Guest Blog The Creator’s Eye: Mover of Fate, Part I by R.N. Feldman

Thanks for having me at Fang-Tastic! 

Rather than yapp away about my book like on any other blog, let’s get weird― paranormally weird!  This is a paranormal book blog, is it not?  Not to say that my series, The Creator’s Eye, doesn’t have plenty of other-wordly stuff going on in it.  Chracaters include different alien beings who have evolved all kinds of strange abilities, such as the lighbringers who can have multiple bodies at the same time.  There are the Movers who can manipulate matter with the force of their will.  And all sorts of Folds, that bend time and space to create wondrous anomalies.  But today, I want to talk about real life paranormal activity― something that actually happened to me.

When I was a teenager, I had a ghost follow me around for about a year and a half.  I had gone to a summer camp on an isolated cove on Catalina Island.  The counselors there told us all sorts of ghost stories, but most of them sounding like trying to tell a scary campfire tale.  It was the handful of people who lived there year round who shared the good stuff―  the stories that were so specific that they actually sounded real.  The janitor told me he spent the winter months cleaning children’s handprints off the bathroom mirrors over and over again, even when there were no kids staying at the cove.  One of the cooks described the ghost of a Native American man who sometimes stood at his window.  The kayaking instructor told me about the ghost of a little girl that appeared in his bedroom and tugged at his toes.  Interestingly, I had a friend who became a counselor there many years later and stayed in the same room as that instructor.  They never met each other, but he told me the exact same story about the little girl.  This camp had a long history.  It was supposedly a native village, a military training ground, a boy’s school, and a dude ranch.  A lot can happen over such a time period.  Still, it all sounds absurd coming from someone else’s lips. 

One night, I was lying in my top bunk trying to fall asleep.  It was about 11:30 at night and everyone else in my dorm was asleep.  I just lay awake, frustrated, staring across the room.  All of a sudden, I had a creepy sensation that someone was standing inches in front of me, staring right into my eyes.  Unnerved, I rolled over to face the wall.  But then I heard someone grab a hold of the wooden ladder and climb up my bunk.  It creaked with each step, and then someone sat down on the side of my bed.  The mattress actually sank down under palpable weight.  I tried the best I could not to freak out.  I got up, hopped out of bed, trying to avoid touching the presence as best I could, and went to the bathroom.  I hung out in there for about twenty minutes until I convinced myself that I had imagined the whole thing, then went back to bed and fell asleep. 

Nothing happened to me again that summer, or the next one.  It was the Fall after that, a year and several months later, that I was lying in bed in my own home.  It was 11:30 at night.  I was unable to fall asleep again and staring out across my room, when suddenly, I felt someone standing at my door, watching me.  Creeped out again, I rolled over to face my wall and ignore it, but in an instant, the presence warped across the room and stood next to my bed.  I could feel it there, icy and cold, just staring at me.  Then it lay down on the bed beside me and tried to cozy up next to me.   Child protective services, anyone?  I shuddered, got up, wandered around the house for a while until I calmed down enough to go back to bed, and went to sleep.

The next morning over breakfast, I told my mom what happened.  I didn’t expect her to believe me, but she looked very concerned.  She had me speak to a friend of hers who was interested in all things psychic and other-wordly.  That friend told me that a ghost is someone who for some reason could not move on to the afterlife.  They had some fear, anger, or other issue that ties them to the material world.   She explained that I needed to treat the specter like an actual person who was invading my privacy and demand that it leave me alone, and once I did so, I needed to believe that it was gone.  It was my belief that allowed it to appear.  I found that odd, because I was pretty skeptical about ghosts until this point and was still somewhat doubtful even when one was sitting right next to me.

Over the next few weeks, her suggestion that the ghost was someone who could not “move on” seemed to be on the mark.  The spirit appeared to me the same way every time.  I would be lying in bed, it would appear at the door, warp across the room, sit down in bed and try to get close to me.  I would say to it in my head to “Go away!  You’re invading my space!” (I was very polite, considering the situation), but every week or two it would reappear and become more real.  I got the sense that it was a very sad person who was seeking comfort, or some sort of human contact. 

Finally, I actually saw her.  She appeared as a woman in her early thirties with long, straight, black hair.  She looked Native American, but wore a long, pale cotton night gown.  She was transparent, glowing a greenish blue, and sat on the edge of my bed looking downcast. 

I wasn’t scared at this point, just annoyed.  I was tired of being kept awake at night.  Up until this point, every time she had appeared I mentally exclaimed for her to go away, but this time I said aloud, firmly, “Leave me alone!  You need to move on!  It’s not okay for you to be here!”  I waited a moment, expecting her to look at me, but she didn’t move her head at all.  Still sitting down, still staring at her lap with a downcast expression, she floated off my bed and slowly rose through my ceiling. 

After that I knew she was gone for good.

Many ghost stories still sound ludicrous to me, but I can also tell when people sound sincere and they believe in what they experienced.  I believe that many things are possible even if science does not yet have easy ways to explain them.  A lot of sci-fi ideas have predated actual scientific developments, and it is this realm of possibility that helps to keep me energized as a writer and a reader.  The Creator’s Eye was a great place for me to explore the edges of my imagination, where metaphysics bleeds over into quantum physics, evolution can take many strange and alien paths, and mental abilities can be taken to wondrous extremes.

-R.N. Feldman

The Creator’s Eye: Mover of Fate, Part I

The Creator’s Eye

Book I

R.N. Feldman

Genre: Science Fiction/ Fantasy

Date of Publication: November 26, 2014

ISBN: 978-1501083617

ASIN: B00O705KD6

Number of pages: 270

Word Count: 58,401

Cover Artist: R.N. Feldman and Caroline Miller

Book Description:

On a hidden archipelago, people known as Movers manipulate matter with their minds while strange Folds in space transform the landscape into wondrous and often deadly anomalies. 

When a young Mover named Michael Edwards discovers that he is descended from a long line of beings who can not only Move matter, but actually Create it, he finds himself at the center of a cosmic struggle for power. 

Manipulated by friends, family, and an ominous prophecy, he allies himself with a host of strange creatures and characters as he fights to become Mover of his own destiny.

Book Trailer: http://youtu.be/o8-NsFjl7dA

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Available at Amazon

CHAPTER I DISCOVERY DAY

Michael took a deep breath as he watched another seizure wrack his mother’s body. It was a small one, but he dutifully laid her on the floor just in case it became violent. He stood nearby as she twisted and shivered. He had to remind himself not to interfere— to let the attack run its course. The seizures always caught him by surprise, but the procedure to deal with them had become almost banal— lay her on the floor, make sure she didn’t hit her head, then wait until it was  over.

After a few moments, she lay still and stared vacantly at the ceiling. Michael helped her sit up. He wrapped an arm around her waist and lifted her to a chair at the dining table. Her wiry brown hair tickled his ear. It was the same color and curliness as his, but no amount of combing seemed to keep it in place anymore. He could barely recognize his own face in her sallow cheeks and sunken eyes. He looked more like his father anyway, with his golden skin, green eyes, and broad shoulders. His mother, meanwhile, had grown thin and frail, but when he lifted her up, her limp body felt as heavy as a sack of wet dough.

“Are you okay?” Michael asked as he arranged her in her chair. Her dull, dark eyes stared ahead blankly.

“Mom, do you want to eat?” he asked, although he didn’t actually expect a reply. It had been years since she had articulated a full sentence, but he didn’t like treating her like a vegetable. Once in a while she was lucid enough to grunt a response, but this time, she did not even move.

“I’m going to make dinner now,” Michael told her, tentatively leaving her, hoping she would not fall or have another seizure the moment he turned  away.

He went to the kitchen sink where he had only just finished washing   the vegetables when he had been interrupted by her collapse. He sliced the sweet, white ghost carrots— a summertime favorite of his town— into big chunks and put them in a pot with the other vegetables. He covered them with stock and turned up the heat on the stove. The pilot clicked a few times, but there was no whoosh of flames springing to life. Michael grumbled at the malfunctioning burner as he set the pot aside and lifted the  enameled stove lid. The firebox was out. The small carton of rocks that usually glowed red with potential heat were instead an ashen grey.

Michael had boiled some water for tea that morning, so he knew that they should be working. Usually when they died, they went out slowly, becoming weaker over the course of a few days, but these had just inexplicably lost their oomph. He wondered if he had accidentally spilled something on them. Regardless, he would have to light them, but he didn’t hunt for matches. Instead, he took it as a chance to practice his  Moving.

He set the kitchen timer for five minutes, rolled up his sleeves and pointed his finger at the small cluster of stones. He stared at them, or actually focused his eyes on an imaginary point beyond them. He would make them catch fire. According to the books his uncle Sefu gave him, he should not hope, need, want, or pray for the fire to manifest. He had to imagine it was already there. Anything less merely affirmed his lack of will. It was a small nuance, but made all the difference.

Michael focused his thoughts like a beam of sunlight, pushing all foggy doubt out of his mind that what he was doing was impossible. His mind wandered occasionally, but he kept bringing it back to its goal, to the reality that he required— that there was already fire in the firebox. His concentration reached a frenzied tension and his vision  blurred.

Unable to hold his thoughts anymore, Michael relaxed his stare. His vision re-focused and to his satisfied surprise, a small spray of sparks issued from his fingertip. It surrounded and warmed the firestones. Without stopping his Moving, he checked the kitchen timer. Two minutes had elapsed. It was not a personal record, but Michael acknowledged that there was at least merit in consistency.

The dull stones crackled, catching fire on their own. Michael ceased his Moving, lowered the stove top, and replaced the soup on the revived flame. While waiting for it to boil, he chopped garlic and parsley. Even though his mother was about as responsive as the firebox was a moment ago, he did his best to make her meals taste good. He hoped that a well-cared for meal was somehow healing or imperceptibly uplifting to her  spirit.

Michael added some herbs and salt, and when the vegetables had softened, he turned off the flame and crushed the whole concoction with a sturdy slotted spoon. It was kind of a shame to mash it up, but lengthy chewing was beyond his mother’s  ability.

“Here you go,” he said, serving her a bowl. “Eat it while it’s  hot.”

At first it seemed she hadn’t heard, but a ghost of awareness flitted across   her face. She dipped a spoon into the beige puree and after a slow moment, dragged it to her lips. Michael watched her mechanically eat for a while. He listened to the clumsy clink of the metal spoon against her teeth and the sloppy glug of her throat. Once he was sure that she was underway, he got up to wash the dishes and perhaps find a moment to pour himself a bowl. But before he took a step, he heard the rustling of packs at the front door. His father was home.

Michael hurriedly opened the door for him. His father was still rifling through his pocket for his keys. “Ah, thanks!” his dad, Simon, smiled through crow’s feet and a thick salt and pepper beard.

Michael took his father’s bags.

His dad stepped into their living room, shutting the door behind him. “So?” he asked as he peeled off his coat and slung it over the sofa. “Is your mom  okay?”

Michael described her recent seizure and added with measured assurance, “I think she’s fine now.”

“Was that the only one?” his dad asked, but did not sound particularly concerned. “No, she had a series of them a couple hours after you left. She’s been  mostly

absent since then. I had to stay around the house the past couple of days keeping an eye on her.”

His dad nodded aloofly and patted his belly, which along with a slope to his shoulders, had grown more pronounced since his wife took ill. He strode over to the stove and ladled himself a bowl of soup. “Is this all there is?” he asked  disappointedly.

“Um,” Michael began, a little frustrated by his father’s dissatisfaction, “I think there’s some phoenix in the ice box from last night,” he  suggested.

Phoenixes were a fiery-colored, long-plumed fowl commonly raised in the region, but lacked any of the powers of resurrection borne by their mythological  namesake.

Michael’s father wrinkled his nose at the prospect of cold bird and glumly muttered, “I’ll stick with the soup.”

Michael tried not to make a face and instead asked how his trip  was. “Interesting,” Simon began as he took a seat at the far side of the table away  from

his wife. “This was an exciting one.”

Michael’s father worked as an assessor for the government’s environmental insurance agency. Arimbol, the island chain on which they lived, was full of unexplained natural phenomena colloquially called folds. They were places where nature and physics would bend. Most folds were so subtle that unless you were paying close attention you could pass through them without notice, but others were beautiful, miraculous  places.

Michael had heard of some where water flowed uphill, optics went awry, or wind burst from the ground with the force of a hurricane. There were also folds that were quite dangerous, that could make you sick, crazy, or even kill you. Most folds were relatively small though, only affecting an area the size of his living room, while the largest engulfed the entire Arimbolean archipelago.

Michael had never had the chance to travel, so loved to hear stories whenever his dad returned from one of his many trips. He had seen more of Arimbol than anyone else in their village, so knew a great deal about its flora and fauna, most of which existed nowhere else on Earth. Some were widespread across the islands and were even farmed. Besides the phoenix and summer ghost carrots, their town of New Canaan was particularly famous for the blue wine squeezed from coastal cobalt grapes grown on the surrounding hillsides. East of Canaan, towards Alexandria, was miles of black  wheat.

While the hills around Canaan were called the Blue Mountains, that area was sometimes referred to as the Burnt Plains.

Some plants and animals were less widespread. They were so specifically adapted that they might inhabit a single pool of water. His father had told him about the white thorn fish that clung to the slippery rocks of a single stream north of Urgench, or the roaks, the giant birds that nested on the tallest peaks of the Morningstar Buttes. Michael’s father told him that they were so large that they could easily carry off hesats—  the shaggy, one-horned buffalos that grazed on the southern  grasslands.

Michael was anxious for his father’s story. He sat down with him, keeping an eye on his mother to make sure she was still eating. “So what did you see?” he  urged.

“Well, a few days ago, a farmer in Skarra claimed that a long chasm had  opened in the ground and green fire just shot out of it, destroying a huge swath of his crops. But when I arrived, the fields were burned, but there was no sign of a fold. For all I knew the farmer had lit the fields on fire himself while burning leaves. But upon closer inspection, there was a series of cracks running down the center of his land. It looked like the ground had unzipped like a pair of trousers.” He gave a sharp snort then slurped back a spoonful of the thick stew. “Hmm, needs salt,” he said, reaching for the shaker across the table before going on. “I told the farmer, ‘Look, I can fill a report out, but there’s nothing indicating that a fold did this. For all I know, you just got drunk and did something foolish.’”

“The guy looked offended and exclaimed, ‘It’s happened more than once! Just stick around tonight and you’ll see!’” Michael’s father sighed. “I didn’t particularly want to stay there any longer than I had to, but he seemed sure of his tale. Plus, in my job, I’ve seen stranger things than fire shooting out of the ground, so I agreed to spend the evening there. He and his wife were hospitable and offered me dinner, but I couldn’t take it, of course. Regulations, you know. I fortunately had the sandwich you packed for  me.”

Michael nodded, glad his cooking had been of some use.

“I waited there until midnight, but nothing happened, so I got up to leave. The farmer begged me to stay just a little bit longer, but I was tired from the trip and   wanted  to go back to the inn. Just as we stepped out onto his front porch, I noticed a green glow coming from the field. We stood there watching as the ground began to hiss and jets of green fire streamed from the earth. It followed the jagged slit I had seen earlier, but it cracked wider. The crops around it caught fire, and the line jutted quickly across the field. It ran straight for their house.”

“What did you do?” Michael asked, leaning in.

“We were dumbfounded at first. I mean, we just sat there with our jaws hanging open like a thirsty hesat. It was probably only a couple of seconds, but the fire moved quickly. I got my wits about me and yelled at the farmer and his wife to get inside and go out the back.”

Folds rarely appeared in places people had inhabited for a long time. Usually his father was called in to examine some place that people had wandered into while traveling. It was his job to categorize and map them, and to file claims for people if they were injured or lost property, but this was unusual that he had to rescue people  himself.

“I ran out into the field and the damn farmer followed me. There was an irrigation ditch running nearby. I quickly Moved the ground with blasts of energy until I carved a trench running to the fissure. The water flowed through it and made the flames die  down a little, but the ground was still cracking and burning and running for the house. So, the farmer and I built up a huge mound of dirt to bury the rift.”

“For a moment, it seemed like we stopped it, but then it just shot straight through the mound. A few seconds later, the farmer’s entire house was gone— just burned to ashes. The fold finally stopped just short of the tree line at the end of their  property.”

“Was his family okay?”

“No one got hurt, but it’s a hell of a mess for the agency. We don't know if  the land will be safe to live on, or even their neighbor's land for that matter. I’m going to have to go back with a crew and run a bunch of tests on it. For now, the farmer and his neighbors are staying with friends, but we're going to have to find somewhere permanent for them. It’s going to cost the crown a lot of money.”

“What a mess!” Michael added.

“But we'll solve it,” His dad said confidently as he got up to drop his bowl into the sink. “I’ll probably have to go back there next week. Are you okay with watching your mom again so soon?”

“Sure,” said Michael, his willingness buoyed by his father’s heroism. “But I was wondering if you could do me a favor tonight? My friends have been back from college for the past few days and I haven't had a chance to see them, plus tonight are the Discovery Day fireworks.”

Michael’s father sighed and rubbed his temples. Michael could feel the refusal coming on.

“It’s been a long couple of days, son. I could really use a night to  relax…”

“But I haven’t seen them in almost a year!” Michael implored. It had been a while since he had used such an insistent tone with his father, but his friends were back for summer from the Moving Academy in Alexandria and he was dying to catch up with them.

His dad grimaced, “Alright, just come back in time to help me get your mom upstairs.”

Michael was elated. He thanked his father and set about finishing his chores so he could hurry to see them.

About the Author:

Mover of Fate is the first novel in The Creator’s Eye series by author and artist R.N. Feldman.  Feldman lives and works in Los Angeles, CA where he teaches at Otis College of Art and Design and spends as much time hiking through the local mountains as he can.  Art, metaphysics, useless scientific trivia, and extensive backpacking treks throughout the world have all been major influences in his work. 

Follow him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/thecreatorseye

You can also see his latest paintings on www.RoniFeldmanFineArt.com   

Website: http://www.rnfeldman.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/thecreatorseye

Twitter: @RNFeldman