is, but sharing the tales, and hearing that people have recommended them to loved ones—well that, as the commercial says, is priceless.
People online often thank me for being so “interactive with my readers.” I find this almost laughable. Don’t they know that my actions are selfish? That I get just as much (and probably more) out of the exchanges than they do? The Internet has provided us many advances in the ability to communicate with one another, but none is greater than uniting people with common interests. So, in case I’ve not made it crystal clear by now…I just want to close by saying thanks, and please feel free to drop me a line. Truly, opening my inbox and seeing messages from readers is the best part of my day.
Sneak Peek
Age of Myth
Shortly before starting The Death of Dulgath, I finished a five-book series called The First Empire, which I sold to Del Rey (a fantasy imprint of Penguin Random House). The first book, Age of Myth, will be released June 7, 2016. Here’s a bit about it, as well as the first chapter. I hope you’ll take a look, and if you like what you see, please consider pre-ordering a copy. This particular series is set 3,000 years before the time of Riyria and tells the true story of how Novron saved mankind and formed the First Empire. Apparently the history you’ve been told isn’t exactly the truth.
Discover the truth in myths and the lies of legends.
Since time immemorial, humans have worshipped the gods they call Fhrey, truly a race apart: invincible in battle, masters of magic, and seemingly immortal. But when a god falls to a human blade, the balance of power between men and those they thought were gods changes forever. Now, only a few stand between humankind and annihilation: Raithe, reluctant to embrace his destiny as the God Killer. Suri, a young seer burdened by signs of impending doom. And Persephone, who must overcome personal tragedy to lead her people. The Age of Myth is over; the time of rebellion has begun.
Chapter One
Of Gods and Men
In the days of darkness before the war, men were called Rhune. We lived in rhune-land or Rhulyn as it was once known. We had little to eat and much to fear. What we feared most were the gods across the Bern River where men were not allowed. Today most people believe the war began with the Battle of Grandford, but it actually started on a day in early spring when two men crossed the river. — The Book of Brin
Raithe’s first impulse was to pray. Curse, cry, scream, pray—that’s what people did in their last minutes of life. But praying struck Raithe as absurd, given his problem was the angry god twenty feet away. Gods weren’t known for their tolerance, and this one appeared on the verge of striking them both dead. Neither Raithe nor his father had noticed the god approach. The river made enough noise to mask an army’s passage. Raithe would have preferred an army.
Dressed in shimmering clothes, the god sat on a horse and was accompanied by two servants on foot. They were men, but dressed in the same remarkable clothing. All three silent, watching.
“Hey?” Raithe caught his father’s attention.
Herkimer was down on one knee, sweating as he opened the deer’s stomach with his knife. After Raithe had landed a spear in the stag’s side, he and his father spent most of the day chasing it. Herkimer had stripped off his wool leigh mor as well as his shirt before gutting the deer. Not so much because he was hot—the spring days were still chilly—but because opening a deer’s belly was a bloody business. “What?” He looked up.
Raithe jerked his head toward the god, and his father’s sight tracked to the three figures. The old man’s eyes widened. The color left his face, and he licked his lips. His expression did nothing to put Raithe at ease.
I knew this was a bad idea, Raithe thought.
Herkimer had been confident and so reassuring that crossing the forbidden river would solve all their problems. But he’d mentioned his certainty enough times to make Raithe wonder. Now the old man looked as if he’d forgotten how to breathe. Herkimer wiped his knife on the deer’s side before slipping it into his belt and getting to his feet.
“Ah…ah…um,” Raithe’s father began with all the eloquence of a croaking toad. Herkimer looked at the half-gutted deer, then back at the god. “It’s…ah…okay.”
Such was the sum total of his father’s wisdom, his grand defense for their high crime of trespassing on divine land. Raithe didn’t know if slaughtering one of their deer was also an offense but assumed it didn’t help their situation. Raithe’s stomach sank. He had no idea what he’d expected his father to say—but something more than that.
Not surprisingly, the god wasn’t appeased, and the three continued to stare with growing looks of irritation.
They were on a tiny point of open meadowland where two large rivers met. A pine forest, thick and rich, grew a short distance up the slope, while down toward the point lay a stony beach. Beneath a snow-gray blanket of sky, the converging rivers made the only sound. Only minutes earlier Raithe had seen the tiny field as a paradise. That was then.
Raithe took a slow breath and reminded himself that he didn’t have experience with gods or their expressions. He’d never witnessed a god up close, never seen beech-leaf-shaped ears, eyes blue as the sky, or hair that spilled like molten gold. Such smooth skin and white teeth were beyond reason. This wasn’t a being born of the earth, but of air and light. His billowing robes wafted in the breeze and shimmered in the sun, proclaiming an otherworldly glory. The harsh, judgmental glare was exactly the expression Raithe expected from an immortal being.
The horse was an even bigger surprise. Raithe’s father had told him about such animals, but until then Raithe hadn’t believed. His old man had a habit of embellishing the truth, and for more than twenty years, he’d heard the tales. After a few drinks, he’d tell everyone how he killed five men with a single swing or fought the North Wind to a standstill. The older he got, the bigger the stories. But this four-hooved tall tale was looking back at him with large, glossy eyes, and when the horse shook its head, Raithe wondered if a god’s mount understood speech.
“No, really—it’s okay,” Raithe’s father told them again, maybe thinking they hadn’t heard his previous genius. “I’m allowed here.” He took a step forward and pointed to
the medal hanging from a strip of hide amid the dirt and pine needles stuck to the sweat of his chest. Half-naked, sunbaked, with bloodstains up to his elbows, and grinning through a wild beard, his father was the embodiment of a mad barbarian. Raithe wouldn’t have believed him either. “See this?” his father went on. The burnished metal clutched by thick, ruddy fingers reflected the midday sun. “I fought for your people against the Gula-Rhune in the High Spear Valley. I did well. A Fhrey commander gave me this, said I had earned a reward.”
“Dureyan clan,” the taller servant told the god, his tone somewhere between disappointment and disgust.
The servant, a gangly man who lacked a beard but sported a long nose, sharp cheeks, and small clever eyes reminded Raithe of a weasel or a fox, and he wasn’t fond of either. Raithe also didn’t like the servile manner in which the man stood: stooped, eyes low, and hands clasped in front of him. He wore a rich-looking silver torc around his neck—both servants did. The jewelry must be some mark of station, he guessed, or perhaps a reward.
What kind of men travel with a god?
“That’s right. I’m Herkimer, son of Hiemdal, and this is my son Raithe.”
“You’ve broken the law,” the servant stated. The nasal tone even sounded like how a weasel might talk.
“No—no, it’s not like that. Not at all.”
The lines on his father’s face deepened, and his lips stretched tighter. He stopped walking forward, but his two fingers held the medal up like a magic talisman, his eyes hopeful. “This proves what I’m saying, that I earned a reward. See, I sort of figured we”—he gestured toward Raithe—“my son and I could live on this little point.” He waved at the meadow, which ran down the slope to the confluence of the Bern and Urum rivers. “We don’t need much. Hardly anything really. You see, on our side of the river—back in Dureya—the dirt’s no good. We can’t grow anything, and there’s nothing to hunt.”
The pleading in his father’s voice was something Raithe hadn’t heard before and didn’t like.
“You’re not allowed here.” This time it was the other servant, the balding one. Like the tall, weasel-faced fellow, he also lacked a proper beard, as if growing one was a thing that needed to be taught. The lack of hair exposed in fine detail a decidedly sour expression.
“But you don’t understand. I fought for your people. I bled for your people. I lost three sons fighting for your kind. And I was promised a reward.” He held out the medal again, but the god didn’t look at it. He stared past them, focusing on some distant, irrelevant point.
Herkimer let go of the medal. “If this spot is a problem, we’ll move. My son actually liked another place west of here. We’d be farther away from you. Would that be better?”
Though he still didn’t look at them, the god appeared even more annoyed and finally spoke, “You will obey.”
An average voice. Raithe was disappointed. He had expected thunder.
The god then addressed his servants in the divine language. Raithe’s father had taught him some of their tongue. He wasn’t fluent but knew enough to understand the god didn’t want them to have weapons on his side of the river. A moment later, the tall servant relayed the message in Rhunic, “Only Fhrey are permitted to possess weapons west of the Bern. Cast yours in the river.”
Herkimer glanced at their gear piled near a stump and in a resigned voice told Raithe, “Get your spear and do as they say.”
“And the sword off your back,” the tall servant said.
Herkimer looked shocked and glanced over his shoulder as if he’d forgotten the weapon was there. Then he faced the god and spoke directly to him in the Fhrey language, “This is my family blade. I cannot throw it away.”
The god sneered, showing teeth.
“It’s a sword,” the servant insisted.
Herkimer hesitated only a moment. “Okay, okay, fine. We’ll go back across the river, right now. C’mon, Raithe.”
The god made an unhappy sound.
“After you give up the sword,” the servant said.
Herkimer glared. “This copper has been in my family for generations.”
“It’s a weapon. Toss it down.”
Herkimer looked at his son, a sheepish, sidelong glance.
While he may not have been a good father—wasn’t as far as Raithe was concerned—he’d instilled one thing in all his sons: pride. Self-respect came from the ability to defend oneself. Such things gave a man dignity. In all of Dureya, in their entire clan, Herkimer was the only man to wield a sword—a metal blade. While pathetic in comparison to the god’s sword, whose hilt was intricately etched and encrusted with gems, his father’s blade was wrought from beaten copper. Its marred, dull sheen was the color of a summer sunset, and legend held that the short-bladed heirloom was mined and fashioned by a genuine Dherg smith. That weapon defined Herkimer, so much so that most enemy clans knew his father as Coppersword—a feared and respected title. His father could never give up that blade.
The rush of the river was cut by the cry of a hawk, soaring above. Birds were known to be the embodiment of omens, and Raithe didn’t take the heavenly wail as a positive sign. In its eerie echo, his father faced the god. “I can’t give you this sword.”
Raithe couldn’t help but smile. Herkimer, son of Hiemdal, of Clan Dureya wouldn’t bend so far, not even for a god.
The smaller servant took the horse’s lead as the god dismounted.
Raithe watched—impossible not to. The way he moved, so graceful, fluid, and poised, was mesmerizing. On the ground, he wasn’t tall, shorter than both Raithe and his father, who admittedly were both large men. The god also wasn’t as broad or as muscled. Raithe and his father had spent their lives building shoulders and arms by wielding spear and shield. The god, on the other hand, appeared delicate, as if he had lived bedridden and spoonfed. If the Fhrey were a man, Raithe wouldn’t have feared him. Given the disparity between them in weight and height, Raithe wouldn’t fight him, even if challenged. To engage in such an unfair match would be cruel, and Raithe wasn’t cruel. His brothers had gotten his share of that particular trait.
“You don’t understand. This sword has been handed down from father to son—”
The god rushed forward punching Herkimer in the stomach. As he bent over from the blow, the god stole the sword from off his back. The copper came free with a dull scrape, and while Herkimer was catching his breath, the god examined the weapon with revulsion. Then, shaking his head, the god turned his back on Herkimer to show his servant the pitiable blade. Instead of joining the god in mocking the weapon, the servant cringed. Raithe saw the future through the weasel man’s face, for he was the first to notice Herkimer’s reaction.
Raithe’s father drew the knife from his belt and lunged.
This time the god didn’t disappoint. With astounding speed, he whirled and drove the copper blade into Raithe’s father’s chest. Herkimer’s forward momentum did the work of running the sword deep. The fight ended the moment it began. His father gasped and fell, the sword still in his chest.
Raithe didn’t think. If he had paused, even for an instant, he might have reconsidered, but there was more of his father in him than he wanted to believe. The sword being the only weapon within reach, he pulled the copper from his father’s body. With all his might, Raithe swung at the god’s neck. He fully expected the blade to cut clean through, but the copper sliced only air as the divine being dodged. The god drew his weapon as Raithe swung again. The two swords met. A dull ping sounded, and the weight in Raithe’s hands vanished along with most of the blade. When he finished his swing, only the hilt of his family’s heritage remained—the rest flew through the air and landed in a tuft of young pines.
The god stared at him with a disgusted smirk. “Not worth dying for, was it?”
Then the god raised his blade once more as Raithe shuffled backward.
Too slow! Too slow!
His retreat was futile. Raithe was dead. Years of training and combat told him so. In that
instant before understanding became reality, he had the chance to regret his entire life.
I’ve done nothing, he thought as his muscles tightened for the expected burst of pain.
It never came.
Raithe had lost track of the servants—so had the god. Neither expected, nor saw, the tall, weasel-faced man slam his master in the back of the head with a river rock the size and shape of a round loaf of bread. Raithe only realized it when the god collapsed, and behind him stood the servant holding the rock.
“Run,” the servant said. “With any luck, his head will hurt too much to chase us when he awakes.”
“What have you done!” the other servant shouted. His eyes were wide while he backed away, pulling the god’s horse with him.
“Calm down,” the one holding the rock told the other servant.
Raithe looked at his father, lying on his back. Herkimer’s eyes were still open, as if watching clouds. Raithe had cursed his father many times over the years. The man had neglected his family, allowed his brothers to beat him, and was away when his mother and sister died. In some ways—many ways—Raithe hated his father, but at that moment, what he saw on the ground was the man who had taught him to fight and not give in. Herkimer had done the best with what he had, and what he had was a life trapped on barren soil because the gods made capricious demands. Raithe’s father never stole, cheated, or held his tongue when something needed to be said. He was a hard man, a cold man, but one who had the courage to stand up for himself and what was right. What Raithe saw on the ground at his feet was the last of his dead family.
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