Jessica Hale: Unspoken (Preview)

JESSICA HALE: UNSPOKEN

  JAIE CAVELL

  The tragic loss of her sister sends a young Jessica’s world spiralling towards disaster. Alone and missing her guiding light, she must search the realm for the illusive Benton twins whom are foretold to be the key to unlocking her future. The shift in power from the changing of the throne welcomes a foreboding darkness and forces Jessica to face her fears and make a choice – conquer or be destroyed. With all odds against her and death breathing down her neck, it will be a ride to remember.

  -PREFACE-

  Fyeria was the embodiment of the ideal Clavine; she was beautiful, intelligent, kind-hearted and most importantly pure blooded. Of all the clans, Clavines were considered the most desirable for their pure blood as it heightens natural abilities and allows for faster development and growth. Any dilutions to the Clavine blood could produce a number of side effects, the most common being a boost to one’s power but a lessening in control. Under the rule of Tservin, king of the Clavine, any crossbred Clavine’s were viewed as inferior and would never hold a position in society above that of a slave. As a crossbreed’s power was unpredictable at best, any crossbreeds known to the realm were turned over to the palace for binding and then assigned to a family for their life of servitude. Tservin believed the importance of a pure blood line over that of anything else, rewarding his kind for keeping his belief alive and shunning any who went against his system. The shunned were sent outside the palace borders and left to fend for themselves. Only a small percentage would be lucky enough to find another clan whom would accept them as their own; leaving the others to die. Outside of the palace borders, only two clans were as well established as the Clavine – the Djinnae and the Haerth’ns.

  Every five hundred years the throne is allowed to cycle to a clan worthy of its rule. The new ruling clan’s largest dwelling would become the realm’s palace and all those in the realm would feel the new ruler’s commands. Any who opposed the shift would be forced either into servitude or would be declared an enemy of the realm. The most recent shift of the throne from Tservin to Draevina, queen of the Djinnae, had seen a change never before witnessed; the old ruler’s commands completely obliterated. Draevina destroyed the walls isolating the three main clans and made it regulation to crossbreed. Many Clavine nobles were executed if Draevina deemed them to be too influential against her purpose – to use the crossbred infants to birth a new age of power.

 

  -Alone-

  Packing her bag for what felt like the millionth time, Jessica Hale looked out through the open window and breathed in the salty air that surrounded her. It was times like this, when everything seemed so right in the world, that she wondered what life would be like if her family was still with her. Jessica liked to think that her parents would be proud of her, but she knew her father would never approve of her or anything she did. To him, she was the daughter who was never capable of proving herself or becoming anything. She paled in comparison to her older sister, Fyeria, in every comparable way; she was the family secret – the crossbreed in the cupboard. Even though Tservin’s rule was over and his commands obliterated, her family still stood as a proud and pure Clavine family. Sure, it was thought that young Miarie D’Allaen would become the most powerful of the sisters because of her tainted blood but the supposed power never came. Miarie was the powerless one, only useful as a servant – which she became when Fyeria was ascended by the academy council.

  Fyeria’s ascension came as a surprise to none, from day one of her enrolment at the academy she exuded excellence and surpassed her classmates in no time. When Fyeria wasn’t at the academy she would wait until their parents were preoccupied and whisk the younger Miarie out through the kitchen door and down to the riverbank. Out under the shade from the dense vines Fyeria would try and teach Miarie some of the things that she had learnt at the academy. This way was very much a new concept to Miarie as the only teachings she had experienced were the ones that their father had previously tried before getting frustrated at her lack of progress and stunning ability to fail at nearly everything he taught her. With Fyeria the lessons were different; she would never get frustrated with Miarie and actually observed her to see where she was going wrong. With Fyeria’s secret lessons Miarie actually started developing her powers and after a few months of the lessons she started being able to see new potentials within old skills.

  The crashing waves bought her back to herself. She glanced down at her hands, bound in wraps and hidden under her worn gloves. The memories of her cradling her sister’s head in them made them feel heavy. The night flashed vividly back to her; she saw herself sitting in Fyeria’s dressing room before the ceremony started. Fyeria looked as beautiful as a proper Clavine bride should be, her vibrant scarlet hair done up in an intricate knot before falling down her back in cascading waves. The strapless gown’s pleated bodice fitted Fyeria like a glove before it transitioned to a silk waterfall and pooled at her heels. A knock at the door had Miarie jumping up to answer it, but it flew off its hinges faster than she could get to it. In the doorway was Fyeria’s soon to be Haerth’n husband. They had already lost their parents half a year prior in what was officially ruled as an accident but what they knew to be a result of Draevina’s will to have only mixed couplings. Fyeria had sacrificed her free will to save them both of an unknown fate should they have been surrendered to Draevina’s palace as orphans of the realm. As a crossbreed of her capabilities, Miarie would have been kept for Draevina’s personal court and would not have had a choice but to obey Draevina’s every command. Knowing what would happen of her sister, Fyeria had accepted the next proposal which came her way; that of Haerth’n born Marcoff. Haerth’n born were most renowned for their brutish abilities and stature, making it surprising when he disappeared from the doorway to be holding a twisted blade to Fyeria’s throat. His grey eyes held Miarie’s bright green ones in a stand-off; he dared Miarie to save her knowing she wouldn’t be fast enough. In not even enough time to blink, Fyeria’s head was separated from her body, changing the pool of white silk to crimson. Marcoff crouched next to her fallen body, rocked backed to his heels and grinned at Miarie.

  In the space of a heartbeat Miarie was on top of Marcoff, riding his chest to the floor with her palms gripping his head between them. She felt the burning from her palms before she heard his agonized scream and closed her eyes before she heard the audible bang. Miarie opened her eyes as she removed her knees from Marcoff’s chest. With tears glistening in her eyes she ran over to where Fyeria lay on the stained tiles. She picked up her sister’s head and cradled it on her lap, the scarlet hair falling in a pile off of her knee. The tears ran down her face as the sobs racked her body. She curled up onto the floor and disappeared inside of herself.

  That was the day that she knew that everything that the Clavine stood for – purity, unity and justice no longer applied in this new world. Miarie was now alone, with Fyeria now gone she was totally devoid of all family and friends, all of whom had been taken from her over the years. She was lost, another victim of the darkness which began to seep into the realm once Draevina had claimed the throne.

  Miarie stilled her sobbing as she felt the darkness stalk into the room. The footsteps thumped towards her and paused in front of her face. The hot breathing warmed her neck as she focused the energy pumping through her veins into her hands. Her palms were still burning from the moment of Fyeria’s death and the extra energy would have started building their pulsating glow. The darkness lifted its head from near her neck; she heard the wet slithering of its tongue across its lips before it mashed its jaw. Not knowing what its gaze was fixed upon didn’t matter as she rushed forward, grabbed hold of a leg with her pulsat
ing palms and twisted the body, using her own momentum to throw it into the floor. She heard the surprised “oompf” escape its lips and she threw her eyes open. The silver skin gave the body away as a lesser from the Djinnae clan. She released a hand from its leg and peered down at where her hand had been – nothing, not even a scorch mark. What the hell was this creature; nothing had ever escaped the effects of her burning palms before without even a small scorch mark. The creature flipped beneath her, throwing her flat onto her back and jumped on top of her. It breathed its hot breath onto her face and sent her stomach churning, its breath smelt like a mixture of burning corpses and rot. Its grin took up its whole face as its eyes drank her in. A drop of its saliva dropped onto her face, scorching her skin in a trail down her cheek before it dropped to the floor. She felt her cheek numb and froze; she tried to recall something of use from Fyeria’s many secret lessons but drew only a single word – Djinn. She stared up at it, now known to her as a Djinn, a malicious underling of the Djinnae born. The thing kept grinning down at her as it shifted its weight to straddle her body, pinning her down further.

  The sensation of her hips being crushed into the floor awoke something deep inside her, an instinct of sorts akin to what had helped her slaughter Marcoff. She bucked her hips, forcing its body off of her and over her head and raised her arms up to cover her face as she slid out from under its body in one fluid movement. She didn’t give the Djinn a moment of thought as she knocked the air out of it by landing on its back. She used her knee to force its head into the floor, wanting to avoid the pleasure of more of its acid-like saliva. Her eyes darted quickly around her, looking for a weapon as her palms apparently had no effect on it. She remembered the blade which had taken the last piece of her world from her; she sighted it above the Djinn’s head and made a grab for it. The Djinn’s arm snapped up and dug its razor claws into her forearm. She screamed out in pain as what felt like venom ripped through her arm. Her internal heat reacted with its venom and responded with what felt like explosions throughout her arm, losing any external sensations to her arm. The Djinn rasped out a strained laugh under the pressure of her weight on its back. The laugh motivated her back towards her goal of reaching the knife. She shifted her weight and leapt towards the knife, tearing her forearm open when the Djinn’s claws were still embedded. Light headedness briefly seized her as blood splashed the floor and the Djinn from her gaping wound. She saw the Djinn’s eyes widen and slightly cloud over in response to the fresh blood spilt and used the temporary daze to snatch the knife up.

  She staggered to her knees, releasing its head and plunged the knife into its throat as far as she could. She felt the tip break through a spinal cord and through the soft flesh at the nape of its neck. She slumped forward, her burnt cheek hitting the cool tiles first. The impact knocked her eyes closed as she felt her body begin to shut down from the loss of blood. The sensations of her body began to ebb away as her arm reduced to a dull ache, almost feeling as if it was just a memory. It was in this moment that the young Miarie D’Allaen decided if she survived this then she would transform herself into the saviour that the realm needed; she would become a beacon of hope, a symbol of strength and unity, she would become… Jessica Hale.