Sunday, September 8, 2024

Sunday Snippet: Illustrious Curse (a Lantern Jack tale)

As usual, we're having bizarre weather. Got hot again then a stormfront moved through and now we're back down to the sixties. I'm not complaining about the cooler temperatures or anything, but I'd rather stick with one range for longer than a week.

Still loaded up with work projects and I'm making solid progress on all of them. Sometimes it's like spinning plates and trying to keep them all going at the same rate, but I love the variety of the stuff I'm working on right now.

Not a bad week for viewing television. I did the taking a break from wall-to-wall words thing again and got pretty much a full round of shows in this week.

Started off with Best in Paradise and enjoyed the rewatch of "Dark Memories." I have one more episode left for this series then I'll be switching over to Beyond Paradise. I'm looking forward to starting that one.

Caught another episode of Death in Paradise with the ninth season premiere. I think this is Jack's last season and the new guy takes over for the next one. Enjoyed the episode a lot.

Watched another episode of Elementary and enjoyed it. Not a huge Moriarity fan, but I like the layers and back and forth between Holmes and Watson with Moriarity.

Finished up the third season of The Batman and I'm getting ready to start the fourth. I honestly can't remember if I ended up liking the fourth season or not.

Also caught an episode of Classic Rugrats and the three vignettes were ones I don't remember seeing before so nice to have something new to me.

That's pretty much it for the life update this week. Tonight's post is from Illustrious Curse, a Lantern Jack novella.

Here's the miniblurb:

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 jerked in his sleep and woke up, a piece of the tattered parchment stuck to his face. "Damn." He carefully peeled the milled page from his skin. "Gotta be more careful." The files were the only thing he had to go on if he had any chance to figure out how to remove the horrible hex on his family bloodline.
"You're not going to find the answers you want in those old pages."
Taben startled at the voice coming from the corner of the table. Then he blinked, not at all certain he hadn't lost his mind. A grizzled-looking carved pumpkin stared back at Taben. Pumpkin? Shit. The lightbulb went off in Taben's mind then just as quickly went off.
He shook his head. "No. No way." His gaze went back to the creepy gourd. "Tell me you're not my cursed ancestor Lantrien Jacquard, the dethroned goblin king."
The pumpkin wobbled back and forth. "You already know I am. And I go by Lantern Jack now. I no longer use my former name." Jack edged closer to the scattered papers on the table. "You won't find the answers you seek, because you're missing more than a few pages."
Taben breathed out on a long exhale. "Then fill me in. What do I have to do to remove the stench of your misdeeds?" He cocked his head. "Wait. You're the one who's been healing rifts, aren't you?" Maybe things would actually get better now.
Jack rolled back and forth. "Don't get ahead of yourself. I've done penance and, yes, I've healed old wounds, but the final chapter has yet to be written." He paused and shrank in on himself a little. "I can't interfere with you as much as I did the others."
Taben jerked his chin up. "Because we're the same bloodline?" It would make sense, based on what he'd read so far.
Jack wobbled again. "That's the main issue. But there's another one." He moved to the parchment and nudged it closer to Taben. "The missing pieces are the key. And you don't have them."
Taben sighed. "Okay, where can I find them and what, exactly, am I looking for?" At this point, he'd scale mountains to get what he needed.
Jack snorted. "You don't need to climb anything. You have to go down. Deep in the archives." He paused again. "And I can't tell you, exactly, what you're looking for, but you'll know when you find it…" He trailed off.
Taben met his ancestor's gaze. "How?" Murky answers annoyed the hell out of him.
Jack's mouth thinned to a straight line. "Because you're looking for the murderers responsible for my queen's death." In a blink, he disappeared from the table.
Taben sucked in a harsh breath. "Well, fuck." No pressure or anything then.
Rising from his chair, he headed for his room. He'd throw some clothes in a bag and pack up some food and head for the archives.
"Nothing like crawling around in a huge crypt … especially close to All Hallow's."

 

This will be the end cap to the Lantern Jack series and I'm excited to get this one finished up.


 

That's it for this week.

Cheers!

Skye

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