Daniel J. James

Excerpt from the book: My father’s mother always said I am the perfect mingling of my parents. Her dark hair and eyes. His curls and wide nose. Her full lips and high cheek bones. His smile and grimace. Though even I’d have to admit that I look more like Dad than Mom. I and my family are theoarm; a race of beings that look human but are different in so many ways. Aside from our noticeably pointed ears, what makes us different is that we are stronger, faster, our senses and reflexes are keener, we heal from sickness and injury incredibly fast, and we live far longer and age far slower. All this is for one purpose. To hunt and kill monsters. When we are born we go through a christening ceremony in which we are given our first earthly possession, a weapon, usually a sword. Every weapon has a name, and the ones that are not a hand me down are sometimes given a name along with the child during the christening, other times by the child themselves when they are older. Grandmother named my sword Shallow Cry because she said when I was born I didn’t scream, I just whimpered softly. She always said that she’d been waiting for me since before my parents even met, and that I had a mark on my head before I was even born, because I was to be christened under a lunar eclipse. Every shadow beast, demon, ghoul and nightmare that walked the earth at the time wanted me dead. Grandmother would say: “They wanted you, they wanted the sword, and they wanted to stop your christening. They would take no chance on another Iago Donavan, or Halo Sky being created. But our people would not let a child such as you come to be harmed. We all wanted nothing more than to keep you safe. We must have killed more monsters the day you were born and in the months leading up to it, than we had in several years before.” At that point my interest in my Grandmother’s retelling of my birth would always fade, and I’d almost demand to hear more about Iago Donavan and his sword the Halo Sky. “Iago, was unarguable the greatest theoarm to ever live. It’s said that after his birth, he and his sword were christened under the solar eclipse, the halo in the sky, which is where his sword derived its name. His birth wasn’t much unlike yours. They say he and his family were hunted by shadow creatures until only he and one other blood relative survived. Iago was blessed by the halo