Rebels and Realms: A Limited Edition Urban Fantasy Collection

by Heather Marie Adkins

  A few more laughs.

  "34C, gentlemen."

  The laughs grew, and a few of the good old boys even clapped.

  "That ought to do it," Logan said, barely loud enough for me to hear.

  "Thank you," I said, turning to get down.

  "Agent Heidrich?"

  I froze and cringed. The laughter died fast, and suddenly everyone was very busy. Hearing your boss snap at someone in that tone of voice will do that.

  Kyrian stalked up. "I don't know what this is about, but—"

  An alarm sounded, cutting her short. I hopped off the desk. Metal shutters could be heard rolling down over windows and doors.

  My eyes strayed to where a portal had opened a few months ago. The last time I was in a lockdown, I had almost been killed. I didn't treasure the idea of that happening again.

  Logan was stifling a chuckle. When I looked around, Kyrian was gone.

  "What's so funny?" I asked.

  Hank walked up, looking harassed. "Take this." He handed Logan a tablet.

  Logan immediately passed it off to me with the speed generally associated with file folders.

  "Your regular password will work," Hank said. "We'll add your biometrics this afternoon." Then he was gone.

  Confused, I pressed the power button and tapped my password out onto the screen. The air logo appeared, along with a few icons.

  "This doesn't explain much," I mumbled.

  "Wait for it," Logan said.

  I shrugged and sat down, clicking on the few icons, hoping to find a solitaire game. Two minutes ticked by before the tablet chimed. A red icon flashed on and off in the corner. When I touched the icon, a notice popped up.

  "The Farm is currently under strict lockdown. A lutine is loose in the building. Please watch your step."

  "What the heck is a lutine?" I asked.

  The tablet chimed again.

  Frowning, I clicked the icon again.

  "Four gremlins have inadvertently been released. Please approach with caution."

  Logan looked amused, but I was starting to worry.

  "Seriously, what's lutine?" I asked.

  "They're small. As far as AIR knows, they aren't intelligent, but if there is something that can cause a little mischief or a little chaos, they will be attracted to it like a magnet."

  I took note of the 'as far as AIR knows,' and filed it away to consider later. "Should we help?"

  "There are probably enough agents helping, which will only make it more fun." Logan appeared to be listening for a moment, then cringed. "Ouch. Or not."

  "What happened?" I asked.

  "Gremlins. I don't think you'll have to worry about bras anymore."

  "Why's that?"

  "Carter was wearing jeans."

  I pursed my lips until I was sure I wouldn't smile. "Is he okay?" Theoretically, I should have earned a prize for the amount of effort it took to keep a straight face.

  "Nothing an ice pack and a few days of rest won't cure."

  "So we should..." I let the sentence fall away.

  "We don't want anyone else getting hurt," Logan said. "Let's go keep an eye on things."

  Four Days Later:

  Memo:

  Please note that no clothing should not be left in the control room. If you would like to claim a pair of jeans, please do so by Friday. Henceforth, any article of clothing found unattended overnight in a common area will be donated.

  * * *

  The End

  New to the AIR Series? If you’d like to read more, Shattered Soul (AIR Series Book 1) sees Cassie on her first big investigation. Want to read further? Broken Paths (Air Series Book 2). Find links to these novels and more here:

  www.booloodian.com

  Interested in information on upcoming releases?

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  Sign up for the Hidden Worlds Newsletter to receive information on upcoming releases, news, and more!

  Writing the AIR series has been a fun and amazing experience. There’s more planned for Cassie and her partners!

  * * *

  If you enjoyed this book, please leave a review on the site where you made the purchase. Leaving a review helps the reader and author in many ways. Your support is appreciated!

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  Thank you for reading!

  * * *

  Amanda Booloodian

  About the Author

  Amanda Booloodian lives in Missouri with her loving, and often times peculiar, husband. In 2006, she took part in Great Beginnings and was awarded first place in the Mystery/Thriller category. Amanda has been passionate about the written word throughout her life. Now, much of her spare time is spent at the computer, delving into worlds accessible only through vivid imagination. In warm weather, when she isn’t pounding on the keyboard, she can often be found wandering through the wilderness. Occasionally she gets it into her head to SCUBA dive or to sit back at home and make wine, which can have interesting results and inspire her writing.

  Read More from Amanda Booloodian

  www.booloodian.com

  The Fallen Vampire

  Prequel to Flux and Firmament – The Cloud Lords

  Beata Blitz

  The Fallen Vampire: Flux & Firmament © copyright 2016 Beata Blitz

  * * *

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author. Please support the author by not participating in piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for only purchasing authorized editions.

  * * *

  This book is fiction. All names, places, businesses, events, and incidents within these pages are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The characters in this publication are fictitious, and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental, except for the vampires and shapeshifting dragons, which are entirely real, of course.

  The Fallen Vampire

  Flux & Firmament – The Cloud Lords

  When dimensions collide, the Cloud Lords rule above mankind…

  One woman’s nascent power and forbidden could be our salvation.

  A freak accident at Chloe's seventeenth birthday party reveals her psychic abilities, and the community responds by condemning her as a witch who must be burned alive. As she attempts to escape across the dystopian, war-ravaged territory of her homeland, she yearns for a chance to find refuge and acceptance.

  On the run and haunted by ghosts from her past, Chloe finds herself at the center of a conflict between the warring factions of Cloud Lords, shape-shifters from another dimension, alternately revered as angels and reviled as demons by the subjugated human populace below.

  A dispute between her people's rulers, the virile Drakonin dragon shifters, and their sworn enemies, the night flying Vampirii, radically alters Chloe's destiny when she brazenly intervenes in their struggle by sheltering a fallen warrior.

  Chloe comes face-to-face with Aethan, a prince among the Vampirii, the most fearsome of the Cloud Lords, known for craving human blood. She will share a forbidden connection with Aethan that could ultimately lead to a place where her nascent power might bloom, provided she can survive the perilous events that will test the bounds of her resolve and love.

  Preface

  They came to our dimension, breathing flame

  and flying through the night,

  these Cloud Lords, our new masters who

  demand tribute

  from us earth dwellers below.

  * * *

  In the face of their supremacy, were we wrong

  to worship them as gods?

  * * *

  Yet, they admit to one weakness

  that they despise themselves for,

  * * *

  Love, which their soothsayer has prophesied

  will one day see fruition with Her, />
  a human female,

  and lead to their undoing or the world’s salvation.

  * * *

  — A fragment from the Ember Scrolls

  1

  “THEY’LL CANE US IN PUBLIC if we get caught,” Miranda whispered.

  “So stay home,” Chloe told her friend. “I’m only going to turn seventeen once. I won’t let the threat of the rod spoil this day.”

  Although birthday celebrations had been outlawed, the Commission considered them a minor transgression, so participants were generally spared the harsher punishments such as permanent mutilation. All the same, a caning was nothing to scoff at since the Officer of Public Corrections tended to dispense justice with such a firm hand that offenders weren’t able to sit on their backsides for weeks.

  “Don’t pretend they went to all the effort of putting on this party just for you,” Miranda said. “Besides, the real reason you want to go is to make sure that Lillian doesn’t get her hands on Wayne.”

  “If Wayne is stupid enough to fall for Lillian, then she can have him,” Chloe countered, annoyed that her friend would hit her with the stinging truth. Miranda was right. The party had been planned to honor Lillian. The fact that she was the mayor’s daughter while Wayne was the sheriff’s son had given the town’s teenagers enough courage to stage the secret event. Because of their parents’ influence, everyone assumed that if caught, the authorities would go lightly on all the participants. It was dumb luck that Chloe happened to share a birthday with Lillian. But she wasn’t about to let that unfortunate detail interfere with such a rare occasion for amusement, nor with her ability to celebrate tonight’s party as though it had been thrown for her own benefit.

  “Listen if you’re afraid to take the risk, I understand,” Chloe said, “But it’s chilly out here, and we can’t stand on your back porch arguing all night.”

  Conflicted, Miranda looked up at the full moon, then guiltily down at her slippers. She hadn’t even bothered to get fully dressed—proof she’d known all along that she wouldn’t have the courage to sneak out. As she twirled one of her brown locks, she said, “Maybe I’ll catch up with you later.”

  Chloe rolled her big, green eyes and groaned. “Alright, but if you do, remember to travel by an uninhabited route.”

  Slipping into the dark shadows cast by the trees in Miranda’s backyard, Chloe was determined to follow her own advice. Her route took her along the streets with the greatest number of derelict buildings. For convenience, the townspeople of Dragon’s Faith had taken up residence in close proximity to one another, leaving the remainder of the former city’s houses and buildings to languish in decay. Almost anything of utility had already been stripped from these gutted out homes. Chloe always got goose bumps when she trekked down these lonely streets. Under the full moon, the dark, empty windows of the houses seemed like watchful eyes. The only real danger was from the feral dogs skulking along the ruins that occasionally banded together into packs. They had been known to attack children and elderly people walking alone in the evening. But fortunately, over the winter, the sheriff had been given the task of culling stray animals that had lost their fear of humans.

  Although Chloe trod down the center of the street in order to avoid stray dogs, she listened carefully for sounds of a patrol. At any moment, she was ready to dive into the thick bushes of the overgrown yards. She couldn’t keep her mind from drifting to thoughts of how this city had been fully populated only seventeen years ago. Last year, she and Miranda had ridden their bikes to the outskirts of town where they’d found a shattered wooden sign, face down in a ditch. When they turned it over, they determined that an artillery shell of some sort had completely demolished the upper half of the sign. Although the town’s original name had been obliterated, they could still make out the inscription: ‘California’.

  “Such information from the past is useless to us now,” her father had said when asked for more information about ‘California’. “And don’t go spreading that name about. You’ll get us chastised for nostalgic yearnings.”

  When pressed again later, her father still refused to tell her the original name of her home town, even though she knew it hadn’t always been called ‘Dragon’s Faith’ as he insisted. Although adults were forbidden from recounting such information by strict ‘nostalgia laws’, her generation had an insatiable curiosity to know more. Whenever one of her classmates learned something about the lost era, it was passed by word of mouth to all the other teenagers. They had compiled a very weak understanding of the lost era as well as the events leading up to the downfall of the preceding civilization. Among friends, Chloe had been proud to reveal that the territory surrounding her town had once been known as California before being renamed as ‘The Pacific Governorship’.

  A sudden dry rattle from above startled Chloe, and she let out a shriek of surprise. She glanced overhead and found a coatl sitting on its perch. The creature resembled an enormous rattlesnake with wings of iridescent rainbow colored plumage. Chloe had been so lost in her thoughts, she hadn’t even noticed that she was walking past the Cloud Temple. She and her friends had concluded that the building had once served as a church for the old religion. It was a large brick building with a steeple out front. Above the entrance doors, a large metal pole had been affixed to act as a perch for the coatls—messengers of the Cloud Lords. With another shake of its rattle, the angry serpent stretched its wings, bared its fangs and coiled its body, signaling that it could strike at any moment.

  A chill ran through Chloe’s veins. Normally the coatl ignored passers-by, but she must’ve startled the serpent from sleep. She’d never heard of a coatl biting a resident of Dragon’s Faith, but there was no reason to become its first victim. The eight foot serpent could deliver enough venom to provide certain death. As she slowly backed away from the winged serpent’s watchful gaze, she put a hand on her chest to feel the necklace bearing a pendant and a crucifix under her shirt—a token that had once belonged to the mother she’d never known. For Chloe, the necklace acted as a good luck charm. She’d discovered it hidden in a cranny of the brick wall behind the old boiler down in the basement. Whether her mother, her father, or someone else had hidden it there, she could never determine. But since the necklace bore a symbol of the old religion, she’d been wise enough not to ask questions, and thus risk having it confiscated. She knew the necklace had belonged to her mother because the pendant bore her initials. Chloe prized this only remaining connection to the woman who had died while giving her life.

  Once Chloe had retreated to a safe distance, the coatl folded its wings and curled up into a ball upon its perch. However, it kept its unblinking eyes trained upon her. After she breathed a sigh of relief, she heard a hound barking nearby. Some people still kept guard dogs chained up in their yards, and it must have heard her shriek when the coatl frightened her. A wooden sign above the Cloud Temple’s door was inscribed with the words: ‘Only Those on High Will Rule’. It was the credo of the New Religion, and from what she and her friends had gathered, it had been a condition of surrender when the Rift War ended. Even though her town was not the capital of the Pacific Governorship, it remained an important launching point for offerings to the Cloud Lords above. And the arrival of the coatl signaled that their rulers now demanded another ritual supplication.

  The sound of horse hooves trotting across asphalt brought Chloe back to the moment—the Night Patrol. Clearly, a deputy had heard the dog barking, and he was coming round to investigate whether or not someone had broken curfew. Chloe rushed to the overgrown bushes on the other side of the old road and hunkered down as low as possible. Typically, the Night Patrol’s job was to issue citations to citizens that hadn’t observed the blackout by forgetting to cover their windows when an oil lamp or candle was burning. One of the many conditions of the truce was the adherence to a set of rules known as the Dictates. The earth dwellers were to abandon their technology, and as proof of their subordination, light was forbidden after certain hou
rs. The Cloud Lords could track even the smallest light on the earth below. In the past, dragon fire had been the punishment for even the smallest transgression. But ever since the New Religion had been organized, a certain amount of autonomy and freedom had been permitted. Chloe was certain that the New Religion had gained its first converts due to social pressure, and then later, everyone else had joined for self-preservation.

  As the deputy’s horse trotted up the street, Chloe finally caught a glimpse of the rider in the moonlight. It was Jarod, the only deputy among the sheriff’s Regulators that she despised. His cheeks had been scarred by acne, but his appearance bothered her less than his creepy demeanor. More than once, she’d seen him in the crowd at public events, staring as though undressing her with his eyes. But thankfully, he was too much of a coward with women to come up and say anything to her. Nonetheless, his pale eyes scanning the length of the street unsettled her. He stopped his horse below the coatl’s perch in order to stuff a wad of chewing tobacco into his already full cheek. Unnerved by the horseman, the coatl reared up into a position to strike, bared its fangs, and shook its ominous rattle. Jarod spun his horse to face the creature and spat a huge, gooey mess of tobacco straight into the coatl’s gaping maw. The serpent was as surprised as Chloe by this unwarranted attack. It choked on the tobacco and nearly slid from the perch. Jarod sidled his horse away from the creature and wiped a trail of tobacco from his chin.