by AD Starrling
Lily’s lips curved in an answering beam as dazzling as the sun. ‘Karad,’ she said.
Laura gasped.
Conrad looked up, dazed. ‘Did she just try to say my—?’
Anna nodded with a tremulous smile. Conrad’s heart thudded wildly inside his chest. None of them had uttered his name since he entered the room.
Tomas sat on Lucas’s knees and watched Conrad with an identical grin to his sister, his green eyes bright. ‘Gada! Hel!’ he contributed enthusiastically.
Victor laughed.
‘I suspect Lily is going to be the brains of this outfit,’ said Alexa as chuckles rang around the room.
A sudden premonition blasted through Conrad as he gazed into the eyes of the twins. These children were special. He could feel it in the very marrow of his being.
He sensed the same awed awareness in the others’ expressions.
Laura reached across and gently stroked Lily’s face, hazel eyes gleaming with unshed tears. Lily grabbed her hand and cooed. In that instant, Conrad Greene felt the bonds of destiny irrevocably seal themselves around the immortals in that room. He thought of the two who still remained to be found, the missing links of their extraordinary circle.
They were out there.
He was certain of it.
THE END
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Author’s Note
As always, I would like to share with you some interesting “facts and fictions” about this novel.
The historical events behind the prologue and the first chapter are factual. Suleiman the Magnificent had his first-born son with Mahidevran Sultan, and later had him killed, for fear of a coup during the Persian campaign in the 1500s; Captain Branimir Rajkovic and the young Ariana are purely fictional characters. The Treaty of the Union was established in London in July 1706, under the patronage of Queen Anne. The talks between the English and Scottish commissioners assigned to the negotiations took place in the Royal Cockpit theatre, close to Whitehall and the Banqueting House.
Conrad’s birthmark, the Aesculapian snake, was inspired by the Rod of Asclepius, the most recognized symbol of medicine to this day. At the end of the book, I introduced the notion that Rafael, Conrad’s pureblood-immortal ancestor and Bastian’s second-born son, was the original “healer” upon whom all subsequent mythological figures, such as the Greek God Asclepius, were based. Giving Conrad a staff weapon to fight with was a logical step to complete the symbolism of the Rod of Asclepius.
The 1962 Columbus Day storm, Typhoon Freda, did happen and was perfect inspiration for a haiku.
Researching the structure of the US Secret Service and how these agents would protect the President during a public function, such as the FedEx Field fundraiser event, was hard work. It was only after trawling through dozens of newspaper articles, pictures, and the highly-instructive websites of several US government agencies, including that of the US Secret Service itself, that I managed to write those scenes. The White House Situation Room exists and is usually managed by a Sit Room director, as depicted in the book. Description of the physical layout and the idea of having the US Director of National Intelligence take over its operation are purely fictional. From my research, I gathered that mobile phones and other such devices are not normally allowed in the Sit Room, which was why I had everyone using landlines. Again, I took a lot of liberties with how the US intelligence community as a whole would coordinate their efforts if a similar crisis as the one depicted in the novel was to arise in real life. I hope it would mimic what I described in the book. The Crystal City US Secret Service detention facility is purely fictional.
The current US President travels in a custom-made Cadillac that contains a blood bank of his specific blood type in the trunk. The full resuscitation kit I included in the book is fictional. The current Chancellor of Germany counts an Audi A8 among her state cars.
The technology to make carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic guns and ceramic bullets that can evade metal detectors has existed for a number of years. The first publicly known plastic gun was shown to the world in 2013.
The fictional Obenhaus Group was loosely based on a very famous and innovative manufacturer of polymer materials, which started life in the German state of Bavaria. The plastic polymer OG1140 is fictional, although the methods used to produce it are factual.
The co-crystallization process used to make the poison and the liquid super explosive in the book is factual. As described in the novel, it has become an area of high interest again with regard to its applications in other industries besides pharmaceutics, including mining and explosives engineering. PETN and its derivative Pentolite were used extensively during the Second World War and large amounts remain leftover in old weapon stockpiles. The R.E. factor used to describe the power of the liquid explosive invented by Svein Hagen is factual. Cetrilium 24 is fictional.
The details of U.S. AFRICOM, the UAV, and the composition, hierarchy, and weapons of the US Marines Corps platoon, are based on factual research. Any mistakes in accurately depicting these are mine alone.
The Kola Superdeep Borehole and Project Mohole are factual, as are directional or horizontal boring and trenchless technology.
The Rajkovics’ yacht The Ariana is based on the super yacht Anastasia, designed by Sam Sorgiovanni Designs and made by Oceanco in 2008.
As usual, a lot of this research material is on my website, as “Extras” under the “Bonus” section. I also regularly feature the music that I would have accompanying many of the scenes in the books under the “News” section.
Acknowledgments
To Kat, Wendy, Lorraine, and Shaheel, my beta-readers. Without your kickass comments, this book would not be what it is today.
To Glendon and Tabatha Haddix from Streetlight Graphics, for coming up with a great cover as always and for being such a pleasure to work with.
To Liam Carnahan from Invisible Ink Editing and Sara Litchfield from Right Ink On The Wall. Your critiques and feedback make me a better writer everyday. Thank you for helping me overcome my bad writing habits!
To my friends Dawn and Ali, and to Ed and the Hagen family. Apologies for being accidental victims of my imagination. At least I didn’t kill you.
To Kriss Morton, who loved Anatole Vassili so much, I just had to bring the man back.
Other Titles By A. D. Starrling
Soul Meaning (Seventeen Book One)
National Indie Excellence Awards Winner Fantasy 2013
National Indie Excellence Awards Finalist Adventure 2013
Next Generation Indie Book Awards Finalist Action-Adventure 2013
Hollywood Book Festival 2013 Honorable Mention General Fiction
King’s Crusade (Seventeen Book Two)
Author Bio
AD Starrling was born on the small island nation of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean and came to the UK at the age of twenty to study medicine. After five years of hard graft earning her MD and another five years working all of God’s hours as a Paediatrician, she decided to return to her first love, writing. She currently lives in Warwickshire in the West Midlands, where she is busy writing the next installment in the award winning supernatural thriller series Seventeen. She still practises medicine. AD Starrling is her pen name.
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