BLURB
Jak Barley, Private Inquisitor,
is tired of adventures and is ready to take on only hum-drum cases offering no
drama–those of missing husbands, unfaithful spouses, or fat merchants paying
well for outing thieving employees–anything not involving traveling, swords, or
the darker magics.
Yet once again his otherworldy
friend, Lorenzo Spasm, drags him into cases involving corrupt CIA (Clandestine
Information Authority) agents, murderous bank robbers, nasty goblins, furious
dragon chases, demonic foes, and going uncover at an elders’ RW (recreational
wagon) park set atop a butte overlooking a harsh desert floor. To top it off,
Jak finds himself the quarry of the Assassin’s Guild after an anonymous
adversary takes out a whack contract on him.
Helping him get through this will
be his intended, the beautiful witchling in training, Morgana.
EXCERPT
“What-t-t-t?” I
managed to croak in answer to the incessant hammering on my sleeping room door.
I keep it bolted along with several magical wards after a number of tedious
attempts upon my life by diabolical assassins, blood-thirsty necromancers, and
numerous bat-turd crazy priests and neophytes of ancient and deranged deities.
Other than that, my life is fairly normal.
I am back to
yawn-inducing cases dealing with unfaithful spouses, stolen silverware, and
runaway teensters—and I intend to keep it that way. You will not be kidnapped
by piss dragons for investigating a horse theft, hounded by nasty wizards over
a missing spouse case, nor forced to traipse through monster-laden wastelands
to answer a simple paternity question. I now choose my private inquisitor cases
wisely in my hometown of Duburoake, and again, that means no adventures. I hate
adventures.
“Come on Jak,
open up.”
What kind of
hedge-born miscreant would be trying to wake a person this early in the morn?
“Jak, it’s
almost afternoon. Open up, you dipsomaniac.”
“Ugh-h-h,” was
all my dry throat could sound. I tried opening my eyelids, but it appeared some
twisted jester glued them together. I was forced to pry them apart with palsied
fingers.
What had that
demented lunatic been shouting last night as he kept refilling my ale mug?
“There be no tomorrow.” Yes, in principle there be no tomorrow. The clock
strikes midnight and it be today, with tomorrow pushed another twenty-four
hours away. We all chase a tomorrow that never comes. Unfortunately, today has
again arrived and it be not pleasant.
My idle thoughts
were just about to lure me back into a feverish slumber when the caller again
began shouting. “Jak Barley, get out of bed, you lazy ne’er-do-well sot.”
Like some
pitiable prisoner coerced to climb the steps to the gallows pole, I forced
myself to sit up and then fight the sudden centrifugal force that threatened to
send me rolling across the room to be plastered against the wall like some
youngster in a harvest carnival ride. The spinning slowly receded to where I
could safely pull on my trousers, though it set off an angry outburst behind my
eyeballs.
“Jak, get up,
you wretched lay about.”
I lurched to the
door and waved my hand across the latch, letting the ring cancel the charms
placed upon it. The magical band and its wards were a gift from my betrothed,
Morgana, a novice witch at the Kuu Academy of Mystical Arts and Witchcraft.
Beginning at the top, I slid the five bolts over and then hesitated at the
latch. I knew the grotesque vision I would see on the other side. I sighed in
resignation and opened the door, there to view the huge, mocking, obnoxious,
leering, and gleeful smile of my supposed friend, Lorenzo Spasm.
“Holy crap,
Batman, what wizard cursed you with that aging spell?” he exclaimed.
I was used to
his outlandish phrases and words because that is what they literally
are—outlandish. Spasm claims to be an inhabitant of a parallel firmament, one
similar to our world in many ways, but devoid of any magic. Partial proof of
that claim is Spasm’s immunity to spells. Any enchantment will rebound off my
friend and back onto the mage or witch who cast the curse.
“What in Hades
do you want? Cannot you see I am ailing?” I managed to moan. I could not even
lift my head to look in him eye-to-eye without setting off another round of
thunderbolts.
Lorenzo is about
six-foot, two inches, to my five-nine. I took in his droopy mustache and
slightly greying hair that went to his shoulders—and the outlandish mixture of
clothing reflecting his exotic wanderings. It is difficult to estimate his age,
though I would guess in the late forties. He was taciturn when it came to
personal details and background.
“Downed by the
brown bottle flu is my guess,” Lorenzo observed with little sympathy. “You reek
of a brewery.”
My answer was a
glowering stare that failed to wipe away his enthusiastic demeanor. “What do
you want?” I finally asked.
“I have a job
for you. It seems . . .”
I slammed the
door in his face and staggered back to bed. Anything Lorenzo found so enjoyable
could only mean peril and hardship. I made the mistake of not locking the door
and Spasm pushed it open. He crossed the room to open a window and then took a
chair at the foot of the bed.
Author Bio:
Dan Ehl has been a journalist and
editor at both weeklies and daily newspapers in Iowa. The winner of numerous
journalism and photo awards, including first in humor from the National Society
of Newspaper Columnists, he enjoys breaking out of dryer newspaper writing to
pen fantasy novels. He served in Germany as an Army photographer during the
Vietnam War. “With a lot of Vietnamese people digging pits with sharpened
stakes at the bottom for people just like me, I knew I wasn’t really wanted. I
didn’t want to be rude and show up anyway. Being from Iowa, we always try to be
polite. And Germany during the early 1970s was interesting enough with the
barracks always reeking of beer, vomit and hashish every weekend.” His favorite
hobbies are hitchhiking and hopping freights.
Keywords: fantasy, private inquisitor, goblins,
witches, demons, adventure
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