Category: Character Introductions

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meet Anne Gothfried

The city of Gavelscore resembles London in the 1880s, except the society is matriarchal and women run much of the world. The language resembles Old English, so when Thána is approached by someone who speaks English with an Australian accent, she’s shocked and intrigued.

To hear Anne tell the story, she fell through a hole and found herself in this backward world with no real idea how to get home. She adjusts to her new situation though and makes a place for herself as a gambler, frequenting the taverns and saloons around the country.

When she hears Thána and Daria speaking in English, she introduces herself, drawn to something in Thána, and begins to ingratiate herself into Thána’s orbit, offering her advice in dealing with the people in the small city.

The question is, is Anne friend or foe? What does she have to do with the murders happening around them? And what does she want with Thána?

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meet Stâlian Susanna Batorry

Thána and her friends find themselves in a world of many dangers, including the church militant. Like the rest of the world, the church, and its military, are led by women. Stâlian Susanna Batorry is the sharp weapon of this military, called The Mother’s Weapon.

When we first meet her, she has come to Gavelscore to hunt, judge, and execute witches.

As a child, she witnessed her sister’s death, by means of a witch’s curse (supposedly) and thereafter dedicated her life to eradicating witchcraft. She joined the church and quickly worked her way up to a leadership position to become the head witch hunter.

Dedicated and loyal, Batorry is a True Believer and that could spell trouble for our heroes.

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meet Xen

In Mörderin we meet a number of new races, including the Pixin who are agender. Xen is a Pixin who is friends with Thána’s sister Daria. Pixin are long-lived and they reproduce through a process they call the joining.

Pixin are good with languages, but not at magic. They each choose several areas to study over the course of their long childhood. Xen chose Pixila, which is a form of martial arts, cooking, painting, and sculpture.

While the Pixin have called Vaneesh home for a number of generations, they originally came through a portal from their homeworld when a volcanic eruption caused widespread destruction. They prefer tropical climates such as the one on their homeworld and the place where they go to reproduce is in such a climate in Vaneesh.

We meet Xen shortly after arriving in Vaneesh, and they are intriguing to Thána from the start. Xen’s eyes are black and so is their hair, which they wear shaved on the sides, but longer on top. Xen is also the mastermind of the plan to rescue Daria.

Xen is not expressive, but is a deep well of emotion nonetheless. They are drawn to Thána first by her relation to Daria, then by her willingness to go into danger for her sister. When that danger threatens to get them all killed, it is Xen who finds a way to break them out.

The only question is, will it be enough?

Mörderin: The Blood Witch Saga Book 2 is coming soon, Readers!

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meet Daria Alizon Delnar

Today, I want to introduce you to Daria, Thána’s younger sister.

Despite the fact that they were not raised together, Daria has always lived in Thána’s shadow in one way or another. When they were young, Daria’s life revolved around keeping Thána out of the hands of the Brotherhood. Later, it was about keeping their secret safe.

Daria is a talented potion maker and garden witch, with a gift of prophecy that is equal parts helpful and frustrating. In Vaneesh, where she and her mother settle after secreting Thána away, Daria comes into her own, growing into her gifts and experimenting with new magic whenever she has time.

Daria married a native Vaneesh man named Habros Delnar and has one son, a sensitive young man named Kota. When we meet Daria, she’s been taken by an invading army, forcing Thána once more into the role of family savior.

It’s been nearly twenty-three years since the girls were together and circumstances with push them to overcome the distance to survive.

Mörderin: The Blood Witch Saga Book 2 is coming your way, Readers!

Photo by Artem Maltsev on Unsplash

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meet Alaina Alizon

I woke up to find my edits for book 2, so it’s time to start introducing you to a few new characters!

We’ll start with Thána’s mother, Alaina. We first meet Alaina in book 1, but we don’t really get to know her. In Mörderin we get more time with her.

Alaina and her husband moved from Spítia to an ancestral home in California before Thána was born, certain that her child would be born a blood witch. The activity of the Brotherhood convinced her they’d be safer there, and for a while they were.

When the Brotherhood finds them and kills her husband, her magic can no longer hide them, Alaina flees with her two daughters, trying to stay one step ahead of the men sent to kill Thána. When that gets too hard, she tries something desperate.

Using complicated magic, Alaina blocks Thána’s magic and her memory before leaving the ten-year-old where she would be found and cared for before fleeing once more with her younger daughter, Daria, leaving a trail of Thána’s blood for the Brotherhood to follow.

Still, Alaina doesn’t stay in one place long and eventually goes back to Spítia before finding a portal to someplace new where the Brotherhood has never been seen. Alaina and Daria settle into a quiet life in Vaneesh. As much as she misses her daughter, she knows Thána is safer where she is.

One day, Alaina decides it is time to find Thána, and despite Daria warning her of some dire visions of a disaster to come if Alaina leaves, she does exactly that. Stepping through the portal, Alaina envisions traveling back to California and from there to embark on a search for her eldest child.

That didn’t happen, however, as the Brotherhood picked up her trail as soon as she was on the soil of her homeworld, capturing her and imprisoning her at the Mano Kourt, where they tried to get her to tell them where Thána was hidden.

Alaina held her silence though, determined to protect Thána even if it cost her her life. When Thána and Cambious show up to rescue her, Alaina doesn’t believe it at first. She’s frail from starvation and torture, but still alive as they make their escape.

Reunited with her daughter, Alaina slips easily back into mothering mode and joyously introduces Thána to their extended family, something Thána has never really known. All that’s left then is to go to Vaneesh and introduce the two sisters, which is where we pick up the story in book two of The Blood Witch Saga.

I can’t wait to share this book with you, Readers. Now I’m off to the day job.

Photo by Jennifer Marquez on Unsplash

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meet Thána Augusta Celene Alizon

Thána is our main character and narrator. Her story opens shortly after her thirty-second birthday in El Paso, Texas where she is working as a midlevel manager at a manufacturing facility. She grew up in foster care after she was found sitting on a bench outside a police station in Rochester, NY with no memory of who she was and a backpack containing a note that gave her name as Thána Augusta Celene Alizon Archer and her age as ten.

With no idea who she was or where she came from Thána had to build her life on nothing while cycling through several foster homes. In high school she developed a love of language, and in particular Old English, which she continued to pursue in college, although she recognized the limited career potential there, she majored in business.

From college she joined the corporate world, working her way up in a company that built electronics, eventually getting transferred to a plant in El Paso which is where we meet her.

She’s a pretty practical person, not given to fantasy or fairy tales. She believes in what she can see. Uncomfortable in large groups, Thána is a bit of a homebody, if you can call the tiny apartment she is occupying a home.

That is until a strange man appears telling her that she is in danger and after several unsuccessful attacks, she’s starting to believe him when she is transferred to a San Francisco plant.

Adventure she could never imagine awaits her in San Francisco.

Thanátou: The Blood Witch Saga Book 1 is available now!

Smashwords (ebook)

Googlebooks (ebook)

Amazon (ebook and paperback)

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meet Cambious

Our second character introduction is for Cambious, our transgender incubus. The guardian of the portal between our world and another, Cambious was born Cambia and transitioned with a magically enhanced surgery.

He is large and very dark-skinned. Thána describes his physical appearance this way:

Through the door, I could see…well, I didn’t know what I was seeing. It couldn’t be real though, that much I was sure of. Because seven-foot-tall men with horns and black skin, dressed in leather and boots just were not a thing that was real. And, let me be clear: when I say black skin, I mean the kind of black that devours light, and when I say horns, I mean horns, thick, black horns rising up from his ample head of black hair somewhere above where I expected his ears were and curling back around and down around toward his face.

Despite his fearsome appearance, Cambious is a gentle sort of soul who loves baroque music and gardening. He and his family are sworn to protect the gate as repayment for a favor done by Thána’s grandfather. When the Brotherhood of God come calling, seeking Thána’s life, Cambious helps her flee through the gate and sets out with her to find her mother.

Cambious uses a complex glamor to get by in a world that isn’t always open to those of his kind, enabling him to seek out partners for his needs. He also has connections among the sort of non-human underground that includes incubi, succubi, dragons, phoenixes, and more.

Thanátou: The Blood Witch Saga Book 1 is out now!

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meet Merry

For our first introduction to the characters in Thanátou, I’d like to introduce you to Merry Ander-Wheather, the first family our main character meets as her journey begins.

Merry is a kitchen-witch, and a bit eccentric, especially for Thána who has lived a pretty mundane life up until the point where our story begins. We never learn specifically how old she is, but she is easily in her late seventies when she enters our story.

Merry wears her long grey hair in a variety of braids that she pins up in various messy ways and she uses magic to alter the color from time to time, preferring bright blues and greens, but tossing in other colors as it suits her.

Merry is a mother and grandmother, though it’s unclear how many children she had or how many grandkids there are, but she is a devoted family lover and she is happiest when her house is full and she can whip up tasty treats for everyone to enjoy.

Thanátou

Merry is eager to help Thána regain her memory and teach her how to be a witch, possibly too eager. She means well though, and becomes one of the first people Thána comes to trust.

I look forward to sharing this book with you, Readers! I am actively recruiting reviewers, so let me know if you’re interested.

I’m off to the day job and more coffee. I hope this Tuesday treats you with kindness!

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introducing Zero, and a cover reveal

I meant to introduce you all to Zero last week, but I completely spaced it. I’ll blame it on the combination of pain and pain meds. So today, I want to do that, but yesterday my publisher emailed me with the cover for In Gathering Shade, and as an added bonus, he included the re-designed cover for Through Shade and Shadow.

Through Shade and ShadowIt’s gorgeous, don’t you think?  I’m in love with it!

Okay, let’s talk about Zero. I started writing Zero’s character originally thinking she was the start of something new.  Then I discovered that she was a part of Shades and Shadows.

We first meet her as a prisoner of sorts, the subject of some mysterious experimentation.  Zero is sixteen, the daughter of a Chinese Sage who was seduced and eventually controlled by an American Shadow with questionable ambitions.

Zero is something of an escape artist, an adept thief, and particularly good with glamors. She doesn’t trust easily, so when she throws in with Raven and Evan she’s also got one foot out the door, and her eye on all the exits.

Even she doesn’t fully know what the experiments did to her, but she knows she doesn’t want to wait to find out.  She has seen first hand what the man behind her captivity could do to the minds of others and she’s scared that he might have done the same to her.

Zero is both Sage and Shadow, and no one knows the full extent of what she can do.  In many ways, Zero is a broken glass held together with duct tape.

I know, I know…what you really want is to see the cover for In Gathering Shade, right?

With no further ado…This cover is beautiful!  I can’t stop staring at the two of them together!

in-gathering-shade

 

I should have release dates and such for you soon!  Now though, I need to get more coffee and get my work day started.

I’d love to hear what you think.  Drop me a note in the comments!

 

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introducing Evan Chayton

Evan Chayton is a Shifter, though he keeps that fact very well guarded.  As he first appears in the beginning of In Gathering Shade, only a small group of people know his secret.  He is also a military man who is assigned to Adam Darvin’s secretive organization.

Raven chooses him to be her handler when Adam sends her on a mission because she trusts that his secret will ensure his loyalty.  After her previous handler turned out to be working for the 8th Battalion, Raven is wary and wants to know she can trust whoever is watching her back.

Evan is a by the book guy, he believes in discipline and protocol, and he doesn’t like showing weakness in any way, but he finds himself vulnerable and exposed when the psychic link between him and his brother forces him to experience his brother’s torture.

Evan grew up in a tight knit family presided over by his mother, who was a force to be reckoned with from as far back as he could remember.  His father was something of a home-body, preferring to spend time keeping their home clean and welcoming, while also supporting the work his wife devoted herself too.

There were aunts and uncles and cousins too, at least while Evan was young.  He started his change early, Shifting for the first time at only nine years old.  They had an older sister, but after an argument with their mother, she had flown away and Evan hadn’t seen her in better than ten years.

Evan and his brother could pass for one another, but they were very different outside the similarity in their faces.  While Sawyer was a risk taker and a thrill chaser, Evan preferred quiet and solid footing.  It was no wonder that when they reached the end of the change and were each fully in control of their Shifting, that Sawyer ended up a spy of sorts while Evan opted for the military.

We meet Evan near the beginning of In Gathering Shade, and he will also play an important role in the next book in the series.

 

I just returned my manuscript for In Gathering Shade to the publisher.  There will be a cover reveal soon, followed by the actual release!