Last month, before the craziness of NaNoWriMo descended once again, I finally completed 2014’s NaNo-novel. The fourth in the Stone Dragon Saga, Dragons in the Deep is currently with my proof and beta readers before the next round of editing begins. In the meantime, I wanted to share a little excerpt from the book with you. (if you would like to see the other books in the series, my author page can be found here and the first book in the series, Dragon on My Neck, is available here)
Let me catch you up: It has been a while since the end of Dragon on the Green. Passiona has folded herself into society life, Anna and Jane have graduate college and become ‘real adults’, Al and his siblings have continued to live with their humans, and a new discovery has shaken up their existence. There is a ship, a pirate ship, that sank in warm Caribbean waters 400 years ago. This pirate ship, mentioned in a king’s holdings and suspiciously otherwise invisible, just may hold the key to finding Al’s parents, and ending Passiona’s bid on domination. There are new characters, new settings, and a different style of writing in this book that I hope you will enjoy…and that will seamlessly flow with the previous 3.
Without further ado…I give you Dragons in the Deep: an excerpt –
“This can’t be real,” Zachary whistled in appreciation, “I’ve never seen anything like it!”
“I don’t think anyone has,” Garron breathed the words out almost reverently, staring in amazement at the scene spread before him on the screen and itching to suit up and dive down to the real thing.
“She looks like she could be on the water, instead of under it,” Lance leaned around Garron’s seated figure to get a better look, “Oh boy, what is that girl doing?”
“Nickel,” Garron hit the call button and startled her out of a staring match with a clown fish, “Have you found something of interest?”
“Well I don’t know,” Nickel admitted, turning back to her perusal of the railings. “I haven’t ever seen ship railings covered in designs like this. I think they’re ancient runes and possibly base Latin words but I’ll have to scan these pictures in to be able to translate anything.”
“I’ve seen a few ships with decorative railings,” Flynn drawled, swimming up beside his partner, “But never ones with decoration on every railing and doorway. Even that mast has some marking at its base.”
“What really gets to me,” Nickel added, “Is that we can make out words. After all of this time under the water the marking should be worn down to an almost indistinguishable smoothness. Instead, the relief is as deep and well defined as if it were carved yesterday.”
“Look at this figure head,” Flynn whistled between his teeth, reaching out a tentative hand to feel the woodworked body. “Normally you find women at the head of a ship, but this…this is something amazing. Almost like a Viking ship, but with a Latin flair. Nickel, take a picture!”
“Hurry up you two,” Lance piped in over their earphones, “You’ve been down there almost an hour and that’s plenty for a first dive!”
“Nickel, snap the picture and come on back,” Garron added, “And bring my bone headed brother with you please! He’s starting to wander off again.”
“Aye aye Captain,” Nickel laughingly agreed, quickly swimming out to take a picture of the astounding figure head before catching Flynn, who was busy attempting to open an apparently locked door to a deck cabin. “You heard the men Flynn,” she giggled at her own rhyme, “Time to go on up to our ship man. We’ll come back down soon.”
“Yes we will,” Flynn agreed, noting the low oxygen in their tanks, “We will be back with tools and time.” This promise was more to the ship than to themselves and, as the duo slowly rose to the surface, the ship seemed to watch them and in watching them, the ship knew that it was time too for long kept secrets to be revealed.
excerpt: Chapter 9, Dragons in the Deep by Elizabeth S. Tyree, copyright 2015
Here there Be Dragons! 