KaelJai.com
Copyright Cassandra Blizzard-LeBedz
All rights reserved. The reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including any information and storage retrieval system, is forbidden without the prior written consent of the publisher and author. For information about "fair use," contact the author.
This is a work of fiction. All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention. Any resemblance to actual events, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.
Published in the United States of America.
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Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Trinooran Language Dictionary For Kael Jai: Book One
Book Two Excerpt
Malevolent Excerpt
The people on the streets of New York City were bundled up against a frigid winter. Small drifts of snow lay scattered on store canopies and parked cars, and puffs of mist hung in the air from street grates, building vents, and vendor carts as warm air met bone-chilling temperatures. But the chill in the air didn’t bother him. His internal temperature remained constant in most weather conditions. His luminous green gaze scanned the crowd of people as he walked along the busy sidewalk, his black leather coat open, revealing the white t-shirt beneath. Snug blue jeans and a simple pair of black leather boots completed his wardrobe. He wasn’t even wearing a warm winter hat, unlike the people flowing past him on the city sidewalk. He wasn’t focused on them at the moment. Anxiety churned in his stomach, a dread that had plagued him since he’d been dumped on this planet. It was worse this morning. The sense that something was wrong made him jumpy and hyper-vigilant. He was supposed to be safe in New York, but he knew he wasn’t. He would never really be safe, and he would never be able to shake the anxiety and the sense of dread that plagued him. Not until he died or he killed Jindom. That was his ugly reality. The truth he carried with him while he pretended to have another life far away from his home. His real home.
He could handle having been cast out of his home, but he couldn’t handle the fear of what had happened to his province since, or the thought of what would happen to these people of earth when Jindom finally came to kill him. He’d been thrown to earth through a portal, abandoned to fend for himself, alone and alienated from his people. Alienated. Alien. That’s what he was considered in this world. An alien. An unknown. It was hard to think of himself as alien, or even different. But to these people on this planet, he was an anomaly, something to be feared, perhaps even dissected. The thought made him grimace.
It had been nearly a full year. He’d managed to survive, keeping to himself mostly, and interacting with humans only when it was necessary. Money hadn’t been a problem. Their technology was still limited and full of weaknesses. Hacking had become a must for him in this new society, and he’d siphoned enough money from a few billionaire bank accounts to keep himself comfortable and out of reach.
He looked human, for the most part, although there were some noticeable differences. His body metabolized food differently. He could conserve energy for long periods of time, build it, store it, and manipulate it. He could literally draw energy from nearly any source, including the atmosphere around him. His body was designed to sustain itself on multiple levels, through food, water, oxygen, carbon monoxide, and from sapping energy from everything that gave off energy.
His eyes were different. If one looked closely enough, they could see subtle differences in his irises and pupils. His pupils narrowed in a horizontal, elliptical pattern at certain times. He had night vision and could see as well in the dark as he could in the light. He could smell better than any earth dog, and could hear several different ranges beyond human hearing. He had no sweat glands, his testicles were internal instead of external, he had slight webbing between his toes, and his fingernails were strong enough to be used as daggers if he let them grow. He didn’t. Let them grow. He was trying to fit in not stand out.
Oh. And then there was that other difference. He had a retractable barb on the underside of his left wrist, complete with a venom sac that held enough venom to kill at least a dozen grown men in less than ten seconds. The barb was not something he flung around at whim. Instead, he only used it in extreme cases. It took three days to grow another one back.
He was tall, lean but muscular, with broad shoulders and a narrow waist. His skin was pale, ageless, although by earth standards he would be somewhere in his thirties. He kept his blue-black hair cut close on the sides, leaving a wavy mass atop his head. His bright green eyes glimmered as if lit from within. For the most part, he looked like a male model. Between his looks and his six foot five inch height, he turned heads, which was why he tried so hard to be anonymous and unseen.
He was a bit psychic. He knew when someone was lying. He could smell it on them before the words left their lips. These were all normal features on his home planet. But here…on earth…these senses were considered heightened, superhuman, almost supernatural.
He was called Kael. It was an easy name for humans to remember, as it sounded similar to their familiar male name Kyle.
He’d prefer not be outcast, but he’d made a comfortable life for himself here on earth, safe from the war that most assuredly still raged on his planet. There, on Trinoor, he’d been a leader, the young ruler of the capital province of Jai. Until the ruler of the Northern province of Nagarr came to claim the capital for his own. It was the longest, bloodiest war in all of Trinoor’s history, a war that broke a centuries old reign of peace among the three provinces.
Master Jindom, the warlord of Nagarr sought to rule over the entire planet of Trinoor. He was evil, insane, brutal and without mercy. After years of battle, one province against two, Jindom had succeeded in casting Kael out of Jai. Kael had been overtaken, betrayed by a spy in his ranks, nearly murdered, then saved by a priejst who appeared out of thin air and took him to the mountains where the priejsts dwelt. Those loyal to him kept him sequestered, hidden, until it became too dangerous. For his own protection, and for theirs, the priejsts opened the portal and sent him to a place where Jindom would never find him, or so they assumed. The portal was priejst tech and only the priejsts knew how to open it. Surely, they’d all been killed by now.
Scowling at the mere thought, Kael paused in front of a department store window. Despite what the priejsts had told him, Kael was never certain that he was safe. He knew the madman Jindom would not rest until he found Kael and killed him. He sensed that his world was still in chaos, his loyal followers still fighting to save Jai and keep his whereabouts hidden. Though he’d been nearly a full year on earth, he knew that one day Jindom would send the Sulcrum to find him. He’d chosen New York City because of its dense population. It made him feel safer. But to the Sulcrum, even in a sea of sweaty, perfumed humans, Kael’s energy signature was unmistakable. Even on a planet populated by billions, the
Sulcrum would have no difficulty in locating him. It was only a matter of time. And when Jindom discovered him...the blood would run thick in the streets.
Kael stood before the large glass window of the store, his gaze both fixed on the display in front of him and on the reflection of the stream of people flowing along the New York City street behind him, alert as ever. Always alert and waiting. In the reflection, he noticed a young, blonde woman on the sidewalk near a stand that sold flowers and small trinkets. She watched him from under her lashes. He could tell by the tilt of her head that she found him attractive. Little did she know the truth of what he was. He barely gave her any thought. He was tense today. He could sense something was wrong in his world. The atmosphere around him felt different, and he couldn’t get his mind off the anxiety. He had an unshakeable feeling that today was his day of reckoning.
Kael smelled him before he saw his reflection in the window. The scent made him tense, and his fists clenched as he prepared for battle. The priejst appeared out of the crowd like magic and stood ten feet behind him, waiting. He knew Kael smelled him and saw him. Kael