Time Shards--Tempus Fury
Page 34
“Tell me, my love,” he said, his voice suddenly, strangely, quiet. “Do you notice anything different?”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t look… different?”
Staring at him intently, Leila tentatively touched the silver in his hair, the lines of his face. Tears welled up in her eyes.
“You look more handsome than the day I first laid eyes on you, my Egyptian Prince, my Sun-Raven.” She kissed him again, and this time he held her as tightly as he could, aiming for forever after. Outside, a roar arose from the city below, as though all of Cahokia could see them.
“What is it?” Leila looked around in apprehension.
“Let us go see,” he replied mysteriously. He led her out to the terrace that overlooked the inner city. The crowds below were waving and pointing up to the sky, where the Vanuatu hung above the palace, shining like a brilliant bird.
“We have company for breakfast.”
To think we are so important,
is an obvious crime
We know that we are specks on a tiny dot
Hurtling through space and time
And yes I understand that my whole life
is just a blink of an eye
in the history of the earth,
as with each moment that goes by
But this moment that I’m with you
It feels like time has stood still
It feels somehow like it matters
And that it always will…
—from “Apocalyptic Love Song” by Shelley Segal
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
As always, thanks to our Dark Editorial Overlord, Steve Saffel, for endless tough love throughout the years of writing this trilogy, and to Hannah Scudamore, Natasha Qureshi, David Lancett, Louise Pearce, Kevin Eddy, and the rest of the crew. A shout out to the skilled and exceptionally sharp-eyed Louise Pearce of Pearce Proof for her brilliant copy edits. Boundless appreciation also to Jill Marsal, our amazing agent, and to the magnificent voice artist Aaron Shedlock, who has brought our entire cast of characters to life—in over twenty-two different languages.
Thanks to all of the following (and anyone we’ve forgotten!) for their invaluable support and generous assistance with research: Dr. M. Tariq Bhatti, Professor of Ophthalmology and Neurology at the Mayo Clinic, Susi and Uwe Bocks, Beth Collins, Sue Erokan, Hector Esparza, Owen Hodgson, Kendra Holliday, Alisha Koch, Junko Maekawa, Irene Minabe, Minas Papageorgiou, Harold Perry, Jennifer Rattazzi, Crystal Roseman, David Speaker, Brian Thomas, and Mary Walls. Thanks also to Shelley Segal for the use of “Apocalyptic Love Song” from An Atheist Album. Words and music by Shelley Segal, copyright ©2011 by True Music. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Dana Fredsti is an ex B-movie actress with a background in theatrical combat (a skill she utilized in Army of Darkness as a sword-fighting Deadite and fight captain). Through seven-plus years of volunteering at EFBC/FCC, Dana’s been kissed by tigers, and had her thumb sucked by an ocelot with nursing issues. She’s addicted to bad movies and any book or film, good or bad, which includes zombies. She’s the author of The Spawn of Lilith, Blood Ink, the Ashley Parker series, touted as “Buffy meets the Walking Dead", the zombie noir novella, A Man’s Gotta Eat What a Man’s Gotta Eat, and the cozy noir mystery Murder for Hire: The Peruvian Pigeon. With David Fitzgerald she is the co-author of Time Shards, Shatter War, and Tempus Fury, and she has stories in the V-Wars: Shockwaves and Joe Ledger: Unstoppable anthologies.
David Fitzgerald is a historical researcher, an international public speaker, and an award-winning author of both genre fiction and historical nonfiction, such as The Complete Heretic’s Guide to Western Religion series and Nailed. He is also a founding member of the San Francisco Writer’s Coffeehouse. He lives with his wife, actress/writer Dana Fredsti, and their small menagerie of cats and dogs in a 130-plus-year-old Victorian house in Northern California. His latest fiction is the Time Shards series.
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