I've got a new ebook that's just come out! It's quite different from anything I've previously published and is titled
Ashes of Heaven.
The brief description is "Passion and betrayal in mythic Cornwall." It's based on the old Celtic stories of Tristan and Isolde but with my own twist. Lots of love and tragedy and sword fights. Also people between the sheets--it is not the PG world of Yurt.
It's available from
Amazon both as an ebook and as a paperback and is also available on all other major ebook platforms. Here's a teaser from the opening:
PART ONE - Brothers and Sisters
I
The passenger
stood by the railing, watching the shore slowly emerge from darkness as the
eastern sky lightened from grey to yellow.
A light breeze came up with the dawn, tugging at his cloak until he
pulled it tighter around him. Behind
him, the sailors emerged from the hold, yawning, and began unfurling the
sails. It was too early for shouting or
song, and they belayed the lines and raised the anchor in silence.
As the ship began
to move, the water murmuring against its side, the passenger gestured toward
the captain. The captain came to him at
once. The man had paid enough that the
voyage would have been worthwhile even without the cargo. He had been a model passenger, giving no
trouble, never sick, eating the same hard biscuits as the crew without
complaint, even though demanding better for the woman and little girl who
accompanied him. But something about him
always seemed to suggest that ferocity waited just beneath his good manners.
“Is this the
coast of Cornwall?” the man asked, his voice soft with the accents of the
south. His hair and eyes were black, his
chin clean-shaven in the southern style, and his cloak of patterned silk, but a
two-handed broadsword was strapped across his back, and his boots were heavily
worn with long use. He, the woman, and
the girl had come aboard with no more luggage than the clothes on their
backs—and a heavy pouch of gold.
“This is still
Bretagne,” the captain answered. “We
will cross to Cornwall tomorrow, and from there it will be on to Eire. The journey will be over in another week.”
The man nodded,
and when he seemed to have nothing more to say, the captain excused himself and
went up to the prow. The water was
foaming now along the sides of the ship, and the rigging hummed as the sun rose
over the coast of Bretagne.
The passenger
caught a flicker of motion from the corner of his eye and turned, quick as a
cat, one hand already on the knife in his belt.
But then he smiled, slipped the knife back, and beckoned. “Are you feeling better, Brangein?”
The little girl
emerged from behind a coil of rope. Her
curly hair was tangled, half hiding her bright black eyes. “Yes, I felt much better as soon as Isolde
gave me the potion. But it’s stuffy in
the cabin. And I can hardly wait to see
Eire.”
“Only a few more
days, little cousin. Another week is
all, the captain tells me.” He pulled
her over to stand beside him, under a fold of his cloak. She was shivering; the early morning sun had
done nothing yet to dispel the night’s chill.
“Is my sister still asleep?”
Brangein
nodded. “I tried not to wake her.” The two watched in silence for several
minutes as the jagged black rocks of the coast slid by. At one point a line of standing stones marched
across the thin grass of a headland and right down into the sea. Seabirds sailed overhead, their calls high
and mournful.
Brangein went to
the rail and put her head back to watch them.
Their broad circles and the steady movement of the ship under her feet
made her dizzy, but she did not look away, only clung to the railing until it
was slippery under her hands. For a
moment, looking straight up into the morning sky, she felt as though she had
shaken free of ship and sea and might herself soar on the salt wind.
When her neck
grew stiff and she looked down again, Isolde had emerged from the cabin and was
standing beside her brother. She was
nearly as tall as he was, black-haired like him, with the same suggestion of
carefully restrained ferocity. She wore
a necklace of silver besants and silver rings on all her fingers.
“I am sick
of this ship, Morold,” she said, though in a low voice, that none but they
might hear. “Could you not have chosen
some court closer than Eire?”
“Closer courts
might be better informed of affairs in the south,” he said with a shrug. “And we know the king of Eire is
unmarried. A few more days, and you will
never have to sail anywhere again.”
“I like
sailing,” piped up Brangein, slipping back to Morold’s side. “I like seeing new places.”
“Eire will be
new,” he promised, and bent to give her a one-armed hug and tousle her hair.
Suddenly she
pointed, her arm emerging from under his cloak.
“Look at the castle!”
The castle
emerged from behind a promontory, located on its own narrow bay. Not very wide but very tall, its towers rose
toward the sky, far higher than the mast of the ship passing below. The castle walls were as black as the rocks
of the coast, but the roofs were tiled in bright geometric patterns, red and
blue and gold. Everything about it
suggested newness, order, and harmony.
Pennants snapped from the highest towers, and a faint line of smoke
indicated that someone was cooking breakfast:
something doubtless better than hard and stale biscuits.
“I like that
castle,” Brangein announced. “I want to
live there.” She leaned her chin on the
rail, straining to see better, all thought forgotten of flying with the
seabirds. Several boats floated in the
bay, none of them rigged. She spotted no
people, but two cows appeared beyond the far side of the castle and wandered
off toward pasture.
“That is just a
little country castle,” said her cousin with a laugh. “We’ll be living at the royal court in
Eire. It will be much finer.”
The captain had
approached again. “That is the castle of
Parmenie. If we had been an hour further
along the coast at twilight yesterday, we might have anchored in its bay. Its lord is named Rivalin. Sometimes when we anchor there he buys goods
from our cargo.”
“Lord Rivalin of
Parmenie,” said Isolde, turning the words over thoughtfully and looking at her
brother. “Is he married?”
“Not unless he
has married very recently,” the captain answered. “He has not been much at home the last year
or two; the castle is maintained by his steward. The last I heard, Lord Rivalin had quarreled
with his liege lord. He is a fiery young
man by all accounts.”
“You would not
like that,” said Morold with a wink for his sister. “A fiery man who quarrels with his liege
lord? Impossible!”
Brangein did not
listen to their conversation but continued to watch the distant castle until it
disappeared behind another tall headland.
© C. Dale Brittain 2017
