Author: Ariel Paiement

Bane of Ashkarith released on July 31st, and lots of people have been asking me about the book. Most of the time, people are curious about the blurb and what genre the book is. So, for everyone wondering what the book is all about and where to find it, this post is for you!

Blurb

Kaidan Tadegan is working on a new site trying to prove the myth that two armies of the gods clashed there. While on the dig site, he discovers the evidence he’s looking for, but he gets more than he bargained for when he discovers a woman’s bones in a section of the dig site where no other remains have been found.

As he digs the bones out, he discovers a journal with the woman’s body, which tells a story that, if true, will turn the myths of the old world and the established concepts of good and evil on their heads. Startled by the find, Kaidan sets out to discover whether the diary’s claims have any validity.

But when the diary leads to a city that’s supposedly long gone, Kaidan’s journey becomes more difficult than expected. Things become even more tangled when he discovers that the city isn’t gone, but it’s no place for the living.

Unable to give up on his quest, he forges ahead. What lies ahead is uncertain, and even more uncertain is whether Kaidan will survive this quest. He has only two questions in his mind. Will he find the truth in this city of the dead? And will the world accept the truth?

Excerpt

Chapter One: Dubarin Hill

KAIDAN Tadegan straightened for a moment, pausing in his work. He wiped the sweat from his brow and craned his neck to see over the hill’s rise. The rest of the dig crew was still working on the opposite side of the hill. Stretching, he picked his shovel back up and returned to digging into the side of Dubarin Hill.

He worked with fervor but also with care, not wanting to damage anything. The sun glared down on him, roasting him alive, and he wiped the back of his neck with a cloth. Nothing had rewarded him for his labor yet, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t. Perhaps he might find something on this side of the hill to answer the questions they’d come here to answer.

He took a deep breath, the musty scent of freshly turned soil filling his senses. Well, even if they never determined whether those who had clashed here were the old gods, they’d at least proven that there had been a battle. That was something. They could hold their heads high when they spoke to the king of Argos about the dig, and when they returned to the Society of the Learned, they’d have something to report.

The hole he was digging had turned into an open-roofed tunnel that sloped gradually downward as he went. Perhaps he’d gone a bit overboard. But he had a good feeling about this area. He could just sense it in his bones. There was something here. He just had to find it.

At around seven feet down into the side of the hill, his shovel struck something with a dull thud. He tested the soil with the tip of the shovel, trying to determine what it was. When he shifted some more dirt, he saw a flash of white under the sun. More bones?

Kaidan knelt in the hole and brushed the loose layer of dirt away. The yellow-white bones of a corpse glared up at him in the harsh rays of the sun, dirt still packed around the majority of the remains. He hadn’t found any bones on this side of the hill, and he’d begun to think the battle hadn’t raged this far. Perhaps they just hadn’t dug in the right places. It seemed they’d given up too soon.

 Kneeling, he brushed the dirt away and grabbed a trowel, gently clearing packed clods of dirt and loose soil away from the corpse. When he had, he backed further up the slope and sat on his heels, staring down at it.

Inside the tunnel, the bones rested. Time and worms had rotted through the clothing of the deceased individual. The slender facial structure of the skull and the tiny stature indicated it was a woman. He frowned. Who is this? They hadn’t found any women’s corpses in the battlefield. What was this one doing all by herself out here?

A book lay locked against the corpse’s chest, her skeletal hands clutching it to her even in the rigor of death. He leaned down, seeking to pry it from the hands of the skeleton. The hands wouldn’t budge. Strange. The tendons were long gone. Nothing should be stopping him from moving the bones. Kaidan put his hands on his hips. Well, destroying the corpse wouldn’t do. Too disrespectful to the dead. He’d have to try a different angle. Jumping down into the hole again, he tried to slide the book out of the corpse’s grasp.

This time, the hands relinquished their prize, and he stared down at the book’s unmarked leather cover, which was worn with age and crusted in dirt. A quiver ran through him, and he grinned. What treasures of knowledge did this find contain? He took a closer look at it, rubbing at the dirt on the corners before pausing in his attempts to clean the item. The leather binding was in remarkable condition for the age of the corpse.

He glanced back at the bones. Far too old for the condition of the book. So how had the skeleton come to be clutching the book in the tight grip of death? He clambered back up to the mouth of his open-roofed tunnel and sat down, dropping the book beside him. What secrets did the skeleton hold that she would never share now? His mind whirred through the possibilities, and he glanced down at the book. Perhaps it held the answers.

With his pulse racing, he flipped open the cover and began fingering through the book, which seemed to be a diary of some sort. The book’s pages were stuck together with time and a dark brown substance, though they yielded with some gentle prying. Upon closer examination, he realized it looked much like dried blood. What had he stumbled across? Hopefully, nothing accompanied by a curse. He never knew with old artifacts, and he’d run into some strange things before.

“Kaidan? Kaidan, what are you doing over here?”

Kaidan looked up to find Zerua strolling down the hill toward him. Unable to contain the excitement, he jumped to his feet and waved to his wife, a grin spreading across his face. “Zer, look what I found!” He pointed to the grave site and waved the book.

She rushed to see, a smile lighting up her gray eyes. “What is it?”

“I think it’s some sort of burial site.” He crouched down on the edge of the pit he’d ended at and set the book down between them. “It’s the first woman we’ve found buried here.”

“Any clues as to why she was buried here?” She knelt beside him and stared at the bones.

He shook his head and sat back on his heels. His attention returned to the book. “Not yet. Let’s take a look at this book though. She was holding it.”

Zerua reached out to touch the book lying on the grassy hillside, brushing her fingers over the ancient leather. “This is in awfully fair condition for being buried thousands of years ago.”

“Outside maybe. I opened it briefly a moment ago, and it looks like there’s dried blood caked to it. It’ll be a wonder if we can get pages apart to read any of it.” He settled cross-legged on the ground beside his wife and pulled the book into his lap. “Let’s see what we have here…”

He eased the cover open, minding the brittle crackling of the paper as he did. The scent of iron still lingered on the pages, and he frowned, flipping past the first empty page to look at the next. “There’s writing on this one.”

His wife leaned over his shoulder, pointing to the flaking black-brown substance. “Seems strange that this substance on the pages didn’t render it illegible.”

“It’s strange that the book is still intact at all.” He stared at the first words on the page. “These are in an old form of Wyrdhan.”

“Can you read it?” She rested her chin on his shoulder.

He bit his lip and stared at the words for a moment longer before reading what he felt was the best translation. “Sedra cannot be trusted. She has lied to them all, but they do not know the extent to which she has deceived them.” His gaze lifted to meet his wife’s wide-eyed stare. “What have we found?”

Pre-order the e-book at Kobo

Order the Kindle version on Amazon. The paperback will release on July 31st.