Ava Redman

Eros watched over the horizon filled with silver clouds making the world lighter than it should have been. He flicked a silver lighter and tossed it to the pile of reeds and blubber, it lit up with a dark purple flame melting and burning.             The stink stung their eyes, permeating the air and the hot rot of poisons hit their nostrils as the demon carcasses melted away in the fire. Minutes dragged on like hours, as the sky tinted a dull grey fleshing out the world around them.             “We should move on,” Marcus Ambruge stood before the burning masses, glittering embers sparking vivid unending colors. He hadn’t seen it before though he wasn’t surprised that some of them burned differently than others. “This land belongs to Mala, he will bring many men with guns once they see the fire.”             “Wait,” Eros said across the grasses.             Marcus turned to catch the glimmer of sharp emerald prick the sky before a burning sun pierced the grey. They stopped an

Marcus drew his spear lightning fast from the ground and pierced into the creature’s flesh smooth, fast and efficiently. The demon let out a gurgling hiss as the blubber compressed down with an acrid hiss and wheeze, a black balloon.             Marcus sprung the spear from its body, stepping back as the mass slumped forward like jelly collapsing out of its mold, slowly sinking into the earth. With it the hut’s reedy walls started to slacken. Marcus took the next step towards the entryway, watching as the thatched roof and bits of corrugated metal collapsed in with a crunch.             His gaze stole to the shadow looming beyond the hut, “She was buying time. Why?” the shadow moved too swift to see in the silver darkness.             A dagger whizzed by Marcus plunging into a creature only paces away from him. Marcus didn’t even flinch as the demon fell forward its decomposition swifter than the oracle. “Perhaps it is the messenger she used to the others.”             “He wo

He pulled out a dagger from his belt and sent it flying towards the creature. It hit its mark an inch deep into a layer of black blubber. Its scream pierced the hut as the blubber hissed and melted around the dagger.             “Silver of Valhalla ,” Marcus straightened once more, “courtesy of the brethren you betrayed. There is only one relief,” he pulled out a vial from a leather satchel tied around his waist. Marcus Ambruge was dressed like a colonial tribesman even though his people though living in rudimentary mud huts and basic housing wore clothing more akin to the western world. Not Marcus, not at all. He’d worn all forms of clothing and found his body most comfortable in nothing but a loin cloth and spear. It had been tradition in the village to hunt naked with only a spear the first time.             It was as freeing then as it was now.             He held the vial aloft in his outstretched palm, closing it as soon as he sensed the invisible limb of the creature mov

“You come with questions far more dangerous than you know,” hissed the creature as the satchel inched closer to it once more.             Marcus Ambruge moved swift as an adder as his spear shot down onto the leather pouch the tip piercing through and embedding in the ground.             The demon’s eyes snapped up at it. “You think I have not seen the future for myself? You think I don’t know what you intend to do once I tell you?”             Marcus let the spear stay in the earth as it swayed from side to side he said, “I came to present you a choice, tell me and you live.”             “Ah, it is the choice I did not see…what a strange occurrence that it should be on those terms. You wouldn’t wish me to stop selling secrets to my kind? You wouldn’t want me to stop warning them of their futures and the future of all demon kind? What about how to kill your kind Guardian?”             Marcus Ambruge did not move a muscle. He sensed a change in the air and knew instantly

The creature sniffed once, twice and the femur bone dropped out of its embrace. “Guardian,” it hissed dispelling the dialect and adopting the unearthly voice that could haunt a man into his grave. It hissed right through to his bones shimmering up his spine. But Marcus Ambruge had met far worse.             “I seek answers from the Oracle of your kind”- “Who speaks?” it hissed rising up larger with every second.             “I am the Grimskeeper and you will answer my query.”             “Grimskeeper,” it hissed rearing up its mass of blankets falling away to reveal layers upon layers of fat and blackness. That tang of putrid magicke hit him across the face. “I have questions I need”-              “Because your mother cannot give them,” said the creature.             Marcus said nothing observing the demon almost up to his shoulders at the other end of the hut. He could not trust the distance to save him from her if she struck.             “You bring me nothing Guardi

The creature slid into an oily smile. “What is it you want human and I shall give it to you.” It cocked its head to the side, its eyes raking over him.             Marcus straightened until his head reached the top of the hut, he was tall and broad as he remained within the doorway of the cramped hut, his size filling out the space, his darkness just inches from hers, his otherness still hidden for now.             The creature’s gaze slid to his cranium elongated and stretched like that of his people as if to confirm his heritage. The markings dotted along his skull, indentations he bore from the ceremony from his successful transition to manhood.             “I seek out the answers to a legend,” he said. “There is a girl set to walk this world and she is the only one who can help my kind eradicate the evil that strives to destroy us,” Marcus Ambruge let his dialect melt away to the slight American accent he’d attained from having spent years outside of his native country.

The hut was old and worn, its thatched roof hung and dribbled in pieces, nothing added or repaired in years. This land was Malin occupied land and everything had burned at least once in the last year as their guns and men had swept through the plains. Everything except this hut.             There was no door, only a slip of hanging reeds intertwined.             Marcus slipped through his spear leading the way, his stance low and readied as he inhaled the sharp tang of blood and magicke assaulting his senses.             She was old and worn, covered in reeds and blankets, bracelets and bones littered across the hut, a femur bone clutched in her grasp. She held a likeness to his people setting the hairs on Marcus’s neck dagger straight. The thing rocked a subtle movement but made no further move as Marcus Ambruge entered the demon’s lair.             “I could smell you long before human,” its voice was oily thin. “Your scent rides the wind. You smell like them but you are not

Chapter 1 The night beat on all sides in a toxic heat wave, a drum roll of tiny insects buzzed unaware as a lion crouched forward in the grasses of the Savannah , sleek mussel, glowing eyes and a ripped maw where it had fought to keep its territory from another lion. It stalked closer towards the lake where a herd of gazelle lay sleeping. The lion paused as another pair of eyes glowed through the grasses.  It slipped back into the night. *             Marcus slipped through tall grasses a spear poised in his hand. He gave the feline beast no heed as he slipped beyond its territory to a place in the Savannah where the animals no longer dared roam, a place that set his heart racing with a wild hunger. This was his homeland and he’d grown up here in this wilderness, witnessed cold hard rage and cunning and what it took to survive. Marcus Ambruge had done terrible things and terrible things had been done to him. Now he was the predator stalking the planes entering the parts

As of tomorrow I will be releasing a mini story I created. I will release a new bite size segment everyday. I've been toying with the idea of releasing a short story that predates my finished manuscript for a while and considering the ways I could do it. If you'd read my manuscript you would know there are some characters that will also appear in my serialization. Though the list of those who have read it are few.... My point is that I want to post my story online and I'm unsure of the medium platform I should use or even the reception which is also dependent on where I release it. So this is my experiment. It's a fantasy young adult story about a girl, well....there is a girl....there might be a boy and there most certainly is chaos. Novelette        Luminescence        Ava Redman MARCUS Ambruge will stop at nothing to uncover the truth about a girl who could change the course of the world. He travels across the world in search of her only to find he already