title: The Dark Side of Light: A Medieval Time Travel Fantasy
author:  Susan D. Kalior 
description: Excerpt: <P>Suddenly, my body tingles. I slow my walk, following my psychic senses. Nausea rolls up in my stomach. I stop and close my eyes a moment to let it pass. My limbs weaken; my heart fires beats machine-gun fast, and my elation sours. I am near. I know it. But I didn't think I'd feel so bad when I found the spot, although, then again, why wouldn't I? I must be brave and do what is necessary to avoid the Big Empty. <P>I open my eyes and walk forward. With each clammy step of my soaked socks and boots, I try to sense the exact spot I died. I am sinking into a trance, looking up at the trees, gnarly branches twisting, parading their shapely leaves. In Celtic mythology the oak is thought to be a tree of doors, a gateway between worlds. Perfect. <P>I'd heard oaks could live up to fifteen hundred years. The forest has seen so much over the centuries, maybe even my old life and more probable still, the horrid way I died. And now the oaks shall witness me again in a new body. I wonder if they are saying to each other, `She's ba--ack.' <P>A strange sensation crawls up my legs, as if rooting me into the bowels of time. This is the spot. With closed eyes, I sink deeper inside myself, deeper deeper . . . down down. My breathing slows. My head feels opened like a flower, whirring with energy that deepens my altered state. <P>I draw my sword across my chest, with one hand on hilt and the other pressing the flat blade against my heart. "I am one with the hunter, the warrior, the predator, the beast. One." My body tingles like sea foam. I touch the periphery of my past, not like the replays in my vision where I feel tossed about inside a memory. But as I align myself with the very taproot of that horrid event, this feels more real than even that. <P>The energy of a cold ocean wave smacks me, leaving me breathless. Like an elevator with cables cut, I crash to my hands and knees, my sword flat on the ground beneath my head. With one hand on the hilt and the other pressed over the blade, I tremble. I gasp for air as I ride on a current from now to what happened. <P>I am in the marsh searching for food. Armored men on horse back thunder toward me. I run, laden by the weight of my water-logged gown, tangled in my legs. Dirty water splashes up around me, itching my shins and forearms. I can taste the marsh water on my tongue. Silt spackles my skin as my bare feet flee into the oak forest. Panting horse breath blows at my back. Men dismount and surround me with sadistic smiles. <P>Dirty blades tear at my already tattered ivory gown, nicking my skin. Blood fills the slices in my flesh. I am on my back, enduring rape. A wide face with yellow hair pants lasciviously over mine: cruel blue eyes, lots of teeth, foul breath. <P>I look past the man's face and focus on a beloved oak tree above me. The sun glimmers through leaves. So beautiful. I drink in the tree's calm beauty with wind rustling and trees making song. I blot out the men's laughter, making fun that I can look so peaceful while being raped. Their cruelty worms its way into my heart, building like a pressure cooker trying to explode me. And the joy of my oak tree fades from focus leaving me to wallow and writhe in a cesspool of degradation. <P>A sword is drawn above me. It plunges down, gouging my stomach. The blade is pushed in harder, through my body, into the earth. I'm trapped. Shrill agony. <P>I feel myself as Shallee for a moment. My hand curls around the blade of my sword, squeezing. Sharp sting. Fingers getting wet. Squeezing harder, eyes bulging wide, staring at a forever knot engraved on my blade. Through clenched teeth, I command, "I am one with the hunter, the warrior, the predator, the beast! One." I'm sucked into a pinpoint where life and death converge. It's violent and pure, a worm hole of perpetual explosion. I feel like I am dissolving. Soon I will be . . . no more. My mouth stretches as far as it can in a silent scream. He-lp me! I evaporate into the energy. <P>The dirt at my face gives way, and I am in slow motion, falling off the edge of light into a black void, like sinking in water. Escaped hair tendrils move about my face, and my long black pony tail floats up around my eyes. I have no bearing, no sense of up or down, backward or forward. I've traveled into my pain, into the quiet dark. I am gone.
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  **Kingdom Come**
  
    
  
   _A Time Travel Novel_
  
    
  
  By Kathryn Le Veque
  
    
    
    
  
  Copyright 2010 by Kathryn Le Veque  
  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any
  manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief
  quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.  
    
  Printed by Dragonblade Publishing in the United States of America  
    
  
  Text copyright 2010 by Kathryn Le Veque  
  Cover copyright 2010 by Kathryn Le Veque
  
    
    
    
    
    
  
   **PROLOGUE**
  
    
    
  
   _Present Day_
  
   _Nahariya, Israel_
  
   __
  
  _Excerpt from the prequel, “The Crusader”_
  
    
  
  For the archaeologist and her resurrected knight, it was coming to an end.
  
  It was difficult to see the road in the dead of night. The headlights of the
  jeep pierced the veil of darkness as Rory and Kieran sped south, away from the
  pursuing Land Rovers. To make matters worse, more clouds were gathering and
  the wind had picked up. Having spent more than a year in Nahariya, 