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Copyright © 2010
A Legend in Time - Available now!
Experience time travel like never before in this mythic fiction with James Sutherland and his mysterious mentor from the future, Professor Albert Traven.
Join Jim as he chronicles his daring journey to the Samuel Colt firearms factory in Hartford during its heyday in search of his mentor and some much needed answers. And again, when he travels three-hundred years earlier to a time when he thinks he'll be alone and safer. Little does he know that he will become a captive to his new surroundings-a New England area populated by the Wangunk Indian tribe, where he finally finds fulfillment and love in his life with the beautiful Indian princess, Namoenee, whose strong character is matched only by her father's.
You will find that true love transcends space and time, as it is there, on the shores of Lake Pocotopaug that Jim learns to appreciate life in a timeline completely different than his own, fights in a war against another tribe, and witnesses a legend in the making-the death of his young bride.
And what about the mysterious Traven? You will discover that he belongs to an organization called the Earth Time Authority-a group of time travelers whose soul purpose is to observe the past and not change it. But when Traven, co-inventor of time travel itself, tries to interfere with Namoenee's death he goes against the group's ultimate directive.
A Legend in Time combines action-packed adventure with the romantic allure of a Native American legend that will entertain both male and female alike; ages: young-adult to adult.
Now available through CreateSpace.
Now available through Amazon.com and on Kindle.
Available through Barnes and Noble on the Nook.
Excerpt: From The Challenge chapter.
The son of a bitch bit me. I don’t know if Warrior’s Cry really hated me, or if he just wanted to make me as injured as he was because of the bruises on his shoulders, which he received from the vine straps the previous day. Whichever it was, he sunk his teeth into my upper arm, and I yelped because of it.
It was day three of the challenge, the last event, and it was the red wrestle.
Warrior’s Cry and I faced each other as we stood just inside the inner circle of the strike pole area at its north end. Wood’s Edge took an inch wide, three-foot long piece of leather and handed one end of it to Warrior’s Cry. He held it in his left hand. When it was handed to me, I did the same in my left hand – leaving my dominant right hand free. Wood’s Edge then strolled to the opposite end of the arena and very ceremoniously thrust a knife into the top of the south strike pole. From our position, he stood tall between the blue and red flags. I turned back to face my opponent and he stared at me with a tremendous scowl – apparently trying to intimidate me. I returned his look of distaste to show him his antics weren’t doing anything, and he immediately started to wrap the strap around his palm. I did the same until there were maybe six to eight inches between our hands. He grunted and snarled. And I laughed in his face. I wasn’t afraid of him.
The object of the challenge was to wrestle each other from one end of the circle to the other and gain control of the knife in order to cut the strap that was between us. If one of us slipped out of the strap or gave up and let go on purpose, then it would be a loss. If no one let go, then the person who cut the rawhide could then retrieve the prize that Wood’s Edge held in his hand.
Namoenee told me that the “red” part of the match usually meant blood by any means necessary to reach the knife before your opponent did. I glanced at her in the mob of people as she sat next to her father. Her brow was curled in worry, but I gave her a reassuring nod that it was going to be okay. It would be – one way or the other. If I didn’t win, then I would resort to stealing the watch. Snow Falling stood in front of us as he did the first day of the three part challenge and I could tell he was proud to do it. He raised his arms high into the air for all to see, held them there for a second or two (just like Mr. Parmelee), and then swung them down straight.
The red wrestle had begun.
I expected both of us to just run toward the knife and have a little wrestling match as we drew closer. Instead, as soon as Snow Falling dropped his arms, Warrior’s Cry lunged and pulled at me until I was close enough for him to cause me injury. Our left arms overlapped, and our shoulders touched for only a second. And that’s when he bit me. He lowered his head and chomped down on my upper arm just below my tattoo. The Wangunks were very superstitious, and I didn’t know if he thought he could gain power from me by sucking some blood out of my arm (or my tattoo), but it really only succeeded in pissing me off.
After my initial surprise and while he was still latched on, I gave him a roundhouse punch that caught him square in the left ear. He released his painful toothy grip and staggered back as far as the tether allowed. We stood there a moment. I was holding my arm, and he was cupping his ear. The crowd cheered. Both of our hands came away with blood on them. The red wrestle event only got worse from there.
He pulled hard against my hold on the strap.
I pulled hard back at him.
We circled each other while looking for a weakness and the dust from the dry ground started to rise up around our ankles. Warrior’s Cry kicked some loose dirt at my feet, and I made a move. I used his pull against me to carry my momentum toward him, and I came up to his right side. I swung my right leg behind his and pushed him hard in the chest. Between my actions and the slack that suddenly appeared in the strap, he went down with ease. As soon as he hit the ground, I started tugging with all my might. I wanted him to let go and lose right there, but all I did was drag him across the ground as my yanking gave way to an all out pull. Dragging my opponent worked until I neared the fire pit in the center of the arena. It was there that I lost my footing on some loose soil and fell. Warrior’s Cry seized the moment to gain the upper hand and got up before I could. He started to do the dragging. After I had dragged him fifteen feet, and he dragged me about five, my left hand was on fire. The leather strap dug into my flesh, and I felt it start to slip from the mixture of blood and sweat. It hurt worse than the bite marks in my shoulder and all I wanted to do was to let go. Instead, I grabbed the tether in the middle with my right hand to give my left hand some slack and unwrapped it a couple of times. Luckily for me my right hand didn’t slip nor did my opponent turn around to see what I was doing. At that point, I barely held on to the strap, and I could have easily lost had he noticed. I quickly rewrapped the strap, but this time I included my wrist a couple of times before I returned it to my palm for a single circumference.
The bond felt more secure than it had to start with, so I flipped over onto my back. Then I spun on my butt until my feet pointed forward and I was in a seated position. I dug in my heels and Warrior’s Cry tripped up on my intruding feet. And with that move, Warrior’s Cry pulled me right up to my feet. After getting us ten feet closer to the knife, he was met with resistance again. The tribe cheered loudly once more.
I went to punch him in the head again with my free right fist, but he blocked it with his left arm, and with his free right, he grabbed me by the wrist. There wasn’t enough slack in the leather strap for me to do anything with my left hand, so our arms ended up crossed above our heads. We started to kick each other in the shins. Some landed, some missed. We pushed, pulled, and shoved at each other.
I grew incredibly hot. It wasn’t as hot as the “hellhole,” but it was close enough when you have a man of equal strength and body temperature only inches away with the bright sun beating down. Fortunately, his grip on me loosened from the sweat, and I twisted my arm and spun my body and he lost his hold of me. I found myself in a terribly awkward position because my back ended up toward Warrior’s Cry, and I felt him try to take advantage of it. I had to think fast on my feet.
It was only because of the tether that I felt him lower his hands to wrap them around my upper body. And I let him, because I thought that once his arms were at my shoulder level I could grab hold and flip him over my back. I thought wrong. I felt a hand land on my shoulder, and then the second one grabbed hold of the waist of my shorts, and I was suddenly pulled backward and hoisted into the air high above Warrior’s Cry’s head. There was nothing I could do to prevent it. Warrior’s Cry let out a scream that curdled my blood. The tribe’s cheers grew louder. I quickly looked around for a chance to escape my horizontal predicament as he carried me toward the south strike pole and the knife, but it happened so fast that I saw no opportunity to do anything except watch my fate.
Victory was soon at hand for my opponent, for as we neared the pole he threw me up against it. If I had crashed into the pole with the small of my back then I am sure that I would have been paralyzed, but because of the short tether and Warrior’s Cry ill attempt, I spun in midair and slammed up against the pole with my stomach instead. The severity of it was the wind was knocked out of me, and I laid there, gasping for air and watched Warrior’s Cry pull the knife out of the top of the smooth stump. As the saying goes, “Haste makes waste,” and Warrior’s Cry took the time for a pre-celebration with the mob of people who were exploding with excitement. He raised the knife up high to show everyone, to make the moment of the win last just a second longer, and that was his mistake.
I laid there at his feet, barely able to breathe, and watched his gloating. I did the only thing I could to stop him. I raised a leg, cocked it back, and in a last ditch effort to win, I thrust my heel directly into his groin. Warrior’s Cry never saw it coming. His straining face went deep red and he fell to his knees, which brought the knife down to the ground next to me. I lunged for it.
