Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thrity-four
Chapter Thirty-five Dragon Secrets
Social List
Author Notes
Myths
And
Legends
The Deyarian Universe Book 1
Previously published as
Chasing Shadows
Myths and Legends
With the addition of the never before published
Dragon Secrets
Sherry Foster
DEDICATION
To the family I adore,
my friends who keep me sane,
and the readers who love to read.
A special thanks to Michael Anderle,
who convinced me to 'just write;'
Justin Sloan, T.S. Paul, and Craig Martelle,
who inspired me.
Beta Readers
Alexandra Cunningham
Joshua Ahles
John Raisor
Kimberly Boyer
Micky Cocker
Thomas Ogden
Marion Dillon
If I missed anyone I am so very sorry.
This book is a work of fiction.
All of the characters, organizations, events, and places
portrayed in this novel are products of the
author's over active imagination.
Copyright © 2019 Sherry Foster
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted in any form or by any means without
express written permission from the author.
Previously published as Chasing Shadows and Myths and Legends.
This book now contains the combined 2 above plus a
short story which was published in this book for the first time.
Chapter One
"Hurry up Darian, We are going to be late!" Patro was getting impatient, standing on the ship waiting for Darian to board.
Anyone watching the ship, and there were plenty of people watching, would have been proud to see the three young men boarding the ship. Those three men were the future leaders of the Deyarian race—a race commonly called The Woven Ones, though few outside the race understood what the name meant. These three young men were born to lead their race, but would not do so for another 975 years.
The three were impatient to leave; few young have any patience at all, even the ones who will live thousands of years. To one just twenty-four years of age, the prospect of living thousands of years does not seem real. It would take hundreds of years for the three to have any kind of mental or emotional maturity. But in just a few short weeks, the lines of maturity would scroll across their shoulder blades, marking them as physically mature.
Darian, hugging his parents goodbye, just waved a dismissive hand at Patro, though he was in just as much of a hurry to sail as Patro and Kane. Darian wondered sometimes how much longer it would be before he could mind-talk with his benyans, the two bonded to him before birth, birthed on the same day. The two who would one day rule with him, along with the one they were setting on a journey to find. He understood that ability did not manifest until they reached maturity, but that it could start early. It would be nice if it started early—he wished it would start early—but thus far, it appeared that it would not. He just hoped it started the minute they turned twenty-five, but from what they had been taught, it usually was a gradual thing. Giving his parents one last hug and assuring them he and his two benyans would be safe, Darian finally hurried up the gangplank and onto his ship. His ship, that had a nice ring to it. Oh sure, it belonged to all of them, but technically, as the Fire Walker and the central point to the Lyra, this ship was his. The next three Ships of the Line would belong to Kane, Patro, and whoever their Shadow Walker turned out to be.
He could feel the pull of the Shadow Walker so strongly that finding him or her would be easy. He was not the only one wondering if the Shadow Walker would be male or female. When his Lyra was born, people had been a bit surprised to find that all three women had each given birth to a male. Usually when three of the Lyra were born, at least one was female. But the soul-threads had led to the three women who were each pregnant with one of the next leaders of the race, and they and their families were all moved to be closer together while they got to know each other. No one had suspected they all carried males.
Kane, standing next to Patro, was busy admiring the ship. The ship was not just any ship, but a Ship of the Line. Named the Lyra Taricasia, it held the blood of the Lyra, and soon it would hold the blood of the Shadow of the Lyra. Well, as soon as they found him or her, thought Kane. Kane had every reason to be proud of the ship. He and Patro and Darian had bled their blood into the ship to make it a Ship of the Line. Eventually they would have four such ships, but for now, until they found their Shadow, they would start with just the one. It was not complete yet, would not be complete until they were complete. For almost twenty-five years, they had been waiting to meet their Shadow. They could feel the pull of this person, but until they actually met him or her, they could only wonder. Upon their twenty-fifth birthday, they were supposed to meet with the leaders of the race, as well as the watchers, and then go in search of their Shadow Walker, but they had other plans—plans that did not include waiting around another month or so to turn twenty-five.
Technically, since they would not reach maturity until their twenty-fifth birthday, their parents could have stopped them from leaving for the Lyriant lands early. For that matter, thought Kane, the Captain did not have to leave with them until they turned twenty-five. But they owned the ship—and what Captain would want to tell the owners “No,” when in just a few weeks those same men would have complete say over where the ship sailed, if it sailed at all? Since the Captain had to shed blood into the wheel of the ship and bond with the ship, it would take some doing to get another captain, but it could be done. And since the three would turn twenty-five just about the time they reached the Lyriant lands and could then bond the Shadow Walker to the tapestry, no one saw the harm in letting the three leave early.
Unfortunately, no one had asked the leaders or the watchers why the boys should stay until they turned twenty-five. If they had, the trip would have been postponed. The boys did not know that what would prove to be vital information would only be revealed when they reached maturity, and even then, only to the three known as the Lyra.
But for a young man on the cusp of maturity, waiting another five weeks to sail away to a foreign land was five weeks too long. When you made it three young men waiting, well, five weeks was too long for young men who thought they knew all they needed to know. They knew they had a S
hadow Walker, they could feel him or her, and their soul threads had been weaving the soul threads of every person born in their race into the tapestry since the day they were born. Weaving the Shadow Walker in would be similar, they assumed. Oh, they knew there was a difference—when one of their race was born, their soul threads reached out to the new person automatically. No action was needed on their part.
Darian was positive he knew just what to do, and since he had a bit of a temper, the other two usually just followed along with his decisions. Fewer fights happened that way. When Darian thought about it—and he tried not to—he wondered why their soul threads had not automatically reached out and bonded with their shadow walker. He and Kane had fought a few times about it. Kane believed Darian was jealous of sharing any of their power with yet another person. Kane, and occasionally Patro, had over the years accused him of keeping the threads from reaching their shadow walker. They knew that when a member of their race was born, no matter where they happened to be in the world, the soul thread of that person immediately wove to Darian, and from Darian to Kane, and Patro, and into the tapestry of their people.
It did not matter what they had been taught growing up—about how the Shadow Walker had to accept the bond since he was born of the Lyriant race—Kane and Patro were sure Darian was doing something to keep the bond from attaching. All three young men secretly thought the person on the other side of the ocean could feel them and was waiting on them to arrive. They would find out how wrong they were about everything they thought they knew, but the journey was not going to be a quick one—nor was it going to be as easy as stepping off the ship to find the Shadow Walker waiting on the pier for them.
Darian looked at Kane and Patro, then the three young men looked to where the crew were casting off the ropes holding the ship in place. "It will not be long now," Darian told the other two.
Looking at the pier, the three young men saw their parents waving. Looking beyond them, they could see the white stones of Central towering above all the other buildings in the port city of Decca. It would be months before they returned. The three had only been to Decca a few times, and had not gotten to explore as much as they wanted. Growing up in the country, the three were always surprised at how many people inhabited the city of Decca. They had been brought up in a rather secluded environment, since they had unstable powers when they were younger. It would not do for a young Fire Walker to accidentally release a large fireball in a city full of people.
But now, for the second time in their life, they were aboard their ship, about to set sail. Only, unlike the first time, where the Captain had only sailed around the bay while the ship bonded to the Captain and the Lyra, this time they were going across the ocean. The captain had told them the trip would be five weeks long and they would be in port at least two weeks doing all the trading the ship had taken on to do. Darian figured two weeks was plenty of time to bond the Shadow Walker to the race, to the tapestry, and especially to him and Kane and Patro, and still have time to explore. They would have the shadow walker to interpret when they had problems. Though, since they had known since they were old enough to be told that they would be bonded to a Lyriant, they had been taught the language and were fluent in it. They had been told that dialects could be different or people might use unfamiliar slang, so even fluency would not mean there would be no misunderstanding.
Darian scoffed when Kane or Patro worried about it. They were the Lyra of their race, the future leaders, the equivalent to would-be future kings. Any misunderstanding would be quickly resolved, according to Darian, simply because who wants to cause problems with another race's future kings? Kane and Patro both told him he was an idiot when he scoffed at their worries.
Darian figured one day he would have to convince his two bond brothers it was very non-leader like to call your fellow future leader an idiot.
Darian watched as the land slipped further away. The mountains in the far distance were a beautiful backdrop to the city of Decca. The last thing he could see, before the ship was too far out, was the snow-covered Mount Kinta. He would miss home, but he was excited to be going on this trip. When they got back with their shadow walker, they would have to take a trip to the mountains. He hoped one day to build a mountain retreat in that mountain range.
Turning to Kane and Patro he asked, "What do you think you will miss the most while we are gone?"
Kane thought about the question a minute and said, "My dragon."
Patro hit him in the shoulder and told him, "You do not have a dragon."
Kane shrugged, "Not yet, but I can feel her calling to me."
Patro gave a huge sigh, "Yeah, but without our Shadow, we can not meet them, much less do the bonding ceremony with them, so how can you miss someone you have not even met yet?"
Kane tilted his head to the side, "I feel her calling, I can almost hear her, what if I can't feel her or hear her while we are gone?"
Darian looked thunderstruck at that comment. "You think distance will make it harder to feel them?"
This time it was Patro who shrugged, "No one told us; we are not staying to ask the watchers, or see what they or the Lyra Brycentia have to say, like I keep saying we should do."
Before he could start up the argument about staying until they all turned twenty-five and seeing what further information the others might have for them, Darian interrupted.
"I feel mine just as strong in Decca as I ever did back on the estate. And a few months ago, when we went on one last family vacation to the mountains, I felt mine just as strongly there. I don't think it will be any different when we get across the ocean. I hope."
About that time, Darian realized what Kane had said—"You said ‘her,’ how do you know your dragon is a she?"
Kane looked at Darian as if he had lost his mind, "I said I can feel her calling, and almost hear her, of course I can tell what sex she is." Looking at Darian in disbelief, "You can't tell what your dragon is?"
Patro narrowed his eyes at Kane. "I can't feel what my dragon is either, I can just feel that it exists."
Kane blinked a few times, "You are both idiots," was all he said before he turned and headed toward their cabin areas.
Darian looked at Patro to find Patro was looking at him. "Do you believe him, Patro? Do you think he really can feel what his dragon's sex is?"
"Honestly, Kane is a great one for trying to pull one over on us, but he seemed really down about missing his dragon. Maybe he does have some sort of bond with it that we don't have with ours yet. Can he have a stronger bond?" Patro turned to stare in the direction Kane had taken.
Darian scowled.
Chapter Two
Looking out across the water, Darian muttered, "I am getting tired of looking at the same view every single day."
Kane shrugged and told him, "You are going to get even more tired of it before we are done, and we still have another week to go before we make port."
"I know, but I am still tired of water, I am tired of this ship, I am tired of not being able to skip to where I want to go."
Patro looked at Darian, "Even if we could skip very well, we could still not have skipped from our home to another country we have never even seen."
Frustrated, Darian told him, "I know that, but we could skip from our home to the ship, once it was closer to port."
Kane looked at Darian in disbelief. "Did you ever listen to any of our lessons, any of them, any at all?"
Irate, Darian replied, "I was in every single lesson you were in."
Kane gave a long-suffering sigh, "Not mentally. I pity our race."
Patro started nodding his head. "I pity us."
Darian scowled at the two. "What exactly are you implying?"
Kane shook his head. "I am not implying anything, I am saying you are an idiot."
Patro could only nod in agreement. Darian, eyes narrowed, just stared at the two.
After a moment, Kane relented and told Darian, "If you had paid attention, you would know that even if we
could skip, even if we could skip well, even if we had learned to skip well enough to take a step from our home and step out onto the soil of another country, we could not skip to a moving ship. It is moving, you idiot, where do you think you would end up? We have to know where we are going to end up before we can take a skip from one spot to another."
For a brief moment, Darian looked taken aback, then slightly ashamed, and then upset. "What if someone, one day, steals our ship—what if pirates take it, how would we find it?"
Patro blinked a couple of times, then shaking his head, he walked away muttering, "I really pity us."
Kane looked at him a moment longer before asking, "You aren't serious, are you?"
Darian narrowed his eyes and said, "You can't tell me you have never thought about pirates taking one of our ships? Taking our ship? We have lost ships and crew to pirates before, you know." Darian was very bitter about the fact they had lost crew members to pirates, but so were Kane and Patro. After all, the loss of any member of their race close to their age was felt by all three of them. They could feel the soul thread die when the individual died. It would get worse the older they got. Right now they only felt people they were woven to, and considering they wove to everyone younger than they were, and their soul threads were constantly weaving upwards into the race, that meant they could feel anyone about 75 years or younger at that point. Not many that young sailed on the trading ships, though, so the losses were few and far between.
Kane looked at Darian in disbelief, not knowing what to say. At times like this, he had to agree with Patro—he pitied the race, and them. It would be almost a thousand years before they were ready to take up the reigns of leadership, so the race had a thousand years before they had to put up with Darian, but he and Patro, well, they had to put up with him every single day of their lives, for the rest of their very, very long lives.
"Ok, pay really close attention now, since you obviously–"
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