Rynlee's Song (Daughter of Time, #1) by Eliza Marie Jones

Rynlee stood in the middle of a battlefield, with bodies lying mangled all around her; the bloody light of a full crimson moon lit the scene with a gruesome integrity. Moans of anguish from the dying and a pregnant silence from the dead met her ears. The smell of it all nearly made her gag; decaying flesh with mud and smoke filled her lungs.

Description:

Rynlee Nalis is a demon hunter. She is a Purator, belonging to an organization who slay demons to serve their King. Even though she’s a candidate to succeed the High Purator, eighteen-year-old Rynlee doesn’t want the responsibility.

Her entire world is turned upside down when Jeynen shows up at the temple that is her school and home. She thought he died five years ago.

And he has no idea who she is.

When an assassin comes for Jeynen and he manages to flee for his life, Rynlee rushes after him. As she tries to discover the truth about him, she stumbles onto an ancient prophecy and challenges those who want to destroy the balance of magic.

Book Playlist

While writing Rynlee’s Song, I mainly listened to songs with lyrics, but after discovering the inspiration of trailer and instrumental music, I only write to songs without lyrics. Here are a few of my favorites (with and without lyrics) that I’ve been listening to for editing Rynlee’s Song and writing the sequel, Rynlee’s Father:

Let Me Go – Avril Lavigne ft. Chad Kroeger 

Heroes and Thieves – Vanessa Carlton 

Clarity – Zedd (especially the Sam Tsui and Kurt Schneider cover) 

Beating Heart – Ellie Goulding 

Hold Me Now – Red 

Dark Side – Kelly Clarkson

Kaine (Salvation) – NieR Soundtrack 

Autumn Love – Thomas Bergersen 

Requiem – Jeffrey Hayat 

He Who Brings the Night – 2 Steps From Hell 

I Love You Forever – 2 Steps From Hell 

Blu-Bird – NieR Soundtrack 

Akatsuki Tsukiyo (Day Breakers) (Orchestra version, instrumental) – Gackt

EXCERPT

Only a faint echo of boots on stone warned Sariel of the approaching guards. He climbed down too quickly, ignoring the pain in his leg as he fell most of the way down. He was lying on his back as before when they opened his cell door. Sariel slowly turned his head to look up, his heart secretly pounding, the only thing that would give away he hadn’t just been lying on the ground all day.

Three guards entered in with a smaller, slumped form hidden beneath a uniform gray prison cloak. Sariel got to his feet then, curious whom the poor soul was they’d brought in. From his size, Sariel thought the prisoner must be just a boy. Whoever it was couldn’t be tall enough to be older than eight or ten years old. The guards said nothing as they pulled the mysterious figure into the cell by chains around his neck and wrists. Sariel noticed the chains were made of solid gold.

He realized with deep sadness how silent the prisoner was. Had he been through so much that he’d lost the desire or ability to speak up at all? Sariel watched as the guards dragged the boy into the middle of the cell, directly in front of Sariel.

“Hold out your left arm.” The guard ordered. Sariel hesitated, unsure whom the guard was talking to. The guard reached out and took a hold of Sariel’s arm, holding it out to the other prisoner. The cloak still hid his face.

Without any order from the guards, the prisoner pulled back the cloak hood and looked up at Sariel with one piercing eye. The left eye bore scars across the sealed eyelid, and the other was a brilliant orange color except for the white of the eye. There was no pupil. The facial features and long, white-blond hair made Sariel realize the prisoner was a girl.

****

One of the men across the room banged his recently emptied tankard on the table and yelled, “Another!” nearly startling Rynlee out of her seat. Another man laughed, noticing her jump.

Everyone here was likely living a life without magic, she realized. What would it be like, to not fight for a living, or to never experience the power within oneself? Rynlee knew most humans weren’t born with magic, but then, she hadn’t developed her own until her teens.

She blew on her hot soup when it came, and took a big bite of a chewy bun filled with nuts and dates, a favorite of hers.

After eating, it was a short walk over to the house Draeger shared with his sister. Rynlee stopped by the garden in the front – now filled with sun-scorched remnants of plants already harvested – and took a deep breath. The smell of wood and salt-dried meat was just as she remembered. As she walked up to the front door to knock, it felt like she was returning home.

A boy answered the door and looked at her for a moment, until he recognized her. “Rynlee!”

“Hi, Kallan. You’ve gotten so tall since I left!” Rynlee ruffled his hair. “Is your uncle home?”

“Yeah,” Kallan opened the door wider and moved to let her in. Draeger was standing with his back to her, talking to his sister Avael about something in a hushed voice.

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About the author:

This is the website of author Eliza Marie Jones. I’m a writer, gardener, nail polish junkie, and artist. I live with my husband in Alberta, Canada. I took website programming and graphic design in college, which comes in very handy doing all the non-writing parts of being an author.

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