The Blood Moon Series

This will be a series of six books in two sets of three. The first three will set the main stage for the latter three, which will take place roughly 60 cycles later, when the warlocks of Oblivion command their armies to march upon the world. The first three books follow the stories of Tira Volim, Ashkule Yichmaachi and Vaekosa of the Tribe of the Wolf as they settle personal scores that lead them to discover plots much darker. The second three will follow the stories of Dogarn the Exile, Bakra Jafari and Cinder.

## **Characters**

### **Major Protagonists**

**Tira Volim**

**Aashkule Yichmaachi**

**Vaekosa**

**Dogarn the Exile**

**Cinder**

**Bakra Jafari**

### **Supporting Characters**

**Marvyn the Aged -** An ancient historian and mentor to Tira during her girlhood, Marvyn smuggles her out of her father's castle and tries to accompany her to Lypter where she can sail to Araia and escape her arranged marriage to a talfar noble.

**Amundi Halvard -** A Nord trapper who ranges between southern Andar and his home village in the centre of Sifland, Amundi accompanies Tira on her journey south to find her mother's people.

**Torvik Yura -** Wise-man and shaman of the Yura tribe and grandfather to Tira Volim, he teaches her the ways of the spirits and reveals the nature of her mother's kidnapper.

**Cade Venzor -** A troubled captain in the Tolnorian military who rescues Vaekosa from deserters and takes her prisoner as duty demands of him. He later becomes close friends with her and helps expose the Oblivion cult beneath Tolnor.

**Duptak -** A senior figure within Aashkule's village in Urchano, this necromancer directs the young orc scholar to serve as a envoy to Tolnor, where he will meet with human magi of the White Academy to trade information pertaining to disturbances in the world's magical ley-lines.

**Nameless -** An introspective koschei who dwells alone in the wilderness of Andar and took part in the Shadow Scourge. When sought out by Dogarn and Cinder, he lends insight into the plans of Mikhalinn and the necromancers under his command.

### **Major Antagonists**

**Mikhalinn -** The second avatar of Oblivion itself and a warlock of unknown age, origin and nature. He exists in spirit form, after his material body was killed by Sorin-Sam on the last day of the Shadow Scourge, over 1000 cycles ago.

**House Aiataar -** A powerful talfar house who turn themselves over to the faith of Oblivion, using their vast banking networks in an attempt to collapse the wealth of the world's greatest cities, leaving them defenceless in the face of the return of Mikhalinn.

**Raknos the Plague Lord -** A follower of Zoor'Ztsh and trusted servant of Mikhalinn under the direction of Benniszth the Blackened. He leads his brethren in spreading plague throughout Sandoria to neutralise the Protectorate's armies.

**Kharkaroth the Immolator -** The greatest among the kulshedra dragons, enlisted by the forces of Darkness to raze the Tree of Life and Death, for it is said that his fiery breath is hot enough to melt stone.

**Benniszth the Blackened -** A deformed human warlock and close servant of Mikhalinn who oversees the advancing armies of Darkness within the continent of Naen.

**High Reclaimer** **Nazlaiiq -** A prominent kiasyd warlock from the Tribe of the Hunting Moon, who orchestrates the campaign of jyhad against the city-state of Tolnor. Even among other warlocks, he is known for his deep zealotry and loyalty to the Annihilation plan.

**Kelsi Venzor -** The younger sister of Cade Venzor, Kelsi inherited the soul of a warlock and was born with black pits for eyes. Her parents couldn't bring themselves to kill her so they left her in the city waterways to fend for herself. She comes to found the Oblivion cult beneath Tolnor.

### **Secondary Antagonists**

**Vendrick Slate -** An ex-slaver who joined the clergy of Itrenar in his later years, he is a deranged sadist and nemesis of Tira Volim for the destruction he has wrought upon her people.

**Duke Loras -** A powerful and profane psychomancer, Loras rules over a castle within Arktorah and presides over a forest known to contain powerful trolls.

**Scaethar -** A ruthless nezumi assassin of the Black Hand, he is employed by house Aiataar to eliminate Vendrick Slate after he threatens to expose their secrets to the Protectorate in return for vast quantities of opiates. He develops a vendetta against Tira after she "steals" the kill from him.

**Elias Torindor -** A paladin of the Sixty-Six, Elias is dispatched from Lyptan headquarters to locate and capture the Girl Who Shall Dance before the forces of Darkness do. Originally posing as an ally of Cinder, he eventually attempts to claim her soul.

**Vasilisa Miraneith -** A solfar vampire who is dispatched along with her pack to kill Aashkule after dark forces discover he is getting close to uncovering their plans for world Annihilation.

### **Minor Antagonists**

**Mordak -** Mordak is a morbid kiasyd druid who claims to be a follower of Orboros the Devourer Wurm. He is found in the company of Elias Torindor when he happens across Cinder.

**Waazig the Taker -** A brutal ogre outlaw who accompanies Elias Torindor in his travels through western Andar. At first seeming crude and savage, he later reveals his nature as a murderer and rapist.

**Jerren Merry -** Jerren is the fourth and final of Elias's initial companions, a pech wanderer who seems out of place amongst the criminals he associates with. He possesses a disquieting aura of eerie pleasantness.

**Kytala -** A dorogar female who searches for Dogarn in order to execute him for the treason of defection from the Gazabarad.

## **Book One**

### **Tira's Story**

**First Scene:** Tira Volim flees the castle of her tyrannical father, Jaegar, with her old mentor Marvyn, riding east towards the city of Lypter. Here she hopes to gain secure passage to the northern continent of Araia, far from her patriarch's grip. However, when the two encounter a party of Protectorate Inquisitors they are sentenced to death after the party's leader, a cold-eyed man by the name of Slate, seems to recognise Tira's face. She escapes into the nearby forest but Marvyn is captured, mutilated and hanged by the roadside. Returning and discovering her guardian's body, she is overcome by grief and guilt, wandering aimlessly back into the woods, heading south towards the Troxian Mountains. She awakes from a nightmare to the sounds of crickets in the darkness.

When Tira finally stumbles, filthy and exhausted, into a small Nordic village, she is met with contempt and suspicion by the inhabitants, roaming the dirty streets until one stranger, a big man by the name of Amundi Halvard, offers her succour as he returns from a long trip across the mountains. He takes a liking to her and when she decides that her only remaining option in the world is to find her mother's tribe on the frozen ocean, far to the south, he offers to take her with him on his next trek through the Troxian heights into northern Sifland. After waiting for the proper chain of the cycle, the two set off.

In the mountains, they exchange stories about themselves and truly bond in the harsh conditions. She learns of Nordic values and, when one day the pair encounter a chatan (giant predatory cat), that Amundi has a great fear of wolves because they caused the death of his wife in cycles past. When they reach the northern reaches of Sifland, they head towards an outpost which is the last standing watchtower of a Jhoshan fortress razed during the collapse of that great empire. On the way to the tower, Tira observes strange green lights in the darkness, which Amundi informs her are the lures of demons which feed on the painful echoes of old battlefields.

They spend the Long Nights at the watchtower with the garrison holding station there and at the dawn of the new cycle continue south across the snow plains, towards Amundi's village. Upon arrival, Tira asks Amundi is he will teach her how to fight. He states that unlike in Taian culture, where it is unladylike for women to fight, in the south all villagers are expected to handle a weapon. Eager to learn, Tira develops some skill in the village commons. Eventually, when she has learned all she can, Amundi heads back north again and Tira travels on south alone.

Stumbling across hazardous ground, Tira enters a field of fragile, thin ice overlying ice tunnels carved by snowmelt, injuring herself. She hears the howling of wolves in the distance and in a panic that the hunters have caught her scent, continues to travel through the night. The wolf pack stalks her and just as they are about to pounce, she falls beneath the ice into an underground chamber, tens of feet below. When she awakes from unconsciousness, she tries to find a way out of the snow caves, dismayed that she has a fractured hip.

Just as she is becoming sure that she will die alone in the ice, she finds the skeletal remains of an unfamiliar humanoid half buried in a small crevice. On closer inspection, she discovers a magnificently forged sword of a silvery, unknown metal. Touching the blade, she is sure that she finds it unusually warm for having lain in the cold for gods know how long. Taking it with her, she is guided by a great number of ice crickets out of the caves to the daylight. Free at last, she knows her only hope is to struggle onward and hope she finds people before the wolves find her.

Alone and helpless in the cold, Tira is once again found by the snow wolves, which surround and close in on her. Accepting death, despite her terror she is determined to take at least one of the hunters with her, drawing her new blade to defend herself. To her surprise, the metal sword bursts into flames, lighting up the night and driving the wolves away from her in a state of animal fear. Unsure of what to do, she carries on through the darkness until as dawn is rising, a group of Adlivun hunters finds her, nearly expired, and takes her back to their village.

Awaking a second time, Tira is now in her mother's village and meets her grandfather, Torvik, who is the tribe's medicine man - a shaman of repute among his people. She shows him her sword and he tells he that it is enchanted, that spirits have been bound within the metal, and that it was forged by the dorogar people of the Gazabarad across the frozen ocean. Tira's grandfather teaches her of spirits and how to commune with them, and she becomes familiar with the three small efreets inhabiting her sword.

After living among her people for over a cycle, Tira finally summons the courage to ask her grandfather of what happened to her mother all that time ago. Tearfully, Torvik Yura tells of how the settlement had been attacked by slavers from the north, an occasion they were unprepared for in the light that none of that kind had ever travelled this far south before. As the men were decimated and huts burned to the ground, his daughter, Tira's mother Tapeesa Yura, had been claimed by the raiders. He discloses that he heard the men call their leader by the name Vendrick Slate.

**Last Scene:** Later that night, Tira sits by the dying embers of the village fire, wondering at how one evil man has brought so much pain to her family. Attacked her grandfather's people. Stolen her mother and sold her into slavery. killed her friend and mentor Marvyn. As she boils with anger, an ettin rises from the now roaring blue flames and encourages her to undertake a quest of vengeance, as she has been chosen by the crickets as the chosen of Flamberge, pagan goddess of righteous fury. Tira resolves to avenge the wrongs done to the world by Slate and put an end to his depravity.

### **Aashkule's Story**

**First Scene:** Aashkule eagerly await the Day of the Dead, when the ghosts of orcish elders walk amongst the living to impart their wisdom and stories of great deeds in past ages. A friend of his, Mintah, informs him that one of the necromancers of the elder council wishes to speak with him, and that his mentor, Duptak, has agreed to the meeting.

**Last Scene:** Aashkule enters the Stone Archives of the Ferrum capital city to learn of

### **Vaekosa's Story**

**First Scene:** Vaekosa's tribe makes ready to travel to a sacred region of the Dark Forest.

Vaekosa's tribe attends the seventh Conclave of High Night, where Arkala Pastrea Vokunda informs the tribes of an imminent plan to reclaim the lands taken by the humans of Tolnor over the past hundreds of cycles. recent burning of the pine forests are seen as intolerable provocations that must be answered with force.

Vaekosa joins in the attack on human forces massed at Noz-Oraln's borders. Vaekosa's love-mate is driven off a cliff by enemies and Vaekosa is left alone in the forests after the battle is done. She is captured by human soldiers who plan to torture her but is rescued by a ranking officer named Cade and taken as a prisoner of war even though his own regiment has been slaughtered in the fray. She is surprised that she isn't killed but disgusted by proximity to this outlander. She is escorted back to Tolnor.

Once back in Tolnor, Vaekosa is placed in the palace dungeons, where she is visited by envoys from the Tribe of Midnight's Hands, who offer to negotiate her release if she will carry out special tasks for their seniors. She catches hints of political unrest in the city-state.

**Last Scene:** Vaekosa leaves Tolnor and returns to her people in the Dark Forest to warn them of the conspiracy.

## **Book Two**

### **Tira's Story**

Tira leaves her grandfather's people to head back north, over 5 cycles after she first entered their midst.

Tira enters Sandoria