Boom Shadow Quotes

The Stadium Have you ever entered an empty stadium? Try it. Stand in the middle of the field and listen. There is nothing less empty than an empty stadium. There is nothing less mute than stands bereft of spectators. At Wembley, shouts from the 1966 World Cup, which England won, still resound, and if you listen very closely you can hear groans from 1953 when England fell to the Hungarians. Montevideo’s Centenario Stadium sighs with nostalgia for the glory days of Uruguayan soccer. Maracanã is still crying over Brazil’s 1950 World Cup defeat. At Bombonera in Buenos Aires, drums boom from half a century ago. From the depths of Azteca Stadium, you can hear the ceremonial chants of the ancient Mexican ball game. The concrete terraces of Camp Nou in Barcelona speak Catalan, and the stands of San Mamés in Bilbao talk in Basque. In Milan, the ghosts of Giuseppe Meazza scores goals that shake the stadium bearing his name. The final match of the 1974 World Cup, won by Germany, is played day after day and night after night at Munich’s Olympic Stadium. King Fahd Stadium in Saudi Arabia has marble and gold boxes and carpeted stands, but it has no memory or much of anything to say.

My theme is memory, that winged host that soared about me one grey morning of war-time. These memories, which are my life--for we possess nothing certainly except the past--were always with me. Like the pigeons of St. Mark's, theywere everywhere, under my feet, singly, in pairs, in little honey-voiced congregations, nodding, strutting, winking, rolling the tender feathers of their necks, perching sometimes, if I stood still, on my shoulder or pecking a broken biscuit from between my lips; until, suddenly, the noon gun boomed and in a moment, with a flutter and sweep of wings, the pavement was bare and the whole sky above dark with a tumult of fowl. Thus it was that morning. These memories are the memorials and pledges of the vital hours of a lifetime. These hours of afflatus in the human spirit, the springs of art, are, in their mystery, akin to the epochs of history, when a race which for centuries has lived content, unknown, behind its own frontiers, digging, eating, sleeping, begetting, doing what was requisite for survival and nothing else, will, for a generation or two, stupefy the world; commit all manner of crimes, perhaps; follow the wildest chimeras, go down in the end in agony, but leave behind a record of new heights scaled and new rewards won for all mankind; the vision fades, the soul sickens, and the routine of survival starts again. The human soul enjoys these rare, classic periods, but, apart from them, we are seldom single or unique; we keep company in this world with a hoard of abstractions and reflections and counterfeits of ourselves -- the sensual man, the economic man, the man of reason, the beast, the machine and the sleep-walker, and heaven knows what besides, all in our own image, indistinguishable from ourselves to the outward eye. We get borne along, out of sight in the press, unresisting, till we get the chance to drop behind unnoticed, or to dodge down a side street, pause, breathe freely and take our bearings, or to push ahead, out-distance our shadows, lead them a dance, so that when at length they catch up with us, they look at one another askance, knowing we have a secret we shall never share.

All this optimism, all this booming and soaring. Things happen like bang. This and that simultaneous. I put out my hand and what do I feel? I know there's a thousand things you analyze every ten minutes. Patterns, ratios, indexes, whole maps of information. I love information. This is our sweetness and light. It's a fuckall wonder. And we have meaning in the world. People eat and sleep in the shadow of what we do. But at the same time, what?

My dreams have been filled with shadows and wings—the booming of wings soaring between mountain passes.

The valley of the shadow of death holds no darkness for the child of God. There must be light, else there could be no shadow. Jesus is the Light. He has overcome death.

Liberty,” boomed Wednesday, as they walked to the car, “is a bitch who must be bedded on a mattress of corpses.” “Yeah?” said Shadow. “Quoting,” said Wednesday. “Quoting someone French.

The queen’s shoulders were shaking. Fireheart, the Fae warrior murmured. Manon would have watched—would have, had she not coughed blood onto the bright grass and blacked out. When she awoke, they were gone. Only minutes had passed—because then there were booming wings, and Abraxos’s roar. And there were Asterin and Sorrel, rushing for her before their wyverns had fully landed. The Queen of Terrasen had saved her life. Manon didn’t know what to make of it. For she now owed her enemy a life debt. And she had just learned how thoroughly her grandmother and the King of Adarlan intended to destroy them.

You heard me. Let someone else send you to your blaze of glory. You're a speck, man. You're nothing. You're not worth the bullet or the mark on my soul for taking you out." You trying to piss me off again, Patrick?" He removed Campbell Rawson from his shoulder and held him aloft. I tilted my wrist so the cylinder fell into my palm, shrugged. "You're a joke, Gerry. I'm just calling it like I see it." That so?" Absolutely." I met his hard eyes with my own. "And you'll be replaced, just like everything else, in maybe a week, tops. Some other dumb, sick shit will come along and kill some people and he'll be all over the papers, and all over Hard Copy and you'll be yesterday's news. Your fifteen minutes are up, Gerry. And they've passed without impact." They'll remember this," Gerry said. "Believe me." Gerry clamped back on the trigger. When he met my finger, he looked at me and then clamped down so hard that my finger broke. I depressed the trigger on the one-shot and nothing happened. Gerry shrieked louder, and the razor came out of my flesh, then swung back immediately, and I clenched my eyes shut and depressed the trigger frantically three times. And Gerry's hand exploded. And so did mine. The razor hit the ice by my knee as I dropped the one shot and fire roared up the electrical tape and gasoline on Gerry's arm and caught the wisps of Danielle's hair. Gerry threw his head back and opened his mouth wide and bellowed in ecstasy. I grabbed the razor, could barely feel it because the nerves in my hand seemed to have stopped working. I slashed into the electric tape at the end of the shotgun barrel, and Danielle dropped away toward the ice and rolled her head into the frozen sand. My broken finger came back out of the shotgun and Gerry swung the barrels toward my head. The twin shotgun bores arced through the darkness like eyes without mercy or soul, and I raised my head to meet them, and Gerry's wail filled my ears as the fire licked at his neck. Good-bye, I thought. Everyone. It's been nice. Oscar's first two shots entered the back of Gerry's head and exited through the center of his forehead and a third punched into his back. The shotgun jerked upward in Gerry's flaming arm and then the shots came from the front, several at once, and Gerry spun like a marionette and pitched toward the ground. The shotgun boomed twice and punched holes through the ice in front of him as he fell. He landed on his knees and, for a moment, I wasn't sure if he was dead or not. His rusty hair was afire and his head lolled to the left as one eye disappeared in flames but the other shimmered at me through waves of heat, and an amused derision shone in the pupil. Patrick, the eye said through the gathering smoke, you still know nothing. Oscar rose up on the other side of Gerry's corpse, Campbell Rawson clutched tight to his massive chest as it rose and fell with great heaving breaths. The sight of it-something so soft and gentle in the arms of something so thick and mountaineous-made me laugh. Oscar came out of the darkness toward me, stepped around Gerry's burning body, and I felt the waves of heat rise toward me as the circle of gasoline around Gerry caught fire. Burn, I thought. Burn. God help me, but burn. Just after Oscar stepped over the outer edge of the circle, it erupted in yellow flame, and I found myself laughing harder as he looked at it, not remotely impressed. I felt cool lips smack against my ear, and by the time I looked her way, Danielle was already past me, rushing to take her child from Oscar. His huge shadow loomed over me as he approached, and I looked up at him and he held the look for a long moment. How you doing, Patrick?" he said and smiled broadly. And, behind him, Gerry burned on the ice. And everything was so goddamned funny for some reason, even though I knew it wasn't. I knew it wasn't. I did. But I was still laughing when they put me in the ambulance.

The truth is that we never know from whom we originally get the ideas and beliefs that shape us, those that make a deep impression on us and which we adopt as a guide, those we retain without intending to and make our own. From a great-grandparent, a grandparent, a parent, not necessarily ours? From a distant teacher we never knew and who taught the one we did know? From a mother, from a nursemaid who looked after her as a child? From the ex-husband of our beloved, from a ġe-bryd-guma we never met? From a few books we never read and from an age through which we never lived? Yes, it's incredible how much people say, how much they discuss and recount and write down, this is a wearisome world of ceaseless transmission, and thus we are born with the work already far advanced but condemned to the knowledge that nothing is ever entirely finished, and thus we carry-like a faint booming in our heads-the exhausting accumulated voices of the countless centuries, believing naively that some of those thoughts and stories are new, never before heard or read, but how could that be, when ever since they acquired the gift of speech people have never stopped endlessly telling stories and, sooner or later, everything is told, the interesting and the trivial, the private and the public, the intimate and the superfluous, what should remain hidden and what will one day inevitably be broadcast, sorrows and joys and resentments, certainties and conjectures, the imagined and the factual, persuasions and suspicions, grievances and flattery and plans for revenge, great feats and humiliations, what fills us with pride and what shames us utterly, what appeared to be a secret and what begged to remain so, the normal and the unconfessable and the horrific and the obvious, the substantial-falling in love-and the insignificant-falling in love. Without even giving it a second thought, we go and we tell.

At his booming voice, her eyes flew open. If he wasn't already on the ground, he would have fallen to his knees. Sebastian was instantly lost. The ship fell away and there was only her. The blue of her eyes was indescribable, so light they unabashedly pulled him in. No color imaginable compared. Her eyes turned pleading. For what? He didn't know. But at that moment he would have given it to her.

Liberty,” boomed Wednesday, as they walked to his car, “is a bitch who must be bedded on a mattress of corpses.” “Yeah?” said Shadow. “Quoting,” said Wednesday. “Quoting someone French. That’s who they have a statue to, in their New York harbor: a bitch, who liked to be fucked on the refuse from the tumbril. Hold your torch as high as you want to, m’dear, there’s still rats in your dress and cold jism dripping down your leg.

My hands are drenched. I check my watch constantly. I stare at the short pollero's thin gold chains around his neck. His shirt and pants aren't as tight as the other pollero's, who walked outside minutes ago. Then the ring against the door, tap, tap, tap. I stand up before the door opens. The door unlocks. Tarsi is awake, and he watches me. His mom smiles and stands up with me. The door opens, a bright flash. My name booms throughout the room. Two shadows appear. At last.

15. Profound connection to the natural world. I’ve written a bit, mostly in general terms, about Indigenous spirituality and how, throughout the world, native cultures have a deep connection to the cycles, beauty, and mystery of nature. Think of the power and mystery in the last words of Chief Crowfoot, quoted in 1890: “What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.

You don’t understand,” my dad said. “They stop you.” “Who? What are you talking about?” my mom asked. “That’s why I was being cautious.” “Who stops you?” “The police. If you’re white, or maybe Oriental, they let you drive however you want. But if you’re not, they stop you.” “Who told you that?” “The guys at the diner. That’s what they say. If you’re black or if you’re brown, they automatically think you’ve done something wrong.” “Rafa, that’s ridiculous. We’ve lived here for fifteen years. We’re citizens.” “The police don’t know that by looking at us. They see a brown face through the windshield and boom! Sirens!” My mom shook her head. “That’s what that was about?” “I didn’t want to give them reason to stop me.” “You were driving like a blind man, Rafa. That will give them reason to stop you.” “Everybody else just has to obey the law. We have to obey it twice as well.” “But that doesn’t mean you have to go twice as slow as everybody else!” The light turned green and my dad brought the car out of first. We cruised under the overpass, a shadow draping over the car like a blanket. “Next time, just try to blend in with everyone else and you’ll be fine,” my mom offered. “The way of the world,” my dad said. “What?” my mom asked as we emerged back into the sunlight. “Just trying to blend in. That’s the way of the world.” “Well, that’s the way of America, at least,” my mom said.

almost fifty per cent and stayed high until the end of the 1950s. In 1957, at the peak of the boom, 123 in every 1,000 women gave birth – a figure unprecedented in American history – and all those children were brought up in far greater prosperity than their parents had known. ‘There never was a country more fabulous than America,’ wrote British historian Robert Payne after a visit in 1949. ‘She bestrides the world like a colossus: no other power at any time in the world’s history has possessed so varied or so great an influence on other nations . . . Half the wealth of the world, more than half the productivity, nearly two-thirds of the world’s machines are concentrated in American hands; the rest of the world lies in the shadow of American industry.’ It was the American Century, and so it would remain.

It took the sun a long while to come over the mountains and until it did my vision was bound to the few gray yards around the trailer. It was day but not day, dim but not night, a fugue of half-thoughts and disconnected images, pulsing with power beyond easy meaning—a crow flapping, glowing black against the gray—a shadow like a man crouched with a knife—parking lots aching with pink blur—so overwhelmed by thought I’d have to sit back, set down the pen, set down my coffee, and it goes on—glass towers gleaming out of gray cityscapes, blinding silver—an old man with a red guitar—the booming flame of rockets trailing smoke—a girl’s face, her freckled cheek downy with fine hairs, fleshy lips spread in a smile over crooked teeth. I sink in reverie—and what, what does it mean?—then scrape a few more lines with my pen. Nothing even approximate. Another failure.

Dorian padded onto his balcony, needing to feel the river breeze on his face, to know that this was real and he was free. He opened the balcony doors, the stones cool on his feet, and gazed out across the razed grounds. He’d done that. He loosed a breath, taking in the glass wall as it sparkled in the moonlight. There was a massive shadow perched atop it. Dorian froze. Not a shadow but a giant beast, its claws gripping the wall, its wings tucked into its body, shimmering faintly in the glow of the full moon. Shimmering like the white hair of the rider atop it. Even from the distance, he knew she was staring right at him, her hair streaming to the side like a ribbon of moonlight, caught in the river breeze. Dorian lifted a hand, the other rising to his neck. No collar. The rider on the wyvern leaned down in her saddle, saying something to her beast. It spread its massive, glimmering wings and leaped into the air. Each beat of its wings sent a hollowed-out, booming gust of wind toward him. It flapped higher, her hair streaming behind her like a glittering banner, until they vanished into the night, and he couldn’t hear its wings beating anymore. No one sounded the alarm. As if the world had stopped paying attention for the few moments they’d looked at each other. And through the darkness of his memories, through the pain and despair and terror he’d tried to forget, a name echoed in his head.

Filming was done outside San Antonio, Texas. The scale of the production was vast and complex. Whole battlefields were scrupulously re-created on the plains of Texas. Wellman deployed as many as five thousand extras and sixty airplanes in some scenes—an enormous logistical exercise. The army sent its best aviators from Selfridge Field in Michigan—the very men with whom Lindbergh had just flown to Ottawa—and stunt fliers were used for the more dangerous scenes. Wellman asked a lot of his airmen. One pilot was killed, another broke his neck, and several more sustained other serious injuries. Wellman did some of the more dangerous stunt flying himself. All this gave the movie’s aerial scenes a realism and immediacy that many found almost literally breathtaking. Wellman captured features of flight that had never been caught on film before—the shadows of planes moving across the earth, the sensation of flying through drifting smoke, the stately fall of bombs, and the destructive puffs of impact that follow. Even the land-bound scenes were filmed with a thoughtfulness and originality that set Wings apart. To bring the viewer into a Parisian nightclub, Wellman used a boom shot in which the camera traveled through the room just above table height, skimming over drinks and between revelers, before arriving at the table of Arlen and Rogers. It is an entrancing shot even now, but it was rivetingly novel in 1927. “Wings,” wrote Penelope Gilliatt simply in The New Yorker in 1971, “is truly beautiful.” Wings was selected as best picture at the very first Academy Awards ceremony in 1929. Wellman, however, wasn’t even invited to the ceremony.

Suddenly he felt like everything was all wrong. He’d made wrong choices every day of his life. In his mind’s eye floated everyone who’d died because of him. Everyone who’d been hurt. From Mindor to Endor, back to Yavin—back to the corpses that had lain, still smoking, in the ruined doorway of the Lars moisture farm. I guess I sort of thought everything was over. I got my happy ending. I thought I did. I mean, didn’t I do everything you asked me to? Master Yoda, you wanted to break the rule of the Sith. And they’re gone. Ben, you asked me to destroy Darth Vader. I did that, too. Father—even you, Father. You told me that together we would throw down the Emperor. And we did. Now it’s over. But it’s not the end. It’s never the end. The cave boomed and shivered as the rock storm arrived like an artillery barrage. Luke just sat, head down, letting dust and grit trickle inside the back of his collar as meteorites pounded the hills. I guess I was still kind of hoping there might be a Happily Ever After in there somewhere. Not even for me. I was ready to die. I still am. It’s everybody else. It’s like everything we went through, it was for nothing. We’re still fighting. We’ll always be fighting. It’s like I didn’t actually save anybody. Gone is the past, he remembered Master Yoda saying once. Imaginary is the future. Always now, even eternity will be. Which Luke had always interpreted as Don’t worry about what’s already done, and don’t worry about what you’ll do later. Do something now. Which would be fine advice, if he had the faintest clue what that something should be. Maybe if he’d had more experience as a general, he’d know if he should search for his missing men, or return to the crash site and wait for pickup, or try to find some way to signal the task force spaceside. I never should have taken this job. I just don’t know what a general would be doing right now. All I know is what a Jedi … Then his head came up. I do know what a Jedi would be doing—and it isn’t sitting around feeling sorry for himself, for starters.

Seriously, should I lose it?” I shrug. “It’s practical. I get it.” He yanks it off and shoves it into the pocket of his shorts. A shake of his head lands everything where it belongs. “Here,” I say, angling my candle toward him. “I already took care of the headband. Fire really isn’t necessary, is it?” I motion toward the unlit candle at his side. He smiles and raises it to mine. As he watches his wick ignite, I stare at the hundreds of tiny whisker-shadows dancing on his face and the contrast of the smooth, illuminated apples of his cheeks. He looks from his candle to me, his eyes glossy in the orange candlelight. “I was just kidding, you know. About your hair,” I say, reaching to adjust a stray curl. “But this is better.” Darren clutches my wrist and lowers my arm slowly, my eyes forced to meet his. The drums from the parade combine with the thump, thump, thump of my heart in my ears. Our smiles fade and my mouth is suddenly a desert. His fingers slide down my wrist until my hand rests loosely in his. A boom from a drum as it passes causes us both to jump. I exhale and take the opportunity to pull away and redirect my attention. Nearly the whole town joins the parade behind the band, some carrying candles, some walking arm in arm. Some holding hands. Did Darren really just try to hold my hand?

I am one person.” “One person chosen by Queen Elena—one person whose brow burned with a sacred mark on the day of that duel! One person who, despite the odds, is still breathing. Our paths crossed for a reason. If you are not gods-blessed, then who is?” “This is ridiculous. This is folly.” “Folly? Folly to fight for what is right, for people who cannot stand up for themselves? You think soldiers are the worst he can send?” Nehemia’s tone softened. “There are far darker things gathering on the horizon. My dreams have been filled with shadows and wings—the booming of wings soaring between mountain passes. And every scout and spy we send into the White Fang Mountains, into the Ferian Gap, does not come back. Do you know what the people say in the valleys below? They say they can hear wings, too, riding the winds through the Gap.

Tex swiveled the FN-FAL on its bipod, identifying the source of the hostile fire. Two men, kneeling on the bow of a boat in the marina. The scope’s cross-hairs centered on the forehead of one of the shooters and he squeezed the trigger. Target eliminated, Tex thought coldly. The man collapsed, the top of his head nearly blown away by the heavy bullet. Next target. Before he could draw down on the second shooter, a rifle boomed from somewhere in the marina and the man toppled over the rail, his body falling into the lagoon.

AND SO THE shadow fell across us that winter afternoon in 1937, but it rested lightly. Nobody dreamed that this tiny cloud would grow until it blocked out the sky. And nobody dreamed that in this darkness each of us would be called to play a role: Father and Betsie and Mr. Kan and Willem—even the funny old Beje with its unmatching floor levels and ancient angles.

In the realm of boundless skies I soar, With the fire of beginnings, I implore, Though thorns may pierce, and darkness may loom, I'll test my strength in thunder's fierce boom. For high above, I seek my place, In the heavens, a name to embrace, Yet every breath fuels my might, As I brave the storms, take flight in the night. In the face of dust, my resolve remains, Despite the wounds, and life's crushing pains, I stand unbroken, my spirit's ablaze, In the crucible, I'll burn and amaze. Though I may stumble, and falter, and strain, In my heart, the desire remains untamed, With sparks in my eyes, and hope in my veins, I'll rise from the ashes, through trials and gains. For I've etched in my fists, a star's radiant gleam, In the city's uproar, I'll conquer, it seems, Though darkness may fall in an infinite stream, My end won't be falling; it's more than it seems. On my face, I may wear the marks of the fight, With a broken resolve, a fractured light, But within my core, strength takes its flight, And from the embers, I'll emerge in the night. Though breaths may shatter, and heartbeats may sway, In the depths of my being, I'll find my way, With fiery gaze, and a steadfast say, I'll conquer the tempest, come what may. I've woven a star in the palm of my hand, Let the drums of the city resound, understand, Though shadows may gather, like grains of sand, My fall is not final, I'll rise and expand. In the realm of boundless skies, I roam, With a heart unyielding, I'll find my home, Through trials and triumphs, I'll ceaselessly roam, My end isn't falling; it's where I'll become.

nudged the stars gently and found them more responsive to my whims as I angled them towards King. And finally, they let me see them. They were just a blur of shadow, but I knew it was them from the cold feeling sweeping through my bones. They stood as a dark lord in Alestria, the streets red with blood as magic swept into their body and made them into a creature of impossible, terrifying power. I saw the throne once more, the shadowy form of King claiming it as Fae wound through the entire palace around him, offering up their lives, their power. King fed on it all, becoming the most powerful Fae to ever walk the land. They ruled with an iron fist, crushing any who turned against them, wielding the masses of the Black Card to control the kingdom. There were curfews and hooded guards patrolling the streets, watching every Fae and making sure they abided to King’s laws. I tried to force the stars to show me King’s face and the shadows began to peel back as I watched the monster sitting on their throne. Lionel Acrux stared at me from within their hood and my heart juddered, but their face changed just as quickly, showing me people I knew hiding behind the mask of shadow. From Orion to Eugene, Greyshine, Scarlett, Mars, Titan, Cindy Lou and finally…Gareth. His mouth was moving in words I couldn’t hear and I tried to get closer, his face contorted as he screamed and screamed and suddenly his voice boomed in my head. “Save her, Gabriel – save her – the power will destroy her and all that she loves, let her bite you, it’s the only way!

You dare to enter my Court?” Nyktos’ voice boomed through the chamber, shaking the entire palace. I saw Aios stir out of the corner of my eye, but I couldn’t take my eyes off him. He drifted forward, his wings moving silently. “And touch what is mine?

I don't remember falling asleep, but I do remember the dream. I went back in that barren cave, the ceiling heavy and low above me. Annabeth was kneeling under the weight of a dark mass like a pile of boulders. She was too tired even to cry out. Her legs trembled. Any second, I knew she would run out of strength, and the cavern ceiling collapse on top of her. "How are mortal guests?" a male voice boomed. It wasn't Kronos. Kronos's voice was raspy and metallic like a knife scraped across the stone. I'd heard it taunting me many times before in my dreams. This voice was deeper and lower like a bass guitar. It's a force that made the ground vibrate. Luke emerged from the shadows. He ran to Annabeth knelt beside her, then looked back at the unseen man. "She's fading. We must hurry." The hypocrite. Like he cared what happened to her.

There are far darker things gathering on the horizon. My dreams have been filled with shadows and wings—the booming of wings soaring between mountain passes. And every scout and spy we send into the White Fang Mountains, into the Ferian Gap, does not come back. Do you know what the people say in the valleys below? They say they can hear wings, too, riding the winds through the Gap.

But I never changed it! That story comes from the fact that when I was going to Switzerland, to the clinic to clean up, I had to land at Heathrow and change planes. And there’s the Street of Shame following me, “Hey, Keith.” I said, “Look, shut the fuck up. I’m going to have me blood changed.” Boom, that’s it. And then off to the plane. After that, it’s like it’s in the Bible or something. I just said it to fob them off. It’s been there ever since. I can’t untie the threads of how much I played up to the part that was written for me. I mean the skull ring and the broken tooth and the kohl. Is it half and half? I think in a way your persona, your image, as it used to be known, is like a ball and chain. People think I’m still a goddamn junkie. It’s thirty years since I gave up the dope! Image is like a long shadow.

Leave!” the king demands, his deep voice booming through the room. But it’s just a voice, and he is just a man.

After all whether boom or bust, it's a bullish market for booze.

Amongst the booming bass and the singing girls and smell of alcohol, my heart felt full, like I’d found my place. The indescribable thrill, not of drinking and singing and dancing, but of being with people who understood you, even if they didn’t know you. The feeling of belonging.

The truth blazed like sunlight in the shadows of Barracks 28. The real sin I had been committing was not that of inching toward the center of a platoon because I was cold. The real sin lay in thinking that any power to help and transform came from me. Of course it was not my wholeness, but Christ’s that made the difference.

Get your hands off my mate.” Evren’s voice boomed through the garden, a demand to not be mistaken, as he stormed through the double doors with a blood-soaked sword in his hand.

When he was hidden in shadows, he looked up at the night sky. He had no choice. He pressed his hands against his forehead, trying to think of another possibility. There was none. He wiped at the hot tears stinging his eyes, then slowly he lifted his arms to the fathomless black sky. He could endure anything if he knew Serena was safe. Anything. "Father of night and evil, I call you." A primitive vibration trembled in the air. He knew the Atrox was near. "Allow me to cross over and become your servant again." A deadly cold throbbed through him with the ancient rhythm of evil. "I come freely," Stanton added and felt something collapse inside him. "Take me back to the night." Spears of lightning crackled across the sky and a concussion boomed through the earth, releasing the sulfurous smells of hell. Then a raven-black cloud seeped up from the ground and hovered around him. Stanton held an image of Serena's face deep inside him as he breathed the icy spirit of the Atrox back into his body. The chill seeped deep inside him, wintry tentacles reaching down to his bones. The Atrox embraced him and welcomed him back to its congregation. Its raw power surged through him and when Stanton opened his eyes, he again ruled the night. The world around him seemed sharper now, as if he could see in the dark. His pain was gone and in its place he felt a dark joy. He grinned as the wild rapture seized him. This time he was no longer invitus. Evil pulsed through him without guilt or worry, consequence or remorse. He breathed in the feel of it, then leaned back and became a black mist, hissing into the air.

White light veiled the world. He did not see things, he saw into them, through them, saw the nightwalker and shadows for the insubstantial entities they were. The souls of his comrades glowed, their light dimmed only by self-imposed restraints, restraints Abelar had shed. As he fell, his body ignited with radiance, an apotheosis of light. For a moment, he felt himself motionless, suspended in space, as if he had become the light. He savored the time, thought of Elden, his innocent eyes, his trusting soul. He loved his son—forever. The moment ended. He plummeted earthward toward the nightwalker. The creature shielded its face with a forearm, cowered before Abelar. Abelar’s soul swelled. No regrets plagued him or tortured his final thoughts. His mind turned to those he loved, his wife, his father, his son. He laughed, shouted Elden’s name as he descended, and his voice boomed over the rain, over the thunder, over the darkness.

A deep, booming chime echoed through the square. It throbbed in the stones under my feet. Children cried, covering their ears. And I started screaming as I ran. ‘Marcel!’ I screamed, knowing it was useless. The crowd was too loud, and my voice was breathless with exertion. All the same and all, I couldn't stop screaming. The clock tolled again. I ran past a nude young girl child in her mother's arms as her hair was almost white in the dazzling sunlight. A circle of tall men, all wearing red blazers, called out warnings as I barreled through them. The clock tolled again and again. On the other side of the men in blazers, there was a break in the throng, space between the sightseers who milled aimlessly around me. My eyes peered over the vast dark narrow passage to the right of the wide square edifice under the tower. I couldn't see the street level there were still too many kids and teens in the way. The clock tolled again, and the rings cried out. Part: 2 Thrashed Just like me, this is not here anymore… It was hard to see now, more than ever. Without the kids, teens, and tweens, to break the wind, it whipped at my face and burned my eyes. -And- I for one at that moment could not be one hundred present certain if that was the reason behind my tears, or if I was crying in defeat as the clock hands rounded the face again, and the bell grew hazier. A big family of ten stood nearest to the alley's opening. The two girls wore blue dresses, with matching ribbons tying their dark hair back. The father wasn't small or big. It seemed like I could see something bright in the shadows, just over his shoulder. I rushed toward them, trying to see past the stinging tears. The clock hands spun, and the littlest girl clamped her fingers around one of the boy's long fingers.

On February 15, 2013, a huge meteor streaked across the sky over Chelyabinsk, Russia. For a brief moment it shone brighter than the Sun and cast stark shadows. At first it did not make a sound, but about two minutes later a sonic boom shattered windows and even knocked people over.

boom of shots firing nearby. To fall to the ground and cover our heads. To feel like an animal, prey in a pile on the ground. We’ve known the shooter could show up anywhere, anywhere people gathered, we’ve expected to see him in our periphery, a masked shadow moving through the crowd, picking people off at random, semiautomatic booms putting bodies down, sending them flailing through the broken air. A bullet is a thing so fast it’s hot and so hot it’s mean and so straight it moves clean through a body, makes a hole, tears, burns, exits, goes on, hungry, or it remains, cools, lodges, poisons. When a bullet opens you up, blood pours like out of a mouth too full. A stray bullet, like a stray dog, might

Nowadays, people often ask me what it’s like hunting with my dad. We’ve actually had offers of tens of thousands of dollars from people who want to spend a day in Phil’s blind. It always amazes us because when we were growing up, duck hunting was our everyday life. When we were kids, we were always in the blind with Dad. I don’t remember my first hunt or the first duck I killed, like other young hunters. It was a different time and Phil wasn’t exactly a traditional dad. He didn’t take pictures of our first duck. It wasn’t sentimental; it was just life. We hunted and fished because we wouldn’t eat if we didn’t. Phil’s number one concern was always safety. If you were careless with a loaded gun, you would not come back to the blind. You’d be stuck at home with Mom the next time. Also, you had to be prepared because Phil wasn’t gonna baby you out there. If you didn’t wear the proper clothes, you were gonna freeze your butt off. And I did many times! You had to get your stuff together as well: shells, guns, and whatever you needed. I will never forget a time when I was about ten and we were all going on a dove hunt. It was opening day, and we were all excited. I was shooting a .410 shotgun, but I could only find one shell. Since we were leaving early in the morning, Phil let me know we wouldn’t be able to stop at a store because none of them would be open that early in the morning. “You better make that shot count,” Phil told me. So I shadowed Phil during the entire hunt, watching him drop ‘em. I rant to fetch the birds for Phil, and if any were still alive, he would pinch their heads. With one flick of Phil’s wrist, the dove’s head separated from its body. I was fascinated and yet a little freaked out. You can’t be sensitive when you’re hunting with Phil. I kept throwing my shotgun up to shoot, but I knew I had only one shot. Finally, about eleven o’clock in the morning, I saw my opportunity. I told Phil I was gonna take my shot. He was supportive and told me to make it count. Boom! Wouldn’t you know I smoked the dove? I couldn’t believe it. I went one-for-one with only one shell. As I turned to look at my dad with the biggest smile ever, I noticed he was putting his gun down. He’d shot at the exact same time. He wanted to make sure my shot counted. “Good shot, Willie boy, put your safety back on,” Phil told me. I didn’t know why the safety mattered since I only had one shell, but he wanted to instill the practice in my brain. We’ll never know who hit that bird, but believe me, I told Jase that I got it for sure.

Where is the boy who has not dreamed of the cannibal isles, those strange, fantastic places over the rim of the world, where naked brown men move like shadows through unimagined jungles, and horrid feasts are celebrated to the “boom, boom, boom!” of the twelve-foot drums?

Father,” the Shadowborn princess said, voice smooth and yet booming through the massive room. “My gift for you on the auspicious night of your birth. I present to you, the murderer of your son.” The King of the House of Shadow leveled his gaze at me, a thousand-year-lifetime’s worth of hatred in their depths.