Character: AUDEN, immortal king of the Anathergians
Auden is the immortal king of the Anathergians. He, and his people, came to Earth over five thousand years ago when their planet was destroyed.
I have to admit it’s difficult for me to give an inside look at Auden. He doesn’t like to give away anything. He’s used to keeping secrets and he doesn’t divulge easily. So, I’ll start from the beginning and see how much I can pry from the man’s closed mind… Ha!
When Auden was born, he wasn’t originally in line to become king. His great-uncle, his grandfather’s brother, had been king, but had raped his grandmother—something unheard of with the Anathergians. Auden, just under two hundred at this time, wished to kill the man, but his grandmother, ever a kind hearted women, talked him out of it. Instead his great-uncle and his family was banished from Anathergia. His grandparents took on the role of king and queen.
A few hundred years later, Auden’s planet was attacked and destroyed by the Zonatair, a vicious species. They were assisted by those of his banished family. During the attack, Auden’s father, the heir to the throne, forced Auden to go with his grandparents onto the ship Nehjed to escape their doomed planet. It was the only ship to have made it out and carried just over three hundred souls.
It was a dark time for Auden. He often blamed himself for his parents’ death. During that time, his grandmother struggled to bring the youngster under control and to find other outlets for his grief and anger. She made him focus on those Anathergians left. Auden came to switch his love for his parents to those around him. They became his family. With the support he provided them, and the acceptance the people gave to him, they flourished, despite their heartache.
When they landed on Earth, it was a relief and a new challenge. Auden took on this trial with open arms and established his people on the new planet.
Years passed and his people spread throughout the world. He became more and more of a leader and soon his grandparents, having spent many millennia alive, wished to pass the throne to their only living family member so they could go to the next plain. This was a huge blow for Auden. He and his grandparents were the only royals left of their race. At least, that he was aware of. Auden knew, without them, he would experience a loneliness like none other. Especially because he had yet to find his eventual Lifemate. But he could not deny his grandparents’ request.
As time went on, Auden honed his people’s abilities and eventually they became engrained in leadership roles throughout the world. His warriors took part in major battles, often helping the outcome for the vanquished and the victors. They helped stop numerous terrorist plots and coups.
Throughout all of this, Auden began experiencing bouts of J’drun because he had yet to find a Lifemate who would anchor him. Chaos often filled his mind, and he began losing control of his most powerful weapon, Ath’mort. A deadly combination for anyone around him.
Those close to him helped him through the process, but they couldn’t provide what he really needed.
When he comes across Leah—an Anathergian unknown to his people—she was like a breath of fresh air. His lungs expanded and he breathed freely for the first time in eons. He didn’t comprehend why, until the night she went through V’nurch—the transition from being mortal to becoming a fully immortal Anathergian. He helped her with this, and during the process they became Lifemates. It was unlike anything he had ever experienced in his existence. All of the horrors, all of the loneliness, all of the doubts he’d ever had disappeared in one blissful evening. And it happened because of this slip of a girl who was barely a fifth of a century old.
He was flabbergasted. And in awe. Never had he imagined gaining a Lifemate would complete him like this. Though she sometimes drives him to his wits end, she has become his reason for breathing. His reason for waking up each morning. His reason for existing.
Royals
The Anathergians Trilogy
Book Three
Michelle C Reilly
Genre: SciFi/Paranormal Romance
Date of Publication: June 29, 2015
ASIN:
Word Count: 100k
Cover Artist: Michelle C Reilly
Book Description:
The highly anticipated last book in the Anathergians Trilogy is here at long last!
Together They Can Prevent the Destruction of the World
The King
Variants, humans whose altered DNA turn them into blood ravaging killers, are attacking en masse around the world. Their leader, Travik, is gathering a force from space to kill every last human.
Auden, king of the Anathergians, has the fate of the world in his hands. His hold is slipping as the threats multiply each day.
Then there’s Auden’s Lifemate, Leah, whom he loves above all others. He struggles to do what he can to ensure her safety while also protecting her from herself.
The Queen
J'ashidah, the Anathergian gathering, is upon them. There Leah will be introduced to thousands of her people and crowned as the Anathergian queen.
But Leah wants nothing more than to use her newfound Anathergian strength, along with her witch powers, to remove the threat of the Variants and their leader. It doesn’t matter that the villain is her father. She’s had enough of his continual harassment and attacks, especially to those she loves. She will do whatever it takes, including lies and deception, to end this threat.
The Royal
Travik, one of the last living Anathergian royals, wants to take Auden’s place with his daughter at his side. He will destroy everything, including every precious life on this world, to get what he wants, no matter the cost. First, however, he must convince Leah to agree with his way of thinking. And if she doesn’t… Well, he has no problem hurting, maiming, or killing those she cares for.
Available at Amazon
CHAPTER 1
Leah’s breath
rang harsh in her ears and her heart pumped wildly in her chest. She dashed
behind a wide tree, her feet barely touching the dark soil and rocks beneath
her. Pine needles slapped against her warm cheeks, bringing with them the
overwhelming scents of pine and sap. She froze, peering down the mountainside,
its green depths ethereal in the full moon’s yellow glow. Each leaf, blade of
grass, and tree groove came to her in explicit detail.
Her stomach
churned as her powers surged through her veins and the left side of her neck
burned from the activation of her crescent moon Designation. The blue-silver
glow from her eyes shone against the branches as she scanned the area below
her, searching the shadows for any signs of those in pursuit. The area had a
deceptive calmness. A cool breeze swept up the incline, sweeping strands from
her ponytail over her exposed neck and along her cheek.
Leah swallowed
in an effort to control her breathing and squinted as a sharp pain lanced
through her side.
How long have I
been at this?
Judging by the
moon’s placement in the cloudless sky, she guessed at least five hours.
A crack echoed
to her left. She twisted her head in that direction and caught sight of a
branch bouncing back into place two hundred yards to the east of her.
Too close.
They’ll be on top of me in seconds.
Turning about,
she combed the area to determine a getaway route.
The tree
coverage had thinned as she’d ascended the mountain, heading south from where
the hunt began. Vegetation had become nearly nonexistent as the terrain became
more rocks than dirt.
The tinkling of
pebbles came to her, the sound so light even her enhanced hearing barely
registered it. They were gaining on her, and her choices for escape were
dwindling. She gnashed her teeth and leaped to an outcropping of boulders. Leah
pushed her powers higher, forcing herself to jump as fast as she could from
rock to rock.
Her witch powers
allowed her to levitate, but doing so would be a mistake. The move would put
her out in the open, making her vulnerable. Her only option left was to use her
Anathergian abilities. She increased her speed, weaving through the obstacle
course. Objects stuttered past her like a film in slow motion. Her gaze caught
each small detail. A lizard jumped out of her way, its bluish-gray body zipping
back and forth. Small white flowers stuck out from a crack in a boulder,
proving life found a way even when the odds were insurmountably stacked against
it.
Leah’s thigh
muscles screamed as she pumped her legs, compelling them to go faster. Sweat
dampened the back of her long-sleeved black shirt. It was the middle of summer
and, though the elevation made it cooler, she wished for spring or autumn. She
darted onto another rock, its reddish-beige surface coming at her fast. The
hairs on the nape of her neck prickled as she sensed someone gaining on her.
The tracker was good. Her enhanced senses couldn’t even feel him there. Nor
could she pick up on the sound of his pursuit.
A heavy weight
bashed into her back and her body fell forward, her face aiming for the
boulder. Her breathe shot out of her lungs. Strong hands gripped her wrists,
spreading her arms wide. Leah struggled to free them, but the assailant was too
strong. The ground came closer and she closed her eyes to prepare for the crash
landing. She forced her Hiy'kula to the front part of her body. The ripples of
silver, like snake skin, blanketed her dermas. It was her ultimate defense
mechanism and impermeable. But it used huge amounts of her Ra'juhl, leaving her
weak and low on power. At the last moment, the man flipped around, taking the
brunt of the fall on his back, while still keeping her hands apart. Her head
bounced back against his chest. A whoosh of air escaped from the man, but he
made no other sound.
Leah let go of
the Hiy’kula, and pushed her powers higher, reaching for her specialty ability,
Va'shule. Bolts of lightning arced from her fingers, but without the use of her
hands, she couldn’t direct them. She tsked in frustration and kicked backward
at the man’s shin.
If I can’t use
my powers, I may as well revert to the methods I used prior to becoming full
Anathergian.
The man grunted,
his voice unrecognizable.
Leah yanked,
trying pull her arms free, but the man’s strength was immense. She could taste
his power in the air, the frigidness of it nearly stealing her breath.
Amping up more
power, she pushed her feet against the hard boulder and rounded her shoulder
blades, rolling up and back. She twisted around to loosen her hands. Finally
free, she spun around and found her pursuer already on his feet, towering over
her like death come for its victim.
Damn he’s fast.
She bared her
fangs and hissed as she bent her knees and brought up her fists. Her opponent
stood at least six-foot-five, taller than her Lifemate, Auden. Her heart
skittered in her chest as she took in the extraordinary wide chest and bald
head covered with red skin.
Zonatair. Here
to take me. Here to kill all humans and take over Earth.
Leah studied her
enemy, determining where to strike first. She feigned with her left, waiting
for a slight flinch from the man. When it came, she bashed the man’s left
temple with her right hand. She sprang off the balls of her feet and grabbed
the man around his neck, and continued her motion to bring down the mammoth
body. They fell with an oomph. Her pursuer landed hard on top of her, covered
the right side of her body.
Leah lay on the
edge of the outcropping, her left leg dangling in the air. She had nowhere to
push off from.
The warrior
scrambled from her neck hold, gripped her shirt, and pulled her up with him.
Leah released blazing streams of her power, and directed it at him. He pulled
her against him and she stopped.
She couldn’t hit
him with the lightning or it would go through his body and into her. Her mind scrambled
for her next move. The man’s scent of clean sweat and forest tickled her nose.
“How about another kick, motherfucker? Right where it counts?”
She lifted her
knee, but he wrapped his leg around her, stilling her at once. Leah opened her
mouth to curse at him, when another interrupted her.
“You’re dead,
Leah.”
Leah stilled and
angled her head in the direction the voice had come from. A man kneeled on the
cliff above her, the light of the moon casting gold streaks along his long,
dark brown hair. His powers were in full force so that his right eye beamed
blue, while the left gleamed with a burnished silver. The eye of a hawk shone
mercury and charcoal beneath his strong jawline.
“Damn it, Nico!”
Leah fumed.
He laughed, his
straight teeth bright in the darkness. “Don’t damn me. It’s your own fault.
This training is supposed to help you improve your night ops. To keep you
unseen and unheard. A ghost. You were seen and heard. Not very ghostly of you.”
Leah shook her
head and then let it fall against the broad chest in front of her. “Can you
please let go?”
The titanic man
released her at once. Stars spun in her peripheral vision, but she hid the
weakness. There was no way she would let on to Nico she was close to the end of
her strength.
Leah examined
the large man who had captured her. The red skin stretched over the wide,
muscular frame. His lilac eyes stared at her, and memories of the conversation
she’d seen of the Zonatair during her ritual returned to haunt her. The beastly
aliens had discussed plans to destroy Earth and all its humans, like they had
Anathergia. Her Anathergian father would then be in charge of the rest of his
race. That is, after he killed Auden, her Lifemate. She swallowed convulsively.
His monstrous
sized hand went to his wrist and a beeping sound came to her. The Zonatair
illusion dissolved to reveal an Anathergian warrior. She glanced at the device
circling his wrist. Gunner, the Anathergian IT pro, had developed it to produce
the exterior to assist with Leah’s training.
Gunner and his
magic.
She nodded at
the tall warrior. “M’sharik.”
The man returned
her nod, but said nothing. His bright diamond shard eyes began to diminish into
their regular ice blue color and his long hair blazed alabaster in the night.
She dampened a shiver and swiveled back to Nico. Leah loosened her grip on her
own powers, allowing the burning in her stomach to cool and her fangs to
retreat. “One more round?”
Nico jumped down
to their level. “Naw. I think it’s time to head back.”
“Already?” She
widened her eyes, trying to portray a look of innocence, while inside she was
relieved.
He’d diminished
his powers, and his gaze, no longer glowing, gave her a once over. “You don’t
fool me, Leah.”
She followed him
as he stepped down. The large man stayed behind her. A breeze picked up and
brought his scents of earth and strength. The icy tinge of his power was still
there as well. “What do you mean?”
“You’ve been at
this over six hours, going full out. I want to help build up your endurance,
but I’m not going to let you completely deplete your Ra'juhl.”
“My powers are
fine,” she said, quickening her pace to catch up.
“We’ll start
over tomorrow.”
“But I want to
keep training tonight. I need to be ready for whatever my father has planned.”
Nico stopped and
whipped around to stare down at her. Leah’s feet dug into the ground to prevent
herself from running into the warrior. M’sharik stepped up beside her, quiet as
ever.
“Leah, if you
push yourself too hard, you’ll become nothing but a shell, and be so weak your
father and the Zonatair could send a human boy to take you. Is that what you
want? To be taken again?”
Leah blinked.
“Of course not. I just want to be ready.”
“The way to
become ready is to build your powers up. That is done by working on your
endurance.” When she opened her mouth to argue, he cut her off. “In increments,
Leah. Not all at once.”
“But a couple
hours of increments isn’t difficult,” she complained.
He took a step
closer, making her tilt her head back to look at him. “Do you know how long it
took me to build up my endurance so I could be where I need to be, Leah?”
She shook her
head. M’sharik’s bright head swiveled back and forth, watching the exchange.
“Close to twenty
years. And even then, I wasn’t where I needed to be. You,” he pointed at her
and she drew back, “have only weeks. Weeks! So stop complaining and do what I
say, all right?”
Leah drew in a
deep inhalation, and her damp shirt stretched across her back. “All right.”
Nico studied her
for a few more moments. “Race me back to the cabin?”
She smiled. “You’re
on.”
“No powers,” he
said, and he zipped around and disappeared.
“What?” she
gaped. “You sneaky, little…” Leah pushed off, pressing herself as hard as she
could to catch up with him.
She laughed when
she hit the small clearing behind Gunner’s cabin, situated in a tiny
neighborhood in Mt. Charleston. A few feet separated her from Nico. Then her
face fell when she noticed M'sharik sitting on the roof, staring up at the
stars, without any sign of having ran over five miles through the woods to
reach the place before them. Leah’s feet came to a stop and she bent over,
kneading at her side.
How the hell did
he make it before us?
The warrior
freaked her out with his stoic demeanor and how he constantly analyzed
everyone.
Nico peered over
his shoulder at her and shook his head. He muttered under his breath. She
wasn’t sure what he’d said, but is sounded something like “pathetic.” As he
entered the back sliding glass door, Leah wanted to stick her tongue out at
him, but tamped down the urge.
She regarded his
disappearing back and then joy spread through her as she would soon speak to
her Lifemate.
Nico had left
the door open for her, and she slid inside and made her way to the kitchen. She
plucked a bottle of water from the fridge and then climbed the steep stairs to
the loft. After grabbing her phone from the nightstand, she landed on her back
onto the mattress. Leah opened an app and selected Auden’s name from the list,
then laid the phone on her chest. After two rings, an image of her Lifemate’s
smiling face floated above the screen. “Q’mara. How are you?”
Leah marveled at
his life-like visage.
Gunner is such a
genius.
“Tired,” she
said. “And sore. How about you?” Leah kicked off her shoes and rubbed her foot
along her aching leg muscles.
Auden’s black
gaze angled to the side for a moment, and she could barely discern the
corridors of the complex in the background. He returned his attention back to
her. “We received a report from Sordjic, the chief of the Italian Anathergian
headquarters, of Variants raiding Florence. We’ve scheduled an operation with a
special ops group to take care of the problem the day after tomorrow.”
She frowned,
uneasy with the increasing number of Variants. The humans had received variant
strains of Anathergian DNA from her father, along with magical compounds from
Daya, his wicked witch cohort, in an effort to make them as powerful as the
Anathergians. Most of the time the humans didn’t survive the transition. If
they did, they often went crazy, killing and maiming people. Sightings had spiked
all over the world. It was as if the mutated humans had all been hoarded in
cages and suddenly set free to terrorize the planet.
Leah knew this
was the beginning of something much larger to come.
“I’ve scheduled
to meet with all of the complex leaders to finalize preparations for the
upcoming invasion. The meeting will take place during J'ashidah.”
Leah’s body
seemed to turn in on itself. The oncoming threat was so huge, she could barely
comprehend it. And soon there would be J'ashidah—a gathering of the
Anathergians that happened every ten years. There she would be presented by her
Lifemate, the Anathergian king, as the new queen. Her stomach whirled at the
thought. Tack on the rigors of her training and being responsible for her
foster brother who recently turned fifteen … It was enough to make anyone melt
into a puddle.
“You return
tomorrow, correct?” he asked.
She nodded.
“After we’ve finished the training.”
He tilted his
head. “How are you holding up?”
Leah shrugged,
her shoulder blade rubbing against the bed. “I’m doing okay. I’ve probably run
at least twenty miles, or more, each night, on top of all the specialty
training Nico and M'sharik are giving me. My muscles are sore, but I’ll be fine
once I see you.”
His white teeth
shone bright against his tanned skin as he smiled.
“How is Ceadan?”
Her foster brother was the only thing that kept her sane while growing up with
her abusive foster parents. Auden had gained guardianship of him at her
request, so it was now on them to ensure he was taken care of.
His smile
disappeared. “Trianne took him to his first day of summer tech camp and I
picked him up. He grumbled incessantly.”
Leah’s lips
quivered. “Yeah, he’s pretty good at that.”
They were quiet
for a few moments, and the time filled with longing. “I miss you,” Leah
whispered.
“And I, you.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.”
His image
dissipated and she held the phone close to her. The warmth of the device seeped
through her shirt and she wished the heat came from her Lifemate. Being away
from him for just a few days made her ache. Their connection with one another
was so entangled, each of them often knew what the other was thinking. Being
away was like having a hot poker stabbed into her spine, its iron cross
twisting the fragile bone and nerves into tiny fragments.
She sucked in a
shaky breath and finally rose to shower.
About the Author:
Michelle C. Reilly is a science fiction romance writer. She's a single mom of two wonderful boys. She spent ten years in the U.S. Navy as a Hospital Corpsman Preventive Medicine Technician, which meant she was actually attached to or stationed with the U.S. Marine Corps. She has a Masters in Science in Public Health, but she is generally an IT geek and a geek of many other things as well. She currently resides in Las Vegas, NV, with her two cats, Meowdy and Moose, and her dog, Katie aka "The Old Lady."
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