Sunday, September 9, 2018

Sunday Snippet: The Illustrious Curse (A Lantern Jack tale)

Well, September is off to a bumpy start. Not in a bad way, more like a "here are some changes, let's see how you like them" kind of thing. So far… meh… I'm not a big fan. LOL

Got some solid television viewing in. I'm still not back to the usual schedule, but I'm getting there. Right in time for the new seasons to start.

Last week, I caught Chicago Fire and I'm almost at the end of season six. Also caught another episode of Luke Cage and a few episodes of Classic Who. I also watched the second episode of Driven from Passionflix.

Started Penny Dreadful and wow, not at all what I expected and better than I thought it would be. Looking forward to more of this show.

Caught another episode of Killjoys and, seriously, I love this show so much!! The banter is sheer perfection and the complicated relationships are awesome. I got another episode of The Dresden Files in and caught a couple of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries. Followed that up with Canal Road. I have two episodes left of this one and I'm still not one hundred percent sure if I've called the killer of Spence's wife. Guess I'll find out soon.

Watched another series thirteen episode of Midsomer Murders and followed that with Babylon 5 and The Sarah Conner Chronicles. I also watched a marathon of Hallmark Channel's The Good Witch movies.

All in all, not a bad week for television. Tonight's post is from The Illustrious Curse, a Lantern Jack Short and probably the final book in the series.

Here's the mini-blurb:

Lantern Jack is back to right his final wrong. Inara Ives is a distant descendant of Jack's wife, the former banshee queen. Her royal blood is diluted, but still strong. Taben Tarrah can trace his ancestry back to the cursed goblin king, Lantrien Jacquard, but his noble blood is tainted by the lineage. Jack brings the two together to finally put his past to rest and join his deceased bride in the afterlife. The duo won't make it easy… but Jack's success over the years means he won't be thwarted.

And a preview snippet…

Taben Tarrah slammed his hand on the table. "Dammit! I knew there was a deep, dark secret in our past." His mother's recent death finally allowed him access to the twisted, terrible tale.
I carry the tainted blood of the freaking cursed goblin king.
No wonder the family's fortunes always turned on a dime. "And usually for the worse." Taben snorted. "Every damn time."
Lantrien Jacquard. Taben traced the name on the document. The last king of the goblins. Jeez, Taben had grown up with the stories of how Jacquard went mad when his wife died. No… the banshee queen had been murdered. Retaliation, so the story went.
Rising, Taben paced the length of the kitchen in the house he'd grown up in. "At least shit makes sense now." The way life got great then ended up trashed beyond all recognition. "My great-great-great-however many damn greats-gramps fucked us all over."
Okay, Jacquard didn't really do the fucking over. Circumstances beyond his control pushed fate in a terrible direction. His grief tipped the scales further and he descended into madness, disrupting the balance between the netherworld factions, creating chaos with his royal power. When the ruling court finally caught up with him, they stripped him of his power, banished him from his kingdom, and cursed him to never join his beloved queen in the afterlife.
Pausing, Taben went back to the table. "So, how did that work?" Cursed to do what?
He rifled through the yellowed pages in the tattered files. There had to be something, information about what the curse entailed. Surely the ruling court didn't mean for the goblin king's line to forever pay the price for his misdeeds.
Taben sighed. "Or maybe they did. It's been centuries and every generation since Jacquard's reign seems doomed to fail." Never to achieve more than fleeting moments of good fortune.
Settling back in the chair, Taben's brain spun with too many thoughts. A recent shift had taken place. Former enemies had become allies. Warring factions set aside differences and formed new bonds. The slow progression of healing rifts had a lot of people talking about the potential cause.
Taben shrugged. "Probably too much to hope for the goblins getting a break." After all, since the king's fall, the once majestic leaders had no one's trust.
Thanks a lot, Gramps.

Taben and Jack are going to be fun to write. Throw in Inara, who's not taking any of the males' posturing, and a new level of fun is achieved.



That's it for this week.

Cheers!


Skye

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