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A high fantasy story in just 1,000 words. Originally written for the Penprints Flash Fic Dash

Imperfect Expressions (Fiction Podcast) — S1E2 — "Sun Eater"

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Sci-fi zombies? Civil war? Undercover agents? Sign me up. ;)

Imperfect Expressions (Fiction Podcast) — S1E1 — "Small Hours"

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A Sweet Lie (on Wattpad) http://my.w.tt/UiNb/svplLsW2mF An imaginary friend, a lie, and a little girl's fate.

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Twitter can be confusing at first. It has a bit of a learning curve. To help you out, here is a simple check list of what I have learned and found to work.

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http://justbjordan.com/dear-mum-a-mothers-day-letter/

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http://justbjordan.com/oregon-native/

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Tip #1: When you wake up every morning decide what time that day you can set aside to write, and stick to it. This will go a long way toward getting that manuscript done.

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Giveaway for dark fantasy novel Never To Live.

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I received several gift cards for my birthday. Now I have a whole bunch of good books to add to my collection. 

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Here's a quick summary of what Goodreads is before we get started. Goodreads is like a giant Facebook for book-obsessed freaks. Yes, I just called myself a book-obsessed freak. I wear the title proudly. :)

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Never To Live: Part Sixteen

His hand gripped the knife, raising it. Elwyn did not move an eyelash. She could easily avoid that blade, but she would prefer not to make another enemy out of this man.

 “Who are you, and when did you come here, elf girl?” the man asked calmly, knife still posed and held loosely between his fingers. His voice was strongly accented, sounding old and foreign to her ears.

“My name is Elwyn,” she said, her naturally deep voice bouncing across the rippling water. “I do not know how I got here, or where this it.”

“You are in the outskirts of Arnon Marsh,” the man replied, his face perplexed.

“That would mean I am still in Elderinth,” Elwyn said to herself, still confused. Arnon marsh was a few weeks’ travels from the masters’ village. She’d never been here before.

A smirk broke through the man’s tense face. He slowly lowered the knife, inspecting her carefully. “What’s Elderinth? And who brought you over from the elves’ land? I was led to believe no more elves or mixed bloods would be here until the loxasta came again.” He still hadn’t moved from his stance over the deer.

Elwyn followed his lead and made no move to stand. He might not be a match for her, but her nerves told her he was dangerous. “I was born in Elderinth,” she said. “Two or three weeks’ travel northwest from here. I am a mixed blood. My father was human.”

“Truthfully? Strange, I didn’t know of any half breeds living farther north. You must not be in the registers then.”

“I thought I was the only half breed in Elderinth, and I have never heard of registers,” Elwyn said. Something was not right here. She could barely understand this man’s speech.

“Anyone with something other than human blood in their veins is listed in the registers. Follow me back to the village, when the loxasta arrive they will know who you are and where this Elderinth is. They are due any day.”

Elwyn stood cautiously, watching him. Perhaps she’d heard of him before. “What is your name?”

“Jairus, Jairus Vietorei.” He sheathed his knife in a crude leather pouch at his hip.

“Jairus, you said ‘loxasta’. What did you mean?” she said, unable to believe her own rising suspicions.

“loxasta, one of the oldest races.”

“Yes, but they were killed decades ago,” Elwyn said, firm. That race was gone. It vanished at the same time the world’s history came to an abrupt end, seemingly erased.

 Jairus smiled, looking confused. “The loxasta will know who you are. Come along, lost elfling.”

A chilling feeling that she would never see her home again ran over Elwyn’s skin and through her gut. She guessed that myth had been proven true.

She was no longer in her own time, but in the past.

Full book available at http://amzn.to/1jcEly8.

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Never To Live: Part Fifteen

Elwyn screamed. She kept screaming until she collapsed, exhausted, throat aching. She buried her face in her arms, not wanting to look at the images any more, blotting the sounds from her ears. Darkness encased her, and she knew the illusions were over. Elwyn sighed, shoulders slumping.

A young child began to sing nearby, breaking the silence. Elwyn raised her head, searching for him. This felt different from the other things she’d heard.

It was cold here, and she could not see or feel anything aside from herself again. The boy’s voice came closer, his song drifting to her. It sounded sad.

“Vines and swords, swords and vines,”the child sang, voice rising and falling. “Flames consume, chasing the eyes.” As if too sad to continue, he paused, and Elwyn trembled. She felt lost. “A dragon appears, swallows the sky.”

Elwyn’s back crashed into earth, pushing the breath out of her lungs. Sun shone through her closed lids. A bird chirped in rustling tree branches. A frog was croaking nearby. She felt tall, damp grass beneath her, and the scent of warm, wet water and mud was in the air. This was real.

Elwyn sat up slowly, almost too frightened to open her eyes after all the images that had just flashed before her. When she did, the world spun. Bright colors of green, blue, and brown watering together, then separating and becoming clear.

She was at a high point in a glade. Tall green grass waved in a breeze, and a thin layer of water covered the ground lower than where she was. Strange draping moss hung from the trees surrounding the area. She was in a marsh. There was no marsh near the masters’ village.

The animals that had been noisily filling the air with their cries fell silent, and Elwyn felt an undercurrent of fear from them. She pushed it away—she would not use the beast tongue again, not after what had happened that first time. Even without using it, she knew it wasn’t her presence silencing them. A large creature and a human were dashing into the glade. She heard them both burst into the area and fall to a halt.

Elwyn fell forward into the tall grass, hiding. For the moment, it did not matter where she was or how she had gotten there. She stared fearfully at the man several yards away. His clothes were made of buckskin, and he had long hair. A hide band was tied around his forehead, keeping the loose strands of his braid from falling into his face. He was tan, well built, and staring at her in shock, a bloodied knife in his hand and a seven point buck with a slit throat lying at his feet.

He did not seem like a normal human to her. He carried himself with the slinking gait of an elf, of a wild animal. Elwyn stared—the man was a mixed blood, like her. His eyes were one solid color, but the tips of his ever-so-slightly pointed ears held a bare hint of the same color as his eyes, and two small, dull fangs were visible in his parted mouth.

Full book available at http://amzn.to/1jcEly8.

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Never To Live: Part Fourteen

Elwyn’s surroundings shifted, light filtering into her view. She felt like she was floating, seeing but not feeling anything. The world became dull and grey, as if a storm were just ending. For as far as she could see in this new realm, the world was burned, not even cinders remaining. It was only rolling hills of drifting grey ash dancing on the still wind.

Elwyn noticed a girl standing among the ruined fields and hills. It was a young elf, her clean clothes out of place in the charcoaled scene. There was a large bird perched on her shoulder, its red, orange, yellow, and shining black feathers the only bright color Elwyn could see across the dull land. The girl’s face was blank, empty, gazing around the hills with a befuddled expression.

“What… happened?” the girl asked, eyes locking onto Elwyn in confusion.

Cold air rushed past, making Elwyn’s skin crawl and dragging the image away, replacing it with another. She shivered in the sudden frigidity, unable to stop staring at the new, frightening land.

Smoke drifted over everything, shadowing massive things sprouting from the earth and reaching up into the thick sky. Loud whistles and shrieks like nothing Elwyn knew split the air, and a sick, pungent smell clogged her nostrils and eyes, making her stomach churn.

The air vibrated, followed by a roar. Through the black smoke a large dragon appeared. He was rushing at her, jaws snapped open. Crouched on his back was an elf, roaring along with him, eyes flashing not two, but three colors.

Dragon and elf descended on her, and Elwyn screamed. That any being, even in an illusion, would touch a dragon’s stinking hide was sickening. They were selfish, vengeful, proud, and disgusting creatures—to avoid at any cost, and to kill when avoidance was impossible. Dragons were cursed beasts. The dark, rotting substance that oozed from their pores was evidence enough of that.

Elwyn felt she would vomit, and she could not yet even smell the stench she knew would be radiating from the thing’s twisted, knobby body. The dragon plummeted toward her—

And passed completely through her body. Elwyn blinked.

Yet another vision shimmered before her. Now she was in a stone room—and the dragon was gone. She shuddered in relief—the dragon was gone. In this room, children bent over parchment, scribbling away at an astonishing rate. Every one of them showed traces of elven blood, however small, and they all carried the two toned eye trait some elves possessed.

Bright light in dozens of colors filled the room. Elwyn threw an arm over her face, waiting in fear. When the color behind her eyelids faded to black she lowered her arm back to her side. She was standing outside an expansive and ornate building, completely unlike the huts and longhouses she knew. Directly in front of her was a slithering mass of many dragons, fighting amongst themselves on the earth, roaring and hissing like the beasts they were.

Full book available at http://amzn.to/1jcEly8.

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Never To Live: Part Thirteen

Elwyn flinched, already shaking her head.

But the woman didn’t stop talking. “Descend into insanity, nearly madness,” she said, “and find Heart. If you accept, Bledrin will find you, and he will try to kill you.”

Weaver was looking at her sadly now. Elwyn backed up, not going anywhere in the blank world. “Why should I agree to such a thing?” She yanked up her left sleeve, showing her shoulder. “When they saw this mark they called me ‘levki’. They called me a demon. I want no part in anything with demons.”

She let her sleeve fall, covering the dark purple mark on her upper arm. Weaver stepped forward, the sad look on her face gone.

“That is so all the others can find you in the end,” Weaver said, “and so you can find them.”

“Who? And I never accepted anything,” Elwyn said harshly. “So why did it begin to grow thirty five years ago?”

Weaver kept staring. “If you agree to my request you will save lives.”

Elwyn blinked. Was this woman trying to manipulate her? No, she thought, watching Weaver’s eyes. She was being completely honest. “How?”

“You will take on a burden so others won’t have to.” Weaver shifted, not looking at Elwyn anymore, but off into the black around them. “Many who would have otherwise died, won’t. But if you fail, even more than would have will die, and another will be asked to take your place.”

“Even if I succeed, some will die?” Elwyn said.

Weaver’s eyes snapped back to her. “Yes, you cannot take on everything.” She seemed to sigh before continuing. “But if you agree, you won’t be alone. We are bringing a few to be your verloir. They haven’t accepted yet, or even listened to the call, but they will at least arrive.”

Elwyn pushed away her growing fear and dread. She was scared but she wouldn’t watch more people die, not if she could prevent it. For once, she wanted to be the one who saved, not the one who destroyed. Was she willing to live a future worse than her past if it would make that happen? Elwyn took a breath to keep herself calm.

“I accept,” she said into the motionless air.

Weaver smiled for the first time, but it quickly faded. “Remember to remember,” she said. “The ones before you died because they forgot what they agreed to and why. They lost their purpose and couldn’t find it again.”

Elwyn didn’t think that would be hard to do, it seemed quite simple. Remembering was easy—it was forgetting that was hard.

“Back in that cave,” Weaver said, “what grabbed you was one of the scattered gates. It will take you to a new place. The sinril will hunt you when you return, and your trial will begin in one of their prisons. If you succeed, remember to find Bledrin.”

“You can use a gateway only twice more after this,” Weaver said, “so try to stay away from them or you could end up coming back too soon.” With that, Weaver turned, leaving her with a mind full of questions.

Full book available at http://amzn.to/1jcEly8.