WORK 01
Book One’s Main Characters
Maret navigates the world haunted by a shadow twin he cannot understand, and that no one else can see. A lonely person, mistrusted by family, driven to reach out to the shadow to discover whether it is an ally or a foe.
Despite working out ways to communicate across the barrier of death, Maret and his “imaginary friend” yearn for more than they can provide to each other.
WORK 02
Maret and the Shadow
How do you explain color to someone who only sees gray?
How can you comfort someone you cannot touch?
How do you teach a shadow compassion, when it does not understand what it is to live?
WORK 03
Order of the Umbellatum
Arghast is an acolyte of those who practice sanctioned necromancy on behalf of the living. They are not strictly dead nor alive, and do not have families. Instead, they care for the dead who cannot pass on, ferrying souls so they will not forget themselves and plague the living as wraiths. They are feared and tolerated by much of Deyvos, though Arghast, as a young acolyte, finds it hard to balance his purpose with his yearning.
The Herald leads the order from the head house in Scaulle. And stranger yet, the Arbiter remains in the afterworld. A single deceased mortal given to watching the resolution of the life-death cycle from beyond the veil.
WORK 04
Map of Telmut
Book One concerns the barony of Telmut, on the western coast of the Alvan Territories.
This map is featured in the front of “Shadow of the Beast” and was commissioned from Keir Scott-Schrueder. (See his other maps: https://www.instagram.com/keir_ss_cartography/).
Each of the details drawn in the circles are important to the story…I can’t wait for you to find out how.
AJ Reid 