2026 O : Obelisk

 

An excerpt from Windmaster of a traveler's detour to the perfect “O” obelisk.

To someone who until recently had eschewed horses for the rolling deck, riding Kaleigh without benefit of saddle or bridle was a new experience. Both her and Dal’s laughter mingled with the soft swoosh of the grass as the fàlaire loped across the meadow, creating wraith-like swirls in the morning mist. Even at a leisurely pace, they reached the ring of stones while the sky was still turning from silver into the bright pink, which at sea heralded bad weather on the horizon.

The call of ancient magic called out with a force Ellspeth felt in her bones. “What is this place?”

“In the times of many ancestors past, this was a place of fiosachd, of good fortune. Eventually someone set up the circle of stones.”

Dal slid from Taer’s back and walked around the stones. Ellspeth could see the five outer ones were as tall as a man. The center stone, a circular spire, twice as tall as the wizard, held court and loomed over a small stone bench. An outer circle of white pebbles, a handspan wide and three or four fingers high, gleamed as a halo around the rocks.

“It is a tradition for mountain people to leave a pebble at a place like this as an offering or just to acknowledge their presence,” Dal explained. “Those embarking on a long journey often take a stone with them for safe travel. We have time. Come feel the music in the rocks.”

The moment her feet touched the ground Ellspeth felt safe. A spot halfway around the circle seemed the place for the pebble in her hand. When she knelt to place it atop a small cairn of similar ones, she thought she could hear the voices of all those who had stopped there. 

~till next time Helen 

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2026 J : Jump

 

Below is a brief except from Windmaster Legacy. Lord Dal is on a rescue mission to save his kidnapped bride. He is trapped on a cliff with open air at his back and an enemy blocking the path to freedom.

An authors note: I foreshadowed the magic used to same the hero without ever knowing it. I just included a tale told to children earlier in the book about horses with wings that flew in the sky with the birds. And a personal thought, I especially liked the stallion's snarky attitude afterwards.

Dust off to the left indicated mounted men galloping toward him in a flanking maneuver. When a third group of men on horseback raced into view, Dal realized he was being herded to the edge of the plateau. Tairneach skidded to a halt, sending rocks flying over the edge. Eagles soared up from below, disturbed from their nests.

With a quick glance, Dal evaluated their odds. Fifty men with drawn swords formed a wide arc, cutting off any escape route.

“Just like old times, huh, Taer?” Dal scanned the stone-faced men, searching for weakness, some misalignment in the formation that would give him an advantage. However, these were not untrained troops. He knew why they did not attack. They awaited their commander.

Dal took a guess. “Come on out, Third. No need to hide. Show your men your great leadership skills.” His voice ringing with sarcasm bounced off the rocks and sang back multiple times. “Or are you afraid? After all, I’m not a helpless mare slowed by a foal.”

Still no answer came from those facing Dal or from behind their lines. “Taer, we need to save Ellspeth. That has to be our only concern. I’ll break their ranks so you can get through. I should catch up in a few days.” At the scornful look, Tairneach cast over his shoulder, Dal added a hasty afterthought. “If they happen to capture me, and that is doubtful, they will take me to Ellspeth. You can track me and we will rescue her that way. What do you think?”

Tairneach answered by nodding toward the open sky. When Dal started to climb down from the saddle, the stallion sidestepped. Dal kept hold of his sword, but had to grab the saddle horn. “Taer, what are you doing? No one can survive that fall.”

The fàlaire’s neigh drowned out Dal’s words. Tairneach trotted two steps toward the edge, then spun on his haunches to face the oncoming force. His commands were clear.

“You’re sure about this?”

Taer’s trumpeting drowned out the screeches of the circling birds.

Dal slid his sword back into its scabbard. Lightning bolts flew from his fingers into the mass of men. Commending his fate to his ancestors, he draped himself over Taer’s neck. With a wild neigh, the stallion spun and raced to the cliff’s edge. This time he did not stop, but leaped into space. Wings emerged from Taer’s side. His triumphant bugle resounded to the clouds. After a few heartbeats of free flight, Dal released his death grip. Sitting up, he adjusted his legs so they would not hamper the slight shifts Taer’s wings made during the glide toward the ground.

Dal held his breath as the earth closed to a handspan beneath the fàlaire’s hooves. Instead of the bounce he expected to experience after a hard fall, Taer’s slow trot absorbed the forward motion. His whinny when he came to a stop sounded like the giggle of a mischievous child.

“You didn’t tell me you could fly,” Dal mumbled. “After all these years, you’re still keeping secrets from me?” A smack to Taer’s neck brought forth another whinny from the stallion and a toss of his mane. “All right, you had your fun,” Dal said. “Now let’s go before those archers find our range.” 

Taer pranced a few steps before heading out at a lope.

~till next time Helen 

If you want to see my previous postings for the challenge, go here. If you're following other blogs in the challenge, here's the master list of the participants.

Buy Windmaster Legacy at Amazon and elsewhere.

2026 G : Golem

 

Golem-a mythical creature made of clay that is animated and brought to life by magic. A rogue mage has found a clay army ready to be brought to life. The except from Windmaster Golem is his first attempt at destroying his rival for the affections of Kia, a mage newly come to her powers.

A figure shambled into the firelight. A stop as if to orient itself, and it lumbered towards the center of the camp. Its destination was clear—Eilidh. The creature which could now be seen as a stone man headed straight for the clanswoman who stood between Kia and Elendl. Flames from the now-roaring fire revealed impassive clay features and what appeared to be a sword scabbard. 

“Halt and be recognized.” Brodie held his breath to see if his yell brought a reaction. 

The creature lumbered forward. It stopped at the protective wards and stood with arms raised. 

“Ancestors, let the wards hold.” 

Magic can’t stop magic, fear put in. And magic had to be used to make a clay statue move. 

But Elendl is the archmage’s daughter, hope added. Her magic should be stronger than the one who brought the statue to life. 

Brodie kept his gaze on the creature. It hammered at the invisible wall with his fist. Deafening peals reverberated with each blow. The wall shimmered into visibility. A heartbeat later it exploded into splinters.

~till next time Helen 

If you want to see my previous postings for the challenge, go here.  

 

If you're following other blogs in the challenge, here's the master list of the participants.

 

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2026 C : Cold

 

Although the weather has changed and spring has gathered a foothold, freezing temperatures, storms of a generation, and inches of snow on Beale Street in Memphis, Tennessee, provided the inspiration of cold as the "C" in the challenge. From Windmaster, an excerpt of bad weather captured in one of my worlds of fantasy. 

Ellspeth’s world reduced to the shifting gray shadow that was Tairneach. Her eyes hurt from straining to see through the curtain of snow and rain that almost obscured the stallion. She rode with one foot scraping the rocks on the side of the narrow trail while her other hung over a thousand-foot precipice. One misstep and both rider and mount would plummet to the valley floor. The driving rain stung every spot of un protected skin like a thousand cuts. Icy rivulets ran off her wide-brimmed hat. They sneaked beneath the collar of the lake seal cloak and ran down her neck. Waterlogged, her clothes sucked every ounce of heat from her body. Only where her legs lay against Cadno’s coat did she have vague feeling. Hours of riding in the howling maelstrom of cold and wet had dulled her mind to anything beyond the need to stay in the saddle.

Dal’s bellow penetrated Ellspeth’s consciousness. “This storm isn’t going to stop. Taer can’t take much more of this, and neither can we. There’s shelter not far up the trail.”

Chattering teeth made a reply impossible, so she just nodded. Even that slight movement threw her numbed body off balance. Fighting not to fall - into the abyss, Ellspeth dropped the reins onto Cadno’s neck and wrapped nerveless fingers around the saddle horn to let the colt pick his way across a stream of water rushing over the rock-strewn path. The crunch of ice beneath his hooves reminded Ellspeth of the snap of the Sea Falcon’s canvas in a stiff wind. If I can stand on the Falcon’s deck, I can stay in this saddle. She clenched the leather horn tighter with a renewed sense of determination.

~till next time Helen

If you want to see my previous postings for the challenge, go here. 

If you're following other blogs in the challenge, here's the master list of the participants.

Buy Windmaster at Amazon and These Sites

2025 P : Passengers

    

In the challenge, "P" is for passengers as illustrated in an excerpt from Windmaster. It also reflects on guild house politics.  

Anger colored Ellspeth’s thoughts so much that passersby on Stratven’s cobblestoned streets moved aside to avoid contact with her. Blinded by her uncontrollable fury, she barely noticed. “How dare he?” Two porters looked up at the venom in her voice, then at her glare, bent back to their work. “The Sea Falcon is mine!” Ellspeth snarled. “Just because he’s a council member of the House of Cszabo doesn’t give Third the right to change my orders. As if I would sail without resupply and shore leave for my crew.” 

Although she pictured what she would like to do to the object of her rage, she refused to even name the man in her rant and used his position title instead. “Wool and dyed fabric. He wants me to take the Falcon for a load of wool and dyed fabric instead of paying passengers. Passengers whose fares were paid by the king! I’ll get the council to back me. Third may have more rank, but I have the king’s request.”

I hope you enjoyed this insight into the world of windmaster. ~till next time, Helen 

 

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2025 O : Obsidian

    

In the challenge, "O" is for the black stone, obsidian. The archmage, Lord Dal, is on an isle in the Southern Sea. His old friend, Semelen, has joined Dal at a mountain spot used for meditation. The purpose of the visit was to help Dal uncover who murdered everyone on the Isle of Mages.

Warning - the subject of loss might be upsetting to some. From Windmaster:

A swig of fresh water from the gourd he carried refreshed him enough to finish the climb to the ceremonial ledge near the mountain’s summit. He spotted a small pyramid of coral rocks. “This is it,” he said to a furred nose peeking out from between the thick ferns. 

Just beyond the marker, an outcropping, worn smooth by weather, formed a natural bench. Eons ago, islanders had carved the symbols for— fortune... happiness... and love—in the green-flecked volcanic rock. Dal folded his lanky frame to the ground in a single lithe movement. Despite the lava’s rumbling deep within the earth, he could sense a serene timelessness in the rock wall. His eyes closed as he sank into meditation. 

Dal’s consciousness floated downward into the volcano. Closer and closer he moved toward the gaping maw of a lava tube. The haunting notes of Ellspeth’s tune floated up from the dark depths. The blue glimmer of runes on the tunnel walls beckoned him into the darkness even as it lit his way. The sound of the flute led him through chamber after chamber filled with obsidian statues, their blank-faces marred only by the flash of fire where eyes would have been. Dal could almost feel the heat from their implacable anger.

The runes stopped at a pool of black water. A scene he knew well, the island heart-home of all mages, formed in the unnatural mirror. The concentric rings of wood and stone cottages seemed so real that he could see the feathers on the eagle in the council room’s stained glass window. Pushed by a southerly wind, a yellow cloud sifted over the island. Dal moaned at the scattered bodies left in its wake. His eyes strained in vain to see movement. Even in sleep, his hands clenched at the memory. Anger and pain vied for control, as the sulfur smell mingled with the remembered stench of hundreds of funeral pyres. Fires he had set to send the dead, those closer to him than kin, to their final rest. 

“I’ll avenge your deaths,” he swore. “If it takes the rest of my days.”

~till next time, Helen 

 

Buy Windmaster at Amazon and These Sites

If you're following other blogs in the challenge, here's the master list of the other participants.

 

Sea Tribute, Windmaster #WeWriWa #SnippetSunday

 

Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors, the weekly hop for everyone who loves to write ... and read!

​Today's excerpt is from Windmaster, the first book of the fantasy, romance series, the Windmaster Novels. To set, the scene, Sea Falcon was attacked by a pirate ship. Thanks to the skill of the crew and the archmage's powers and sword, the ship won the conflict. But it came with a price. The crew's tribute to their lost crewman is told in the post, Burial At Sea. But there is more than human acknowledgement of the boy's sacrifice as he died to save his captain. And now the SundaySnippet, a different kind of tribute to a lost sailor.

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Excerpt

A crewman’s cry of surprise at the two shipfish who rose alongside the ship broke Ellspeth’s inward focus. She felt the crew’s awe as the sea creatures’ whispery sounds repeated the funeral dirge. Their silver bodies surged upward to balance on split tails. “Almost like the King’s Guard,” a grizzled crewman at the rail offered. His observation of an honor guard came true when two more shipfish surfaced—the body balanced between their large back fins. The Sea Falcon’s crew stood motionless while eerie whistles echoed across the lake. When the final note of the unusual dirge faded away, the shipfish and their cherished burden slipped out of sight. Full dark had settled upon the still lake before the crew sought their bunks.

Unwilling to move, Ellspeth stood alone at the bow rail.

End of Excerpt
 

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Windmaster  - Available at these online bookstores

 
​I hope you like the snippet I shared this week for Dal and Ellspeth. Be sure to read the other Weekend Writing Warriors blogs and the #SnippetSunday authors for more great reads. 

~till next time, Helen