KERRIGAN’S RACE
Also by CM Michaels:
THE SISTERS IN BLOOD SERIES
Dangerous Waters
Omnipotent Blood
Praise for the Sisters in Blood series:
“Kudos to Michaels for jarring me out of my expectations — Four fangs!” — I love Vampire novels.
“Thoroughly entertaining, gripping and enchanting from start to finish. Michaels’ imagination runs rampant and is apparent throughout the entire storyline.” — RT Book Reviews
“The lore and plot are enjoyable, thoughtful and imaginative. Michaels puts trust in his readers’ ability to suspend their disbelief, and in turn he presents them with a compelling, enthralling narrative. Michaels explores complex issues such as sexuality, faith and sacrifice without pretense or artificiality. His characters are realistic, complete with their flaws and mistakes and genuine emotions. I felt like I was discovering a new type of folklore, with fantastic descriptions of terrifying and amazing creatures.” — Fantascize.com
KERRIGAN’S RACE
THE SYRENI: BOOK ONE
CM MICHAELS
Kerrigan’s Race: The Syreni (Book 1)
Copyright © 2017
by CM Michaels
Cover art © 2017 by LLPix Designs. All rights reserved.
For information on the cover art, please contact LLPix Designs
ISBN (Paperback): 978-0-692-99139-8
ISBN (eBook): 978-0-692-99140-4
Published by Realms of Fantasy, LLC
2017: First Edition
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Warning: This book may contain graphic sexual material and/or profanity and is not meant to be read by any person under the age of 18.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The idea for Kerrigan’s Race first came to me back in 2013 while spending a long, relaxing weekend in Michigan visiting family. I was so intrigued by the premise that I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and ended up spending almost the entire weekend putting together the high level plot-arc, much to the chagrin of my three brothers who I was there to visit. Such is the life of a writer. Unfortunately, I was in the middle of writing Dangerous Waters at the time so I wasn’t able to pursue it further. Only after the second book in my Sisters in Blood series, Omnipotent Blood, was published in 2015 was I able to focus on flushing out the story. As a writer, I found switching genres from Urban Fantasy to Fantasy to be an incredibly rewarding experience. I hope you enjoy Kerrigan’s journey, which is only just beginning.
A special thank you to my amazing team of beta readers: Claudia, Donna, Karla, Karen, Melannie and Kevin. Your constructive feedback and encouragement throughout the entire process has been invaluable.
To my mom and dad in Heaven, thank you for raising such a tight-knit family and always encouraging your kids to pursue their dreams. I wouldn’t trade my childhood for anything.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
ALSO BY CM MICHAELS
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
AUTHOR'S NOTE
MAP
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
SYRENI TERMINOLOGY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PROLOGUE
Teresolee’s Great Northern Ocean: 2010 AD
* * *
The mighty King Celandor buried the serrated prongs of his ever-trusted trident into the soft under flesh of a swooping griffin and tossed it aside. “Aristos, take my daughter and dive for Halon’s Gate—we can’t hold the birthing chamber much longer.”
“But she’s still in labor, Celandor. Our baby—”
“Will drown,” the king growled as he engaged two more attackers. “Would you have our entire race go extinct instead?”
Three swift kicks of Aristos’s sinewy, emerald tail catapulted his lithe seven foot body from the water. He sailed wide of the much bulkier griffin attempting to squeeze its eagle-lion form through the armament opening closest to his incapacitated Pulchra, shredding the chimera’s throat with a backhand swipe of his razor-sharp gauntlet spikes before entering the chamber and skidding across the rough stone floor. The female he’d bound his soul to—his compar—turned her head to meet his apprehensive gaze, her radiant violet eyes growing wide with fear. All it would take for her to ensure her survival was to slip beneath the surface into the safety of the awaiting sea. And yet she kept pushing, her focus solely on the delivery of their child. He couldn’t have loved her more.
A quick glance through the rectangular shaped portal he’d just jumped through confirmed his king’s words. Legions of the winged beasts darkened the sky—in spite of Teresolee’s enormous crimson sun being almost directly overhead—and they were down to a handful of warriors. Even attempting the stealth, minimally guarded birth while under attack had been the foolish act of desperate parents. To wait any longer would be unconscionable. Rather than drag his heavy body the rest of the way across the uneven stones Aristos rolled into the inner ring of open water used by the Syreni to defend the chamber, swimming and climbing over his fallen brethren to reach the inverted birthing platform Pulchra was resting on.
“I’m almost there, Ris,” she whispered, nestling her soft cheek against the side of his blood covered face. “And it’s a girl. We’re having a girl.”
Aristos was so awestruck by the fortuitous news—the ever-declining female birthrate made it all but a certainty she would be having a son—that his plans of dragging Pulchra off to Halon’s Gate were all but forgotten. He swept her magenta locks back from her frost blue lips and smothered her mouth in a heartfelt kiss. Only the flapping of her oxygen-starved gills forced him to end the embrace so she could duck under and take a breath.
The wet sucking sound of a spear finding its mark was followed by a shrill underwater squeal. Aristos snapped out of his reverie just in time to find a griffin general plunging a second harpoon into his beautiful Pulchra’s stomach. She went flaccid in his arms as the green foam of the sea turned crimson. Opening his golden beak, the general let loose a triumphant wail that shook the very walls of the birthing chamber. The last of the fertile Syreni females was dead.
Aristos feebly clung to his fallen mate, making no effort to protect himself as the winged beast drew a long scythe-shaped blade from the leather satchel fastened between its shoulders and stepped closer, placing the cold steel against his throat. The quick death the razor-sharp edge promised would be a far more merciful
fate than having to explain to the king that he’d disobeyed his direct order and gotten his daughter killed. Joining his love in Caelum—the eternal resting place of his fallen brethren—was the only solace available to him now.
But as was his luck, he was granted no such reprieve. Aristos watched in a kind of shock induced stupor as Celandor’s trident plunged through the gloating griffin general from behind, shattering ribs and impaling organs before immerging from the beast’s leather-armored chest. A solemn glance at his lifeless daughter was all it took to confirm the king’s worst fears. The faint glint of hope was quickly extinguished from his deadened pale green eyes.
He beheaded the monster who’d murdered his daughter with the beast’s own weapon, holding his grisly white-and-crimson feathered prize up for the entire griffin army to see. “Your kind has long called me the Peaceful One. You’ve mocked my attempts to negotiate a lasting truce in the face of a millennia-long war. That ends now. Our vast armies in the east will unite with our southern raptor allies and swarm your hatching grounds like the great fire wasp plague. You think you’ve scored some momentous victory here today? Your arrogant general just sentenced your entire species to death.”
Before their enemy could regroup, Celandor took a firm hold of Aristos by the forearm, wrapped his other arm around his lifeless daughter’s chest and disappeared into the darkened abyss with the two of them in tow.
CHAPTER ONE
Olympic swimming trials
* * *
Present Day — Omaha, Nebraska
“That doesn’t feel like sleeping,” Austin purred, stilling my hand that had ventured beneath the hotel room sheets and the waistband of his boxers. The feel of him stiffening under my touch shot my libido into overdrive.
“Are you complaining?”
He let out a low, throaty chuckle. “Asking me to be the strong one here is a really bad idea, Kerr. You know we can’t tonight. You’re due in the pool in,” he braced himself on his elbow and leaned his shoulders up off the bed to glance at the digital alarm clock. “Five and a half hours. Sleep. Now.”
“Fine,” I snapped, spinning away from him with a huff and a swift pull of the covers that left him laying bare-chested in the cold. “Just remember tonight the next time you jab that thing into my hip and whisper how horny you are. Payback’s a bitch.”
Austin curled his muscular arm around my waist and tucked himself up against my back. Even through the mound of sheets, the feel of his ripped, martial arts honed body pressing so tightly against mine made me melt into his embrace. “You’re going to blow them out of the water tomorrow, girl. There’s nothing to worry about.”
Yeah, other than the fact that three of the girls I was up against in the final had set world records of their own. Only the top two finishers would qualify for the Olympic team headed to Tokyo. Not qualifying would be as much as admitting the first twenty-one years of my life had been a complete waste. Then there was my stellar fifth place finish at the last trials when I was seventeen. That wasn’t doing much to boost my confidence either. “Everyone keeps telling me that. What if I don’t? What the hell do I do then?”
I brushed at the tears that escaped my eyes. Great. Now I was crying. Could I get any more pathetic? Austin squeezed me in a tight, grizzly bear of a hug and kissed the nape of my neck. “Oh baby. I knew you were worked up. Shit.”
I’d been holding so much in that when the damn finally cracked, it crumbled in spectacular fashion. We’re talking Mt. Saint Helens, Hurricane Katrina proportions. I cried my guts out while he held me, periodically kissing my neck and my shoulders while he waited out the storm. When the worst was over, he handed me the whole box of tissues. “Remind me, who holds the world record for the hundred freestyle?”
“I do,” I mumbled, my nose buried in a pile of Kleenex. My Rudolf-like voice made me sound even more pathetic than I felt.
“And who’s the only swimmer so far to win their preliminary and semi-final heats by over three lengths?” he whispered into my ear, caressing the lobe ever so skillfully with his tongue.
That earned him a ticklish giggle. “Me.”
“There was this one totally amazing girl who captained the Stanford NCAA champion swim team last year. Kerrington? Kensington? Damn it, I know it started with a K.”
I twisted my head around to meet his waiting lips. “Kerrigan—Kerrigan Everett.”
Austin growled and claimed my mouth, pressing me against the bed with a surge of passion that left my head spinning. “Kerrigan Wyatt, you mean.”
“Not for five more months, mister.”
If it’d been left to us—with our freakishly insane schedules—we’d probably end up getting married at the training center between rounds of one of our epic kickboxing workouts. Thankfully, our well-intentioned but sometimes overbearing mothers had relieved us of being involved in the decision making from the start.
Not that I always approved of what they decided. Case in point, my bottom-of-the-shoulder, milk-chocolate hair would be transformed for the big day into a burgundy and pink ombre angled bob, with sweeping bangs hanging over my eyes that would be sure to drive me crazy. Way too rocker chic for my taste. But when a prominent Hollywood stylist like my soon-to-be mother-in-law offers you an olive branch of sorts by agreeing to devote an entire day to pampering you—something big-screen celebrities regularly paid thousands for—only a fool would complain. We weren’t exactly kindred spirits to begin with. She not-so-affectionately referred to my swimming, martial arts training and marathon gym workouts as tomboyish hobbies. The general lack of effort I put into my appearance was something she simply couldn’t comprehend. To her, starting a day without makeup—wearing the least smelly pair of yoga pants you could scrounge up for your morning jog—would be worse than any torture they could dream up at Gitmo.
Setting aside the bizarre image of me with a hairstyle that belonged on some brooding LA teen addicted to her mother’s Oxycontin, I gave Austin’s toffee colored locks a playful tug. “Who knows? Maybe I’ll meet my dream hottie before then and we’ll run off together to some far away, uncharted island.”
My flirtatious taunting ignited the possessive male inside him just as I’d hoped it would. Who said I had to play fair? Both of my wrists were quickly secured above my head by one of his broad hands as he slid his knees inside of mine and swept my legs apart. Somehow he’d removed his underwear while still in the process of mounting me. Impressive. I felt a firm tug against my thighs and the top of my butt, and what was left of my cotton panties went sailing backward over his shoulder.
Making only a token effort at foreplay—at least by his standards—Austin’s teeth nipped at the delicate skin along the side of my breast while his skilled fingers began to work their magic inside me. The moment I was wet enough, he drove himself all the way into me in one thrust like he was staking his claim on a patch of land in the old west. “You’re mine, mi amor. Always.”
“Always and forever,” I happily agreed, rotating my hips to grind myself against him in perfect rhythm with his powerful thrusts. With any luck, by the time we finished my post-orgasm brain wouldn’t be capable of coherent thought. I might even be able to sleep. The sly little smirk on his stubble-covered, ruggedly handsome face told me he knew he’d been played. Not that he cared. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for me. “I love you.”
CHAPTER TWO
Halon’s Gate — The Syreni high court
* * *
I begrudgingly swam down the winding, marble floored hall that led to the High Court. As a child I used to spend hours marveling at the intricate statues of the Syreni kings lining these walls, dating all the way back to the time before the segregation—when the last of the portals linking Earth and our world were destroyed. The carved figurines held no interest for me now. Nothing did. Cherished memories of ducking into the infirmary entrance I’d just passed to share a secretive kiss with Pulchra—long before the king had blessed my courtship of her—sent another soul-crushing wave of
pain cutting through me like I’d ingested a powerful acid that was slowly dissolving me from the inside out. I’d studied both Chaucer and Menander in school, and it struck me how ill-informed they both were. The decade since my compar and our unborn daughter had been brutally slaughtered in front of me had not healed my wounds as they foretold. It had only intensified the loss.
Taleoek dropped into a respectful bow and fisted his plate mail covered chest as I approached, then swung open the ornate golden court door he’d been guarding. My general. May the great Poseidon and Neptune protect you.
I’m not sure even that would be enough, my friend. I leaned my forehead against his and patted his right shoulder. It was far too informal a gesture for someone of my title, but Taleoek was the closest thing I had to a brother. He’d fought beside me since I was old enough to lift a sword. We were inseparable growing up, his ill-advised antics being the cause of most of the reprimands I’d received. Unfortunately, I’d have to face this battle alone.
The faint bluish glow from hundreds of phosphorus lamps illuminated the three-story High Court. Both upper galleries were filled far beyond their capacity, which wasn’t at all surprising given the unprecedented vote taking place today. I did my best to ignore the flurry of insults and accusations that had become my standard greeting since Pulchra’s death, taking my place at the far end of the immense, Syreni-shaped granite table that served as the formal meeting location for the Throne of Nine. Our ruling council derived its name from the nine members it contained: six regional generals, the chancellor, our king, and the vacant seat designated for the queen.
The king was dressed in his ceremonial dark navy robes, and had his waist length ashen hair woven into an elaborate ponytail. His enormous chest and upper arms were imposing even in the loose fitting material. With a flick of his long silver tail he rose up to address the crowd, ever present trident in hand.
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