Dark Moon Rising
Sci-Fi Paranormal
Romance Novel
A futuristic paranormal romance novel (120k words) in a retrospective style reminiscent of the great science fiction of the 1960s.
In an obscure arm of the Mist Galaxy, light years from old Earth, the Ajoricans (Jories) are life companions to certain humans with psychic abilities. Time and space obey these cat-like creatures. They can bend and stop time, see time-to-be, jump vast distances alone, and take their humans with them.
The true rulers of the Mist Galaxy are the immortal Nidians who took up residence on Moon Aden eons ago. These winged creatures are tired of life and have brought in humans to help them die.
Captain Lord Rhad Detangi, heir to the ancient Leopard throne, rescues twelve-year-old Princess Reisa Hyatt-Hale from a hostile takeover of her parents’ castle. Able to read minds and manipulate others by “pushing” them, Rhad discovers Reisa is an empath, who is unaware of her own psychic powers.
Years later, their lives intertwine again when they are put on a ship bound for the prison planet Cortania. Reisa is grown up. Her powers have evolved and her feelings have matured. The compelling presence of Rhad Detangi is an irresistible force she cannot fight.
Rhad has never forgotten the girl he rescued so long ago. The emotional bonds they forged, and Reisa’s ethereal beauty combine to fuel the obsessive need Rhad feels. Can they win against the evil forces that threaten their worlds? Can her absolute love survive his absolute power?
EXCERPT:
The caves in the mountain behind the Temple of the Sun were cool and damp and totally without light. Rhad could see nothing in the darkness that was blacker than any night he had ever known. He could hear the wash of water. The stream, swift running, swished and gurgled as it sped through the cavern.
Rhad lay on a level place beside the water, naked in the smooth sand. He was alone, solitary as he’d ever been, suspended in nothingness. He seemed to float, outside himself. He felt his body, but did not seem part of it. His mind was his existence, his universe. It expanded, and, as his teachers had promised, Rhad could peel back the layers, exposing levels as discrete as lines drawn on a map. No, not like a map.
The levels of his consciousness, and of his subconscious, were multidimensional. They were places he could reach–could go–by willing himself there. They were distinct and fluid at the same time, the separations contiguous to, but not part of each other. The strata were sharply divided.
Rhad flowed inside the orb that was his mind, exploring, swimming freely from one compartment to the next. Each was as different as the rooms of a house.
He dozed and was back in his body. There was light, a faint light approaching. It was Reisa. Not the child. No, she was a child no longer. This was Reisa-to-be. She brought the light; Reisa was the light. She smiled, her silver eyes pale and cool, and laid her hand on his chest. Her movements were liquid, slow, as if she moved under water.
She was clothed in garments of gold, like shafts of moonlight, diaphanous, clinging. She touched his lips with her fingers. She bent and put her mouth on his, open like a flower.
Heat consumed them, flames licking their bodies. Reisa’s hair took fire, a glorious radiance, streaming upward and away and around them.