A Virtual FantasyCon Participant: Excerpts by Author Mark McQuillen
Strong Language
Confrontation..From Legends IV...😛
"How do you know she's not here? Why do you get to feel her, and I can't? She's my fucking mate!" He shouted, and went back to hauling off and smashing rocks.
Malice had to stop to think about that question for a moment as she watched Nyx move another boulder; and another. Five, maybe six more, tossing them behind him, barely missing the lot of them.
"Hey, we're trying to help ye, asshole!" Jack protested barely sidestepping the last one.
When Nyx picked up the another, Malice's hand came up with a burst of violet light, pieces of rock rained down on him. The Demon turned so fast, hissing at her like he was possessed.
"Oh shit." She heard Jack gasp.
"Move!" Morgan called out as another large rock sailed in their direction.
The three of them scattered and Malice blinked out of the way, leaving the boulder to crash into a tree nearby.
"Nyx, you stupid bastard! I don't know why I can feel her and you can't; and neither do they!"
The Demon gave a snarl of frustration as he rushed the Valkyrie, but she spun like a toreador in a bullring, then blinking a few feet away with her back against a tree.
"Nyx, stop it!” She warned him, her eyes darting to Kember in an attempt to focus her thoughts. “This is your last chance." She added, looking back with a calm about her.
"You, don't get to give me ultimatums!" He growled back at her, a lunged yet another rock in her direction.
Malice had had enough. If the asshole wanted to play hard ball, then so be it. "You asked for it!" She let out, as his fist came flying at her face.
Like two waves in a storm, they crashed into one another, and Malice managed to flip the Demon over her back and sent him flying into the rock he'd just thrown. It took a moment for his head to stop spinning, but when his mind had stopped, his target was clear as day and panting through labored breaths in front of him.
"Don't do this!" Malice cautioned him, but again he growled at her and set off once more. "Fuck!" She hissed, ducking and rolling to one side as the Demon came to a halt.
"You like to play games?" He snarled, and then laughed when the adrenaline took over.
"Not too into getting my ass handed to me by a madman!" Malice huffed, annoyed that it had come to this. “You're insane!”
The pompous windbag was making it difficult for anyone to get shit done. What was it going to take to make the bastard heel long enough to get him back to the Null?
Malice braced for the next attack, her fists flying. It was all she could to block is attacks, and then came the blow to her nose. She rolled with it, circling about as her hand assessed the damage; only to come away bloody. Wiping her hand, but not her face, she waited for the next attack; her growl catching everyone's attention.
"Shit, this is gonna leave a mark." Jack said as he watched Malice's hand ball into a fist, hauling back as Nyx rushed her.
A brilliant flash of blue and green light exploded from somewhere behind her, dropping the Demon like he'd been poleaxed. It took her a moment, looking at her own fists, not even a remnant of magic sizzling in her palm. It hadn't come from her..
“Uh, Malice?” She heard Jack blurt out, and she spun round to see Kember, and the same blue green flames covering her outstretched fingers.
“Holy Mother of all the Gods!” Jack finished, his mouth open wide in awe. “What the bloody hell just happened?”
“That wasn't in the archives!” Morgan let out, shaking his head in wonder. “That was amazing!”
Malice stood there, surprised but proud, and blew her lover a kiss. Kember had saved her, and rendered the Demon unconscious. “Thank you!” Malice smiled at her.
“Always!” Kember smiled back, letting the Witchfire diminish as Malice knelt down beside Nyx.
“You bloody fool!” She sighed, and reached for him, hauling him up and onto her shoulders."You got off easy, asshole!"
All about me
by Mark McQuillen
I was born on Maelstrom AFB in Great Falls Montana. I have lived all over the world being a military brat and also with my own twenty years of service in the Air Force. I was in the air and sea rescue with 179 jumps. I have lived in most of Europe and Japan and spent a year in the USSR. Most of my family lives in Webster City, Iowa. I currently live with my wife and the puppies in Pueblo Colorado.
After retiring from the Air Force as a Tech Sargent. I went to work in customer service for AOL and other service providers in tech support. I was a computer geek before it was the cool thing to do. I really enjoyed my job. I liked being on the phone in customer service.
I began my journey in writing as a way to relieve stress. I was diagnosed with Degenerative Disc Disease and had to be fused from my waist to my tailbone. It took eight pounds of titanium to do this with. Unable to work a regular job I started writing Tolkien fan fiction on a site called the One Ring. As soon as I wrote the first few sentences I was hooked. I did this for four years before I started
Darkness Awaits.
Darkness Awaits.
My inspiration for Darkness Awaits is a picture I have of a cloaked figure of a woman with a sword. I had been playing around with the idea when I saw this picture. 45,270 words later Darkness Awaits was finished. Two of my Valkyrie characters Mist and Malice came from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. I based my main male character Gil after my father and myself as well as guys I served with. PTSD is a very real very horrible thing for anyone to go through writing Gil and Jack Swanson as your typical GI’s that suffer from PTSD was a way for me to cope with my own battle with it.
As of now I have ideas for five maybe six books in the Valkyrie Darkness Series. I have another series in the works with Jessica Wren and Mara Reitsma called the Queen of Winter. It is being written solely in character over Facebook messenger. It has been a pretty crazy experience we have had times where we have written twenty-six pages in forty eight hours then have a lull then off we go again. It is all about coordinating the right times to be able to work. I also have a book called Distorted Pasts that was released on Sept. 30th 2017 written with Mara Reitsma.
If you like what you have seen and would like to learn more stalk me in the following places.
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