• A little about Red Moon Rising



    A series about a magical world who’s about to get a wake up call with the resurrection of the once powerful vampire clan.


    The world of Zi Aalieo had once been ruled by their all-powerful vampire clan and the leaders, the Council of 12 with Sheridan as their leader. They had been strict but fair rulers whose main concern was the well-being of their kind. Their rule, however, was tragically cut short by even more devastating events. With the Council now dormant, the mystical inhabitant of Zi Aalieo are slowly become scarce and those who still exist thrive in the well concealed school known as the Mystics’ Academy.

    All throughout the land of Zi Aalieo, the magical people known as Mystics have fallen into chaos. Where most have gone into hiding, others seek refuge in the Mystics’ Academy. There is not one soul that doesn’t wish for the peace that the Council of 12 had strove for. Among them is the curious Aponi, an orphan who has lived at the Academy since birth, and Skye, an inexperienced psychic whose powers are far more devastating than anyone could possibly imagine. But it’s the shy Amarissa whose life is changed forever as she becomes the grounds for the revolution that’s about to shake Zi Aalieo.
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    Prologue





    An ominous wind howled as it rushed through the lifeless forest as the clouds growing dangerous in the sky above. The world seemed bleak as if the dark sky itself had sucked the life from everything turning it gray. Dead leaves rolled across the barren earth, rustling in the breeze as they weaved through the trees.. All the animals lay tucked safely in their dens as if they knew it was unsafe, leaving only the fearless ravens to gaze about from their perches in the bare branches. Even they were eerily silent.

    Bordering the dull forest was a vast meadow filled with stiff grass and bowing crumpled flowers, long since dead. Jutting out of the barren field was a massive but plain building. It’s walls seemed to stretch towards the sky as if to reach for the heavens as they spread themselves across the countryside. Age layered upon the red bricks which, at any other time, probably would have seemed warm and welcoming. The simple windows that spotted the building revealed no light beneath their curtains as they rattled under the strengthening winds. A dark shadow cast itself across the land at the structure’s feet, as if in warning.

    Yet, even with its forbidding appearance, the building still looked like a god given sanctuary to the two figures running down the jagged stone path leading to what appeared to be its front door. Though their lungs burned and their legs protested every step, they kept running, fearing to stop. The smaller figure stumbled once, crying out in a feminine voice, before regaining her composure and clutching the small, blanket wrapped bundle closer. The larger figure behind her urged her on, telling her to not look back.

    By the time the two were mere feet from the door, they were rasping painfully, their bodies shaking in effort with each breath. The smaller figure, clearly female, shifted the bundle in her arms, adjusting the blanket slightly to gaze upon the face of a baby of no more than six months. The other figure, a man, all but beat the door down as he called to the Keeper.

    After a few seconds footsteps were heard behind the door before it barely creaked open enough to reveal a man who, at first glance, seemed as old as the building he was standing in.

    “Yes?” came his crackling voice as he barely poked his head out from behind the door.

    “Please let us in!” the woman cried out, clasping the baby to her chest.

    The old man cocked one sagging eyebrow while looking them up and down.

    “Please,” the woman cried again with desperation in her weary voice.

    The elder gave the cloaked man a suspicious look but his disposition towards the woman became gentle, “What be ailing ye, milady?”

    “Let us in!” the cloaked man roared.

    “We are in terrible danger!” the woman all but wept, trying to move the older man to understand just how badly they needed shelter.

    The elder eyed the man almost irritably, but he still moved aside and gestured for the lady and baby to come in. She graciously crossed the threshold, almost crying in relief as she dropped to her knees a few feet inside. The cloaked man tried to follow but purple lightning crackled over the building as if an invisible force surrounded it, preventing him from entering.

    “What?” he growled, cursing under his breath.

    “Just as I thought,” the old man mused with a deep frown that said he clearly knew something the others did not.

    “Thought what? Why can’t my husband come inside?” the woman wailed in disbelief.

    The cloaked man looked up at her but before he could even open his mouth the old man spoke up, “This man is not your husband. This man is exactly what you are running from.”

    The woman’s eyes widened as she turned them to her “husband.” The being growled as he realized that his charade had been discovered. His flesh rippled as if something lurked beneath the paper thin surface, ready to climb out. Spikes exploded from his spine, making a sickening sound of ripping flesh as they tore through his skin. They were jagged as if they had been crudely carved out of bone discolored of the many centuries. The spikes followed his spine from his neck all the way down to his pelvis were they met a massive tail nearly twice the being’s height. The demon grew taller and his limbs rippled with muscles, making him twice his original size. What was even more threatening was his nails, now yellowed claws, and the blackened, rotting fangs that protruded from his gums in the snout that had grown from his face. Raging rubies replaced his yellowed eyes, piercing through the dark dreary air. As if his appearance wasn’t horrible enough, surely his stench was. The smell of his grimy flesh reminded one of rotting sewer while the odor that oozed from his jaws was like that of decaying meat left to long in the summer heat.

    “Rivalen!” the woman screamed as she clutched her baby and scrambled away from the door.

    “If you are referring to that laughable fairy, he was almost as much fun to eat alive as he was to chase down,” came the being’s rumbling growl.

    Tears welled in the woman’s eyes but the old man seemed unaffected, “Leave these ground before we rend your merciless soul into the pits of hell.”

    “We?” the woman came to her sense just enough to notice the various peculiar people standing all around her throughout the room. They seemed to have come from nowhere, but she was glad they were there even if they all seemed a little…unique..

    “You ancient fool! Return to me what is mine!” the demon roared.

    “My baby will never be yours!” the woman snarled defensively as she stood, her courage growing with the number of people around her.

    “Leave, demon! This is your last warning,” the old man proclaimed pointing an accusing finger at him.

    “Never!” the beast roared back, “Not until you return to me what is so rightfully mine!”

    The woman stiffened angrily and gently but swiftly handed her baby to another nearby. She threw a hand out towards the demon, saying a short spell as she did making the hand to glow a soft pink. The spell sent the beast flying back a few feet but he quickly regained his footing and laughed deeply causing the earth to rumble below their feet.

    “Nothing but a tickle,” he mocked.

    “It wasn’t meant to hurt,” the woman growled while lifting one still-glowing hand toward the door.

    As she started towards the demon, the woman slowly began to close the door with her magic but the old man grabbed her shoulder, confusion at her sudden change of character clearly shone on his face.

    “Milady?” concern wrinkled across his aged face as his eyes asked her more than his words did.

    “I am sorry for involving you in this,” the woman replied, sorrow straining her voice when she placed one delicate hand softly on his shoulder before her gaze fell upon her infant. “Please, take good care of her.”

    The man gave her a regretful look, immediately understanding, “What shall we tell the child?”

    “My little butterfly,” the woman smiled but the sorrow reached her eyes as she momentarily forgot the demon to lean over the baby, her baby, one last time… “Tell her …tell her that her parents died a noble death to help their homeland.”

    “And who, pray tell, are her parents?” the woman holding the baby asked before the elder could.

    “Lorelei. Lorelei and Rivalen,” the woman, Lorelei, replied.

    She leaned closer to the baby, cupping the its face in one hand as she kissed its forehead. A wave of regret hit her like a kick in the gut as she looked into her baby’s face. A face she would never see again. A face that would never know hers, her own mother’s. Pain wrapped around her heart as Lorelei knew that neither she nor her husband would ever be there to scold the child when it did something wrong or scoop the child into their arms to kiss all their pain and fear away. These were joys that neither child nor parent would ever experience and it shook Lorelei to her very soul.

    Lorelei stepped away from her baby giving the child one last look before regrettably turning to the door. Though her nerves screamed at her with every step she took, Lorelei kept on, refusing to look back even when a steady torrent of tears were streaking down her face. She took a deep breath of finality when, at least, she stepped over the threshold and closed the door with a wave of her glowing hand.

    As soon as the door snapped shut a harsh explosion shook the earth. There was a roar from the beast before a heavy object, most likely the demon, slammed into the door, almost blowing it off its hinges. Scraping could be heard as the demon seemed to be walking across the landing outside the door. Suddenly everything went quiet before an ear-splitting scream rang out. More scraping. Another earth shattering explosion. For those inside, time seemed to drag on each sounds causing them to shudder and cringe. A final blood-curdling scream that left their ears ringing saturated the air followed by a deafening silence.

    No one moved. No one spoke. They all stood where they were, staring towards the door, half-hoping, half praying that any moment the woman would walk back in. It seemed like an eternity until the baby’s cries broke through the silence, making many of them jump.

    “Oh, shhh shhh,” the woman crooned rocking the small thing in her arms.

    “Poor thing,” a man among the crowd commented quietly.

    “What’s happening? What is it, Nalra? ” came the voice of a small boy as he squeezed his way through the people and began to jump up and down to try to see what the woman held. The woman, Nalra, bent to show him the babe.

    “‘Tis a baby girl,” she answered soothingly, “A new friend for you, Wolf.”

    The boy smiled widely, “Where’d she come from? Why is she here? Who brought her? Can she sleep in my room? Can I play with her? What is her name?”

    The amused face Nalra once held immediately evaporated into confusion at his last question, “I don’t know. Her mother never told us.”

    Nalra looked at the people standing around her and straightened herself to stand with them.

    “What shall we call the new addition to our family?” she asked looking around at the group surrounding her

    As she did so part of the cover flipped from around the infant to reveal her pudgy chest. The attention of the people around her suddenly seemed glued to baby as if it were life or death.

    “There’s a crest!” someone shouted from the stair behind Nalra.

    “It’s the crest of Aerolyn!” cried another.

    Nalra looked down and saw that there was indeed a crest on the young one’s skin. Ribbons of soft rainbow pastels twisted together, weaving in and out of itself to form the outline of a ancient and symbolic butterfly that somehow seemed to glow and pulse with its owner’s heartbeat as if it had a life all its own.

    A smile graced Nalra’s lips while she gently murmured almost as if to herself, “Well then, little butterfly, we shall call you Nova.”