PRAISE FOR GODDESS CHOSEN

“Hartlove fashions a riveting blend of history, religion, and horror in this briskly paced series opener. The author balances his ferocious imagination with historical passion. A masterful historical fantasy that informs as well as enthralls.”

Kirkus Reviews

“Jay Hartlove has fused several genres in a driving narrative sparkling with historical exotica. I recommend you buy this crazy novel.”

John Shirley, author of Bleak History and winner of the Bram Stoker Award

PRAISE FOR GODDESS DAUGHTER

Hartlove delivers on the tension in Goddess Daughter. Fans of his first novel will be pleased to find that the narrative runs through a rampage of deceit, double-crossing and the darker side of human motivation all in the same fashion as Goddess Chosen.

J. Malcolm Stewart, author of The Eyes of the Stars

“Writing which in its depth invokes past masters like Crichton, Benchley, and Straub.”

Critics Studio Magazine

“Hartlove is a master of spellbinding suspense, mystical mayhem, and spiritual surrender.”

Library at The End of The Universe

GODDESS RISING

Book Three

of the

“Goddess Rising”

Series

JAY HARTLOVE

copyright © 2020 by Jay Hartlove

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for the purpose of review and/or reference, without explicit permission in writing from the publisher.

Cover design copyright © 2020 by Niki Lenhart

nikilen-designs.com

Author photo copyright © S. N. Jacobson

Published by Paper Angel Press

paperangelpress.com

SAMPLE CHAPTER

19

THE WALK HOME FROM THE HOSPITAL WAS SURREAL. Desiree couldn’t bring herself to make eye contact with people she passed on the street for fear of her god-self reaching out and seizing their souls. Could life really be moved into and out of a body so easily? She wondered if soldiers ever got used to the feeling of taking a life, or if they had to make excuses to themselves for the rest of their lives. All these questions, and every time she got more answers, it all became just that much more intense.

She opened the door and moved directly to collapsing on the couch. It was more of a loveseat, so she was left with one leg sticking up in the air. She glanced over at the giant hole in the back wall of the living room and thought about how Joseph always referred to his god Ptah as the Opener of the Ways. More like ‘Opener of the Kitchen’.

Sanantha came out from her room. “Welcome home. You all right?”

“No,” she groaned without getting up. “I used to think more information leads to more understanding which leads to better coping. Knowing more is not helping.”

“Helping with what?”

Desiree sat up. “My powers are out of control. They take off on their own and I just get dragged behind. They’re frightening too, like life and death at a whim. Knowing what’s going on doesn’t help. All the history and mechanisms and relationships don’t give me any handle. I can’t tell if my conscious actions are helping Isis or not. It’s like I’ve found this fabulous alien spacecraft crashed in my backyard. I know it can go to the stars, but with no instruction manual and all the controls in an alien language, I can’t make it do anything. If it flies, I can’t tell if I’m doing it or it’s doing it on its own.”

“Is Isis pushing you aside? Are there periods when you can’t remember what you’ve been doing?”

“No, I’m always aware, which makes it worse. Oh, I see. You’re thinking about when I would shift into being my mother and lose my Desiree identity. No, I don’t feel like I’m being overwritten, just forced to be a passenger in my own body.”

“That is consistent with the loa mounting experience. You said all your answers so far don’t help. What would you like to know?”

“How to be the god I’m supposed to be. Both of our angels say I am. Osiris in my dream said I am.”

“Who knows how to be a god?” Sanantha asked.

“Other gods? Alec contacted Boann. I felt for her when I went out to the woods by the river.”

“Maybe. I can try to summon a loa. I don’t know how successful I would be. I was only ever a flag mistress in my village, and it usually takes a mambo to summon a god from scratch. The only time I have ever been mounted was when Erzulie revived you.”

“Joseph knows the Egyptian gods, he served one of them.”

“Yes, but he was also imprisoned by them for thousands of years.”

“Do we know why?”

“No, and I don’t think that would be a polite question.”

Desiree squirmed around on the loveseat and pulled her phone out of her back pocket. “I still think he’ll have our best access. “Hello, Joseph? It’s Desiree. May I ask you a favor? Right, of course. Thank you. Can you come over to the cottage this afternoon when you’ve got a minute? I need your advice. Okay, sure. Thanks.”

She hung up and gestured broadly toward the door. “Wait for it …”

The knock came.

Desiree grinned overbroadly. Sanantha got the door. “Come in.”

“Joseph, I need your help. You have been wonderful answering all my questions. Sanantha, you have been a rock of support in my corner. Now I need an expert, a peer. I need to talk to a god and see how I’m supposed to do this. Boann did not talk to me when I went to her. Sanantha’s not sure the loas would listen to her. What can you do to put me in touch with a fellow Egyptian god?”

He frowned. Was that thought or caution? “I am an angel of Ptah, the Opener of the Ways.”

Desiree snickered to herself.

“What?” he asked with no humor.

“Nothing. Sorry, please go on.”

“As we saw with Kailash and Semeru, holy places are holy because they exist in both this plane and the next. I could open a gap at Karnak where my gods are resting.”

Sanantha helped him out. “I understand your reluctance to visit the gods.”

“I want to help and I will. I will have to avoid direct contact with the gods, though.”

Desiree couldn’t help herself. “When Silas freed you, it was against the gods’ wishes? Why were they holding you?”

“Yes, my master freed me before the gods were satisfied. I had exceeded my authority, acted on my own wishes and against theirs.”

“Isn’t helping me more of the same?”

“No, I am assisting a goddess. Helping the Neters is why I exist.”

“Actually, Isis is known for acting on her own,” Sanantha added. “Plenty of stories have her going against the wishes of the other gods. So helping a rebel may not excuse you. Please be careful.”

Joseph smiled what almost came across as boyishly. “I didn’t know you cared, Doctor.”

Sanantha smiled back. “Don’t flatter yourself. I need you here to protect her. Promise me you will keep her safe.”

“I promise.” He turned to Desiree. “When would you like to leave? I know the place well, so we can get there in one step.”

“What time is it there now?”

“There is a two-hour time difference. It’s three o’clock here now, so it’s five there. We’d have a little over an hour of light.”

“Am I overdressed. I mean, it’s the desert and I’m in a sweater.”

“You should be fine. You might be warm, but it gets very windy.”

“All right then. No time like the present.”

Sanantha spoke up. “Please don’t do it in here. Go out back, maybe. You create a cloud of black sulfurous smoke when you leave.”

Desiree snickered. “Bye, Sanantha.” She started to follow Joseph but stopped to retrieve her wallet.

“You won’t need that,” Joseph said. “We’re going and coming right back.”

“I dunno, traveling to another country. I’ll take my passport and credit card just in case.”

She and Joseph walked to the patio. She took his hands facing him and closed her eyes.

“Are you still frightened of this travel?” Joseph asked. “We have done this several times now.”

“Not afraid of the trip, but the blackness is always a shock. I’ll just keep my eyes closed, thank you.”

With the rushing sound of air, she knew they were no longer in Ireland. She felt a gentle warm breeze on her face, opened her eyes, and involuntarily took a breath at the view. The grandiose pylon gate of the Temple of Isis at Agilika loomed behind Joseph like a fortress wall. It was huge and beautiful but there was something more, something touched her deeply. “Joseph, I feel like I’m home.”

“People came from all over Egypt to worship you here. This place keeps you alive in people’s minds even today when they visit and learn. Did Alec tell you about the impression prayer leaves on a place?”

“Yes, like Patrick’s gravestone.” She was happy to notice no tourists present. She looked around and saw they were on an island.

“This place is steeped in thousands of years of belief in you.”

‘Well, not me personally, but my soul, which is where I feel the connection. Is this one of those holy thin spots?”

“Oh yes, this temple very much exists in both planes.”

She looked around again and felt something didn’t fit. “Why does this place feel like it’s in the wrong place?”

“Oh, of course. Isis remembers it in its original setting. This temple complex used to be on a nearby island called Philae. When the Egyptians built the Aswan High Dam, the Nile backed up and expanded Lake Nassar, and it flooded Philae. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization declared this a World Heritage Site and spent nine years dismantling the entire complex, numbering all the blocks, and reassembling it here on Agilika.”

“They moved all these temple buildings? Wow. Wait a minute. That’s UNESCO. My mom worked for UNESCO.” She walked across the entrance plaza, looking up at the two pylon towers that formed the front gate. “Those giant carved images all across these faces include other gods in addition to Isis. Will they be on the other side for me to talk to?”

“That’s my hope. Now you’re going to need to know how to part a gap to go there and to return. I can’t come with you.”

“Right. Do I use my god chi?” she asked, grasping.

“Yes and no. You will need to summon it, but not to project it the way you do when you heal. You let it flow into one hand, and then you use that hand like a knife to split the firmament.”

“Split the firmament.”

“The split will be narrow, so you need to line up your body flat behind your hand so you can slip through.”

“Right, I saw you stand sideways on Kailash.”

“Since you’re new at this, don’t expect the gap to be as wide as the one I made for you and Brother Renpo. Any gap will do, just squeeze through. Let me set up a shadow phase for you to practice on.”

“Part of me thinks this is perfectly normal, and part of me is scared shitless.”

“You know which part is which. Isis used to do this all the time when she visited this temple.” Joseph took off his sunglasses and swept his gaze back and forth between them. At first, she didn’t see any effect, but then she saw a distortion, as if she were looking through water at him.

“I won’t even ask how you built that. I take it this is made from the same stuff as the barrier between worlds?”

“Yes. Stand like this.” He stood sideways to the wall with his legs and free arm bent back to hide behind him.

“Oh my god, Joseph. Walk like an Egyptian?”

He appeared taken aback. “Of course.”

“No, no. I mean you are in the same position you see everyone in tomb paintings.” She pointed up at the pylons. “Like those figures. They didn’t understand how to portray perspective in their art, so they drew everything flat.”

He stood up straight to face her. “That’s not true. They drew figures like that out of vanity.”

“What? I was an Art History major.”

Joseph rolled his yellow eyes. With his sunglasses off she could see him do this. She wondered how often he did this that she couldn’t see.

“Once people saw this was the position gods and angels used to travel to heaven, everyone wanted to be portrayed as divinely important. So they had artists place their images in this posture whenever possible. They couldn’t actually make the trip, but they wanted to be remembered as having a touch of the divine.”

She stared at him flabbergasted. Standing there indignant in her sweater, cords, and boots in the Egyptian desert, she couldn’t even find words.

“Surely you learned how important status was in art.”

“Yes, yes. The more clothes you wore in your portraits, and the bigger you were pictured in relation to the others, the more important you were. I get the vanity thing. I’m just having a hard time believing the divinity thing was so lost to time, that we in modern times guessed so wrongly.”

“Thousands of years of unspoken tradition followed by hundreds of years of silence under the sand. I think you will find a lot of things have been reconstructed incorrectly. Shall we try this?” he said resuming the position.

“Of course.” She reached inward, took a deep breath and summoned the god chi in her heart. Then, as Renpo had taught her, she whirled her arms around and let the heat flow down into her right hand, ending with her body mimicking his.

“Now picture the barrier as a viscous gelatin, spring forward with your back leg, and bring your hand down to cleave the barrier like a hatchet.”

She did this and was shocked at the sensation. “I felt my hand part something, like I was tearing through fabric.”

“Good, now do it again, and this time as you feel the splitting, walk into the gap and push it open.”

Again she followed his instructions, and again she was amazed at the result. She passed through and ended up next to Joseph. “I felt that. Why am I still here?”

“This is a practice wall. It has this world on both sides. The real wall has the spirit plane on the other side. Practice one more time, going back through to your side. I want you to know this sensation well. It will be your way home.”

Summon, displace, pose, spring, cleave, and step through.

“Well done.” He performed a bit of tai chi himself, ending with a sweeping away with both hands. The practice barrier vanished. “Now you’re on your own.”

“Do I cut anywhere in particular?”

“Anywhere here is good. This whole area is as you said, a thin spot. Oh, and don’t worry about any locked gates. They won’t be there on the spiritual plane.”

She felt like she was about to jump off a cliff even though she was standing on flat ground. She wet her lips and took a deep breath. “A guy I knew in college said he had visited the astral plane by making espresso with Red Bull instead of water.” She smiled weakly at Joseph. He smiled reassuringly back. “I don’t think this is what he meant. Here goes nothin’.” Summon, displace, pose, spring, cleave, and step through. The walls of her cut stuck to her as she pushed through, making her drag her following arm the last few inches. Obviously she needed more work on technique.

She found herself at the Temple, but the air was filled with mist. The sun was obscured, making it seem later. The carvings up on the walls appeared the same. Semeru had appeared different than Kailash. She walked between the pylons, looking for any sign of life. Behind the gate was a courtyard lined with flower-topped stone columns. Behind them were rooms that probably were for priests back in the day. The other end of the courtyard was another, smaller pylon gate. She turned around and she could no longer see Joseph who waited outside. Alone in a heaven only her soul recognized.

Through the second gate was an interior court of columns. Beyond that was a chamber of high flat walls covered in hieroglyphics. She sensed this was the actual sanctum of Isis. She felt calm here, at home. She was tempted to just sit down on the floor and revel in the peacefulness.

She remembered why she came, and decided bold was better than timid. She was a god, after all. “Hello! I’m home! Anyone here?”

“Isis, is that really you?” a woman’s deep voice called out from the shadows through a passage out into another courtyard.

Desiree looked closer and saw an outline emerge. It was a woman in a flowing gown, but she had the head of a hippopotamus. Even though she had imagined this moment of first contact, meeting one of the gods face to face was a lot more daunting than she imagined. “Hathor! It is lovely to see you again!”

Hathor stepped right up and enveloped her in a hug. Her huge head felt very strange. “Sister! It has been centuries. I thought I would never see you again. So many have never returned. Let me look at you.” She held Desiree at arm’s length and looked her up and down. Then she let go, frowned, and stepped back. “Oh no, you didn’t.”

Desiree wondered what the god saw. She reached up and felt a headdress of bull horns holding a sun disk. She hadn’t felt it there before. She wasn’t sure what to say, but words came up anyway. “Yes, Isis moved into my body, that we now share, so she can walk the Earth. She did not have the strength to manifest and travel to the material plane. I need advice on how to best serve the goddess. How does a goddess gain believers that bring strength? How can I tell which motives are mine and which are hers? I want to do the right thing.”

Hathor gently swung her massive head side to side. “We do not approve of this. We are not supposed to walk the Earth unless our believers wish it. We only possess humans to give them messages, not occupy them like puppets.”

“It’s still me, Desiree. I’m still here. Isis gave me life and I’m letting her use my body.”

“You always were a rebel. I love you for that. There are limits though, and you have crossed them. You already know we do not agree with your revenge quest.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean by that.”

Another figure appeared out of the misty shadows. This one was a tall muscular man. It wasn’t until he came into the light that she could see he had a falcon head.

Desiree’s heart jumped and she felt compelled to greet him. “Son!”

He paused and frowned deeply over his enormous beak.

Hathor said, “Yes, it’s really Isis. She’s sharing a human body.”

Horus did not look entirely convinced. Moreover, he did not look happy to see his mother.

Isis in her heart was crushed by sadness.

Horus put his hand on Hathor’s shoulder and motioned with this beak toward the front of the temple complex, toward where she had left Joseph.

Hathor and Desiree followed his gaze. “Oh no. You are not going to gain favor by bringing Ptah’s exiled bastard.” She held up three human fingers. “That’s three bad throws in a row, possession, revenge, and the exile. Remember the pillars, dear: strength, tenacity, intelligence, and,” she paused for emphasis, “discretion. You’d best be going back now.”

“Please don’t reject me. This place feels so much like home, and you feel so much like family. You said yourself it has been far too long. I really need to understand how I can do right by your sister goddess. To do right by you.”

“I am sorry,” Hathor said, “but talking to you any more will only come to a bad end. It was lovely to see you again. Perhaps we will meet again, in happier times.” She and Horus turned and walked back into the mist and vanished.

The goddess inside her felt crushed. Desiree felt crushed. She hung her head and tried not to cry.

As she turned to go, something on the stone floor caught her eye. Up against a wall in dust, it looked like a bug. She pulled out her cell phone and used it as a flashlight. “No service. Big surprise.” The light revealed it to be a key. She picked it up and examined it. Gold, with a hieroglyphic stamp on the thumb grip. She looked around and no one came back out to say anything. She slipped it into her pocket.

She walked dejectedly out through the courtyards and the pylons, and could see Joseph waiting. He was making eye contact, so she guessed he could see her. She raised her arms and shrugged in resignation.

He shook his head and slumped his shoulders.

She started to summon her god chi to open a cleft back through, when a feeling pulled at her to turn to the right. She recognized this yearning as Isis trying to tell her something. At first she only saw the river and the horizon beyond. Then she looked closer and saw … pyramids? Yes, a grouping of three. Giza was at the other end of Egypt, how could she see them? The effect was tantalizing. The harder she looked, the closer they appeared. Her feet felt light on the ground and when she looked down, she saw the ground flying by beneath her. It felt like a dream and somehow it didn’t frighten her. Apparently physics doesn’t apply in the spirit plane. What was Isis showing her?

She flew up to a walled city built around the Great Pyramids. Everything was new and clean and people were working in and around the buildings, priests and bald acolytes. She landed in the middle of the complex, near the sphinx, which was intact and painted. No, she didn’t land, she descended right into the ground, finally emerging in a large cubical underground chamber. A colossal painted statue of Isis dominated the room and faced a gray stone altar. The room was made of black granite and was lit by twelve torches in sconces around the statue’s feet. A gold throne sat next to the altar, and in it sat a priestess. Behind the altar stood a short, pale priest.

A panel swung opened and another taller priest entered. The man behind the altar and the new man wordlessly exchanged gestures. Laid out on the altar was an assortment of utensils. The new priest reached into his robes and pulled out a case, and from the case he pulled a wand and a dagger which he added to the altar collection. The short priest assisted the taller one with his attire and preparations. This routine looked very much like what she had seen Alec do.

Almost. This gear included an elaborate metal crown and a purple sash belt. There were also more utensils here, including little copper mirrors. If Alec was working from the same rituals, why didn’t he have all this stuff too?

For the first time since he entered the chamber, the tall priest looked up at the statue of Isis, dropped onto both knees and then lowered his gaze reverently to her painted stone feet, holding the rod and sword in either hand down at his sides. He began in a language Desiree did not recognize, yet did understand. “Great Isis, Goddess of Life, Protector of Humanity, hear my summons.” He swung the rod up in a broad arc to hold it aloft and spoke more forcefully. “I stand at the center. I am the Master. You must hear my summons.” He then stood up and drew a symbol in the air with the end of the rod and stated, “I have the power. I now walk freely on your plane. You must come forward at my command.”

The priestess frowned at his bold gesture, but this was only his opening volley. He leaned back and looked the huge statue straight in the eye, pointed his sword at Isis and demanded, “I am Chosen. You must obey me. Tell me what I seek.”

Desiree felt Isis wanting to possess the priestess, so she decided to play along. She swooped into the priestess and took over her body. She was alarmed at how easy it was to do. She stood up abruptly and raised her head proudly. One by one, twelve rays of light erupted from her forehead to form a wheel-like crown. She raised her hands and five more rays of light shot from each upturned palm. Desiree loved the effect. They felt like they stood for something. Were these keys of some kind?

The tall priest did not look satisfied. He commanded further, “Do not dare to withhold your powers from me! I demand that you employ all your abilities to my task. I know of the last seven rays of enlightenment. I need them to strip away all deceit to find my enemy, our enemy! Reveal the last seven Arcana to me!”

Desiree felt a profound emptiness. She did not know why, but she felt like he wanted something that had been stolen, something she should have kept safe. She felt a tear roll down her cheek. Isis was really upset.

The priest saw the tear and looked terrified.

The short priest’s head transformed into the head of an ibis bird. Oh, Thoth possessed the priest.

“Faen-ka.” Thoth said quietly, but clearly.

The tall priest seemed incensed by that name, and whirled on his fellow, only to see the god standing there instead. He dropped to his knees.

“Son of Earth,” the God of Wisdom addressed him paternally, “the twenty-two images at your disposal, those twenty-two rays of knowledge Isis is offering you now, are the only keys I have ever possessed for your use. The additional seven you seek, the Tablets of Aeth, reveal the powers of creation itself. In all my wisdom, I do not know how to convey such secrets to the minds of men.”

“Great Teacher of Mankind,” he humbly addressed the god, “if these keys are not yours, then from whence did they come? And to whence did they go? Does Isis not command all the material, mental and spiritual realms?”

Really? I do? I mean, she does?

“These images were designed by the betrayer you now seek. My daughter Isis thought Faen-ka discovered them in a foreign land and brought them as a gift to the gods. Now he has taken them out of the temple.”

The priest was clearly surprised and took a moment to think about it. “I have only watched my predecessor use these images. He used them just last month in our conflict with Moses. I was never given the opportunity to memorize them. I am certain neither of my fellow high adepts have ever even seen them. I may be the only person who has ever seen them, but I know they do exist. Is there no way for you to view them?”

“They are not of Our sphere.”

The priest was again shaken. “Can you help me find the traitor?”

“You will not find him in this lifetime.”

Desiree raced to keep up. This Faen-ka guy brought new magic to the Egyptians, then right after Exodus, he stole it and ran away.

“The clairvoyance your keys have given me has never failed. If I will not succeed in my mission, is it because I will die, or is it because my adversary has the Tablets of Aeth and I do not?”

“You will not die an early or unnatural death.”

Desiree was still trying to grasp what had happened when Isis spoke up on her own. “If these Arcana are so powerful, then why didn’t Faen-ka succeed in using them to defeat the Hebrews’ magic?”

“Always the trusting one,” Thoth commented lovingly at her, shaking his long beak back and forth slowly. “Why does the snake not fly through the air? It is against its nature. This man was never a son of Egypt. His intent was not to defeat Moses, but to lead Ramses into defeat.”

Desiree put it together, but was horrified at the result. Faen-ka was Ramses’s trusted advisor, maybe even his High Priest. He planted new magic so Ramses would not take Moses’s miracles seriously. That lead to Ramses’s legendary overreaction and defeat. She was astonished at the scale of the deception and amazed at how no one saw it coming. She felt terrible for the Egyptians. All those people suffering and dying, just to embarrass the king. This revelation outraged Isis. She was not going to let this slide.

Desiree knew she was watching something that happened a long time ago. The reactions she was feeling from Isis were what the goddess felt back then.

The priest was still trying to figure out a game plan. “If there are now powers on Earth that we cannot master, how will Egypt fare against those who have such power? We can blame the loss of the Hebrews to the treachery of one man, but if the traitor trains others and they attack us, we may not be able to defend ourselves.”

Desiree thought this priest was really smart.

“Faen-ka will not attack Egypt, and he will never have any followers. Yet your thinking is correct. Although Moses was originally trained in this very temple, the secrets of power now at his command are not ours.” The god raised his hands above his head and looked upward. “Seeker of Truth, know that the world is changing, and the truths I have given you, though immutable, will not always apply to the world of men. O Egypt, a time shall come when, instead of a pure religion and an intelligent cult, you shall have nothing left but ridiculous fables that posterity will find incredible. There shall be nothing left to you but words graven upon stone, dumb and almost indecipherable monuments to your ancient piety.”

Desiree felt Isis decide to hold her tongue in spite of her anger, but she definitely sized up the tall priest. She decided if he wasn’t going to catch his old master in this lifetime, Isis would make sure he did in another lifetime.

Another lifetime? All at once, Desiree realized she was looking at the first version of Silas Alverado and that Faen-ka was Sammael in disguise. It was all she could manage not to let her mouth drop open. She also now knew what she had to do.

With that thought, she fell back out of the priestess and tumbled through the dream space back to Agilika. She was still in the spirit plane where she had started. She looked around and wondered if she had actually moved at all. She guessed it didn’t matter.

She was about to summon her god chi to slice her way back into the physical world when she spotted Joseph. Only he wasn’t alone. A tall god with a head that looked sort of like a donkey, was talking with Joseph, right there in the real world. Joseph was very reverent, bowing his head.

Desiree pulled up the chi as fast as she could, whirled it down into her hand and sliced. She knew Joseph had seconds. She jumped through the split just as another split opened up behind Set, who reached to put his hand on Joseph’s shoulder.

“No you don’t! He’s my servant now!” She ran up, ready to fight the god, but it was too late. He and Joseph slipped from view. She dove for where they vanished, but the hole was gone and so were they. She kicked the sandy flagstones and yelled, “Shit! Shit! Shit!”

She grabbed her auburn hair with both hands. No more headdress. She finally figured out her goddess hitchhiker was hell bent on going to war with Satan over a three-thousand-year-old deception, and not ten minutes later she lost her supernatural protector.

Oh yeah, all the while standing in the middle of the Egyptian desert in a sweater and boots. She thanked her good luck that she remembered to bring her passport and credit card. She pulled out her cell phone. At least it had a signal here.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jay Hartlove is the award-winning author of the urban fantasy “Goddess Rising” trilogy (Goddess Chosen, Goddess Daughter, and Goddess Rising) and the fantasy romance Mermaid Steel. He is also the playwright, director and producer of The Mirror’s Revenge, the musical sequel to the “Snow White” fable, which had its theatrical run in the San Francisco Bay Area in August 2018 to rave reviews.

His stories are filled with conspiracies and the supernatural, gods, dreams, angels, and hidden connections. His creative motto is “Dark Secrets Revealed”. He loves to take stories where the reader does not expect, with sympathetic villains, heroes with very dark pasts, and lots of plot twists. He was selected as one of the “50 Authors You Should Be Reading” by The Authors Show.

Jay is a former competitive costumer, having won Best in Show at both San Diego ComicCon and WorldCon. You can read more about Jay’s creative adventures, including much of the research he put into his books, at jaywrites.com.

YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY

GODDESS CHOSEN

Book One of the “Goddess Rising” Trilogy

by Jay Hartlove

The man who would beat the devil isn’t a hero, but a ruthless madman.

GODDESS DAUGHTER

Book Two of the “Goddess Rising” Trilogy

by Jay Hartlove

How far can you genetically alter someone before she becomes someone else … before she loses her soul?

Available from Paper Angel Press in

hardcover, trade paperback, digital, and audio editions.

paperangelpress.com

Table of Contents

19

About the Author

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