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Hi everyone, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I'm glad you stopped by! 

Today, if you didn't know, is excerpt release day!  

To celebrate the upcoming release of my next novel, Anialych: People of Sand, I'm sharing excerpts from the book, every Thursday this month. (make sure to check out last week's, if you missed it!) 

I hope you enjoy this short, the beginning, the start of a world you all know well by now. 

[love]

{Rani Divine}

Excerpt from Anialych: People of Sand

By Rani Divine

©Copyright RAD Writing, 2019

“Go,” Sheyvu breathed as she released the hands of her sisters, sending them off to their own lands. The choice had been made during the night, with the death of the witch. Though not Sheia’s eldest daughter, Sheyvu was chosen by the Vartes to take charge of the people—and they had looked to her in more than slight confusion when she’d made her decision known. The Dewin could not be localized to the desert, not when humanity could very well have spread out in any direction from the plains. The Vartes had left pieces of Paradise here on this world, and they needed to be protected. The tree of souls within the forest, the pure lake and seeing stones in the mountains, resting rock in the Anialych lands, and the spirits of the Diafol and Esforos himself locked away within the islands and in the deep. Sheyvu’s people could not leave them alone, for humanity to find at every corner.

 One by one, her sisters left her sides. Corinne to the islands, Yeshu to the waters, Tzet to the jungles, Hythdor to the mountains, and Meena to the plains. They each had their own following of seven Dewin, Dewin who would be used to form their own species within their designated lands.

 As soon as they left the desert, they would no longer be the concern of Sheyvu, nor even her own kind. The Vartes would give them means to speak to one another, as had always been. No matter the distance between them, they would always be as they were now—sisters, to the very last—but their realms would be their own. Coetir, Dŵr, Cedwig, Mynidd, and Cayau they would be called. 

 None looked back as they started upon their way, leaving Sheyvu and her hundred remaining Anialych to watch them leave. She was glad that they did not turn back to her. It meant they were prepared, that they agreed in her decision. Truthfully, the sisters had instigated the idea together. They’d worked as they always had in mother’s absence, voting on what would be the best way to proceed, and they’d known this was the path the Vartes had chosen for them. Humanity was restless within the plains, and the Dewin needed to hold the world in stewardship until humanity was ready to receive it. Even the plains themselves needed to be cared for, and to them Sheyvu sent the strongest of sisters. Meena would not be broken down, even under so great a charge.

 “What are we to do now?” Aedan asked as he came up beside her, the highest among the wanderers—those most connected to the Vartes, second only to the witches.

 “Delilah holds the key,” she replied, still staring after her sisters as they disappeared into the vast mirage before them.

 In her heart, Sheyvu believed she was not yet prepared for what the Vartes asked her to do. Her mother had meant everything to her in years past, and now Sheyvu would live the rest of her days as witch in her own right. Though she’d known since childhood that she would be named witch if the time came for her mother to be taken back into the heavens, though she’d borne the triquetra mark upon her wrist from the day of her birth, she did not yet feel readiness for the task at hand. Humanity had rejected them outright. Sheia had gone to them in the form of the humans, a right granted only to the high witch, and still they’d mistrusted her. Sheyvu didn’t even know what been done to her mother in the hours leading up to her demise. All she knew was that Mother was gone, and that now she was one of only two of her daughters to remain in the desert.

 Still she held her head up high, knowing the Vartes would bring her through this. She would not be asked to do anything that she did not have the strength or will to complete. The Vartes was by her side, even now. All she needed was to go to the humans, to make them understand, to show them the fault in their ways. But thus far, Delilah had been the only one willing to speak to any of them. And Sheia was the only one the girl had ever spoken with.

 “I cannot go there,” she whispered under her breath as she turned to look Aedan in the eye. “Do you understand?”

 “You wish for me to go to her, my witch?” His brow furrowed, and Sheyvu imagined what it would be like if he were allowed to turn human, how beautiful he would become if he could’ve taken on their form. Instead, the gift was given now to her and her sisters, to bridge the gap between human and Dewin. Sheia had called it a gift.

 “Watch her,” she answered. “Delilah will be alone now. She will be afraid.” She turned and looked back out at the red rocks and sand-filled plains beyond. “Give her time.”

 Silently, Aedan reached out and took hold of her hand. Now that Sheia was gone, her father was the only one who well knew the burden she bore. But without her mother beside her, Aedan seemed less of a father and more of a man who’d simply worked beside her mother all these years. In the lives of the Dewin, it was not necessary that Sheyvu’s father remain a part of her life. For the rest of her people, fathers and mothers were not even known. The trees surrounding resting rock were the ones who chose what pairs to join in the making of young. The high witch was the only woman required to bear children of her own body, with whatever man she saw best suited.

 Sheia had chosen Aedan.

 For his part, he had done his best to remain in their lives. But he was a wanderer, and it was not possible for him to remain in one place for very long. Every fiber of his being desired to be out there, to go and walk their land and pray to the Vartes. That was his charge. To go out into the deserts and speak to the land, to pray to the Vartes for Paradise to be returned to them all.

 And yet, Sheyvu could think of none better to see to his mate’s final mission. Her father was the best option available to go to Delilah and to bring her deep into the desert, to resting rock. The girl would be the first human to lay eyes upon it, to see the whole of the Anialych with her own gaze. For now, Sheyvu could only hope that Delilah would be prepared for the things of the future. Already, Sheyvu felt as though she’d seen far too much.

 “Go,” she urged, releasing Aedan’s hand. “Please.”

 He nodded and turned toward those who stood behind them, toward resting rock. “Return to your duties,” he said to the crowd. “The witch has made her choice.”

 Sheyvu’s eyes drifted down to the mark upon her wrist, the symbol that would forever tell her people of the family to which she belonged. She was the daughter of Sheia, the first witch to ever be born upon this world. Even in her wildest of imaginations, she did not know if she would be as successful as her mother.