Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
Populace: Small worlds much like islands that humans do not know exist. Each Overseer domain has one, and each populace secures a portion of the Nephilim Knowledge library. This ensures no one person can access all the information and use it for evil.
Elysium: A populace ruled by Micah Amor, one of the most powerful Overseers out of the eight domains.
Kingdom of Nephilim: A world connected to our own, spellcast into hiding. This is where the king reigns. The role of the Nephilim has one purpose: the protection of humans.
King Rory: The most ancient living Nephilim.
Seer Maturity (coming of age): Age twenty-seven, when a Seer’s power expands exponentially.
Assets: Special Seer abilities. Not every Seer is the same.
Water and Demons: No one knows why demons fear large bodies of water, but water doesn’t work as a weapon.
Seer Sensory: Can sense good and evil in both humans and Nephilim. Eye color is random and never the same as a way for them to hide from detection.
Guard: A mental barrier, a shield.
Seraphim: An angel who has the ability to walk the Earth.
The Darkest Knight: The demon king.
Archangel: The most powerful of angels.
Archdemon: The most dangerous of demons.
Interstice: A rift (crack, split, or break) between worlds.
Mokie: Creatures that are part sea, part land. Known to be irritating, little, and similar to weasels on Earth, but they have wings, and they can rift. They also have big teeth and a proclivity for biting and travel in mischief-making clusters.
Chupa: A large, white beast native to the populace of Elysium—long fangs snarling beneath its black lips and its featherless wings spread several feet wide and tall, black veins zigzagging through their several-foot expanse.
Evos: A fruit native to the Kingdom of Nephilim that tastes like human cherries and peaches combined.
Soto: A fruit native to the Kingdom of Nephilim that promotes fast healing.
Conscript: These warriors, who have survived the Fray, opt not to enlist with the Gilded Army and instead protect humanity under a Crystal Seer.
Eagle: One of the generations of humans in the know about the Seer order. They work within the Seer operations.
Part One: This World
The Sacred Book of Nephilim
Long ago, angels walked in the shadows of Earth, their sworn duty to protect humanity from hellish creatures. Sworn to remain invisible to those they protect. It was a solitary and treacherous duty entrusted to these illustrious warriors. Eventually, though, temptation, driven by loneliness, was as slithery and venomous as the snake in the Garden of Eden, leading some of these devoted servants to seek the pleasures of the flesh that only a human companion could offer. But no matter the reason for such actions, a broken vow is a broken vow, and swift punishment followed. They became the Fallen, no longer welcome in the kingdom above, and now they live amongst us, divided between good and evil, some fighting for redemption while others embrace the bowels of hell. To the world, they appear simply as mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons, but make no mistake, they are nothing so simple at all.
They are both the light that burns through the darkness and the darkness itself.
They are the Nephilim.
Prologue
Pain slices through me, excruciating spasms wrenching my belly in eternal punishment. I pant through the contractions, clinging to Nathan’s hand, touching my mate—a comfort beyond what any human medicine could offer me. But even with his grip holding me and him speaking to me, another wave of belly-clenching pain overtakes me, and a tortured scream I barely recognize as my own rips from my lips.
“Breathe,” Nathan urges. “Breathe, Elaine. You can do this. Not much longer, and our miracle baby will be here.”
My baby is a miracle. We’re blessed—so very blessed—in ways humans could not begin to fathom. As a descendant of the Nephilim, conceiving a child is the rarest of gifts, usually granted only to the ruling class of our kind. Not to those of us who live amongst the humans, the Bedrock lineage, the common among the Nephilim.
But tonight, we are not among humans. We are with our kind inside a medical compound surrounded by Seers as eager for our miracle as we are. I want this baby beyond all else, beyond my own life.
So, bring on the pain—and almost as if the heavens above heed my challenge, my entire body locks up. I curl forward and scream at my doctor. “When? When?!”
To Dr. Parisa’s credit, she is cool and calm, her confidence a soothing balm through this entire process, but now excitement bubbles from her voice. “You’re there, Mama! I need you to push when I tell you. Wait. Wait. Now! Push!”
Nathan chimes in with firm instruction. “Push, Elaine! Push!”
I arch forward again, deeper, pushing as hard as I can, and it happens—it really happens. I can feel the baby slide from within me. I gasp at the sound of a baby crying, my baby, and tears of joy stream down my cheeks.