Hi everyone! Here is my entry (#196) for "The Writer's Voice", a contest hosted by Cupid's Literary Connection, Love YA, Brenda Drake Writes, and Mother. Write. (Repeat). For more info on the contest, click here.
Wish me luck!
ONE FIFTY ONE
YA Dystopian
96,000 words
PLOT SUMMARY
Seventeen-year-old Aeneas doesn’t belong to a Colony. As the bloody scars on his back remind him, he was one more than needed. One more than necessary.
Then another bloody message, written by his dying mentor, twists and turns the world he thought he knew. His first instinct: run away, away from the high-walled city of Ilium that no longer feels like home. It takes the chance rescue of Casseopea, an orphaned girl from the Colonies, to make the running stop. Cast out into the dangerous depths of Ilium by her power-hungry Chieftain, Memnon, she draws Aeneas into her quest to find a mystical key. But the key unlocks a startling truth: her Colony is his own, and his real family is in grave danger.
Armed with a new understanding, a new set of allies, and a new purpose, Aeneas must return to the Colony that he has never known, stand up to its Chieftain, and change the fate of Ilium forever. ONE FIFTY ONE is a YA Dystopian novel complete at 96,000 words, and is the first of a series.
FIRST 250 WORDS
This can’t be the true Son of Ilium.
Panicked thoughts swept through Memnon’s throbbing forehead as he reached for the silver-plated battle axe that had hung from his war belt since he was a young man. Cool steel-coloured eyes bore into him from the intruder—the boy—watching his every move. Tattered robes, soiled from the filth of the city Underground, lay at his feet.
First a beggar, now a boy. This can’t be the true Son of Ilium.
Memnon’s heart beat a little faster. The axe wasn’t there. Only nothingness. It should have been there—it was always there. Instead, the cold leather of his belt gave way to the folds of velvet from his tunic. Something wet. Something warm.
Blood?
He felt more eyes on him now. He was surrounded. The Elders of the Colony. His people. But they weren’t his people anymore. Not now. Not with this boy, this stranger, this outcast, standing in his way. They used to be his people. Now, their hatred burned a hole in his chest. The horrible feeling of revenge flowed from their eyes, through the room, and settled in the bowels of his stomach. But they didn’t move. They seemed to be waiting. Waiting for the boy. His heart beat faster still.
How dare they! This is sacrilege, treason. After all these years, years of peace, years of stability, contentment! I am their Chieftain! How dare they...