Title:
Shadow And Light
Author:
K.R.R. Brigstreet
Genre:
Realms
Heat Rating:
4
Publisher:
Breathless Press
Formats Available In:
All eBook formats
Word Count:
20,625
Release Date:
17th May 2013
ISBN: 978-1-77101-140-2
Blurb: A strange phenomenon
casts unending night and irrepressible feelings of lust over Kaliana.
She must discover the cause, but she can't seem to stay focused...
When night falls over Meso and does not
end, Chancellor Kaliana and Master Ganshi must find the cause. As
they search for the truth, they discover more than science can
explain. Within the night lives a boundless sexual energy, turning
scholars into seducers and musicians into man eaters. Beneath the
earth a fire moves and rumbles, bringing forth a creature that will
envelop and consume all that call it. In the endless night, all
boundaries are broken. Can Kaliana and Ganshi overcome the onslaught
of lust long enough to restore the balance between shadow and light?
Book Links:
Excerpt:
When the sun shone, it flooded the
valley with a beam that struck and splashed between twin mountains.
It danced outward, skittering through the mountain valley toward
opposite civilizations advancing. The peoples moved each to the
other, slowly, like seeds in the earth waiting for the right
combination of warmth and moisture to coax their substance from the
soil.
To the east, light meandered over green
terraces that descended between rock-lined funnels, joining the
streams that irrigated miles of pasture, and wound a slow and steady
route to the geometric city of Meso. A solar system of paved streets
orbited a central blinding compound of glass, stone, and steel. The
people of this city reflected their own reverence for the aesthetic
machinations of the universe they tried to emulate. Their lines were
sharp. Their angles pristine. Their movements productive and
efficient. Sunlight that did not succumb to the walls of glass
enclosing the structure melted over the bodies of these people. The
rest flowed over the sharp angles and refracted, fractioning
crystalline and settling over the far eastern forest, where it
disappeared into the maze of trees.
Light spared none in the west. The
earth cracked beneath its weight, crushing moisture from rocks and
opening the veins of plants, desiccating. It painted self-portraits
on jagged sunset bluffs, gazing into the mirror of dominion. The
light enveloped completely any river that once shaped the red and
orange cliffs, leaving a dusty trail for rodents and lizards dashing
in and out of shade. Men and women scratched hoes in the dirt,
pulling free meager crops that seemed as if they sprouted old and
worn. The men and women lived, and the children played and learned,
among a vast cornucopia of poisons and potions.
They were hard, shaped by the same wind
that aged the banks of empty riverbeds. The people's hard-bought
respect approached religious devotion to the dry land. Sobered by the
relentless light, the people of the western border mercilessly clung
together, commanding of the earth just enough to survive.
This is the light from which the young
man traveled.
It happened at Two Mountains Standing,
under the moon of the summer solstice. Presiding over the ceremony,
the moon bathed the dancers in the pale white reflection of the sun.
The dancers disappeared and reappeared in flickers of shadow and
light, reflections of the red and yellow fire surrounding them and
within them. Their bodies surged, throwing black shadows across the
sacred fire circle and onto the two mountains framing them. The moon
smiled down on the shadows looming giant on the mountainsides,
mimicking their owners' frenzied movements.
The shadows came together and parted,
came together and parted, circled and leapt over the fire, leaping
from mountain to mountain. Sweat ran down the dancers' arms and legs
and they pounded it into the packed earth. A turbulent, wordless
harmony brought forth the incantations. Curved backs raised heaving
breasts higher, spines rippled, and hot, slippery tits bounced in the
bodies' rhythmic undulating.
In the center of this frenetic circle a
man lay, immobile. He was a stranger to this place. A solid short
mound of earth covered each of his arms; his legs extended toward the
sacred fire and also disappeared into the earth. When dancers leapt
the fire, they sometimes landed on his submerged arms and legs,
pounding them deeper into the ground. The man's eyes stared
unblinking up at the moon. No lines marred the man's face, which was
dark and unmoving. A braid ran down the back of his head, and the
tail of it fanned out loose behind his shoulders where he lay. His
eyes were fixed on the moon.
There was no telling how many dancers
circled the fire. Sweat poured from their bodies, turning the packed
earth to mud. The mud splashed with each pounding step, covering the
dancers' legs and the silent man with specks of reddish brown. Sweat
turned the specks quickly to streaks, which ran down their bodies
like tears. Harmonies rose in pure ecstatic emotion, and hands began
to smear rivulets of mud over the arching and writhing bodies.
About The Author:
Between writing and slinging organic
veggies at local farmers' markets, K.R.R. Bridgstreet teaches English
Literature and Composition to unsuspecting college freshmen.
Bridgstreet and her partner live in the woods in central New York
with their cats and chickens. Visit krrbridgstreet.com for news on
latest releases and upcoming books.
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