A Sample of Amy’s Work…

Amy was published before her gender transition, however is uncomfortable sharing a work that contains her old name. She filled much of the time between with ghost writing work and comissions. But now, she is redebuting, and below is the first chapter of her new novel, Apoligia.

Chapter One

My last memory of me was the day I became a mother.

The wound in my bloating stomach drew me to sorrows I had never known. Each morning she kicked at my womb, every afternoon I was sick, the evening I wallowed in strange gluttonies; I cursed Polysys. That sweet god and his kiss of fertility.

My suffering was my cocoon, in which I found death. Days of agony and bitter sweat all led to the moment I held beautiful Altosa in my arms, and the hatred melted away like frost in spring.

The loveless woman found herself loving. 

I chose the name Altosa. The name of my mother passed down to a girl too little to even kick her feet. It was my desire. Possessive and potent. The union of my love and my pain.

She would have the world, and everything that was denied of me. Peace, love, dignity; The dialect of my heart learned those words when Altosa’s head was pressed against it. A blue clarity was put upon the clouds of the future. And, with the coming of those clouds, so did I die. 

Kelena the concubine would be Kelena the queen.

My husband came to speak with me, but I spun a fancy that I was too drained for his splendid company. In truth, I knew he would want to hold Altosa, but I did not wish to release her for even a moment. I would keep her, touching soul to soul, so that my ancestry may seep deeper into her veins. Mother to mother, Altosa would never comprehend this love.

To Heto, the matron of mother, I prayed she guarded Altosa.

To Nypheo, the handsome heir of dreams, I asked that she dream of the mothers she did not know. And when sleep came, I was swept into his kingdom, so my body may sleep under his mother’s starry sky.

The clouds returned with the night. The glittering stars died, and the wind swept the close with a rumbling the palace; And the palace, proudly standing upon the cliffs, would tremble along its melody, with such ferocity that I would awake to find the warmth whisked away, so that all the earthy tones of the stone walls took a gold, grey-and-silver hue.

I was frightful from the moment I stirred. The only sounds were the whistling of stones and flapping curtains, yet I heard something amidst the deadening silence. My bed floated, a ship amidst a sea of dark, and I held Altosa close to me. In me, I knew my husband would not allow such awful silence. Not on that night.

“Kolossius!?” I cried. “Guards!?”

Then I saw a shift. The darkness turned like the face of a coin, gold and serpentine, draped in tall black. I gasped and Altosa awoke, and bawled. And this thing, this masked man in the dark, stepped closer. The shadows seemed to sway from him like a shawl, but they did not obscure the moonlit glint of the dagger in his hand. 

He moved in almost slithering motions. He seemed impossible and ethereal and, if I were not looking upon him, I would think he was as real as a rumour. He leaned in close, slipping the dagger forward in a certain gesture. “Kelena.” His voice slid across my skin, slimy and rasping.

“My husband will kill you,” I warned, keeping Altosa at my chest, and cried, “Kolossius!”

The serpent glanced nervously to the curtain that led to the hall, but nothing came. He scoffed, “They aren’t coming, queenling. They’re sleeping. Don’t fear. I’m only here for the child.”

He held out his unarmed hand, wrapped in black.

My teeth ground against each other. “Craven. You can’t have her!”

He coiled back, like a cobra. It made the same, animalistic instinct as when I had first seen one. The instinct to retreat came over me, and I pulled back across the bed, but then came a new instinct. The instinct of a mother beast.

He lunged.

I turned, pulling Altosa in, catching the blade in my arm. It parted flesh and it sliced bone, and I screamed. Oh, I screamed, but not in pain. It was the spirit of Hero flaring like a falling star within me, and I felt a rage. I pulled, ripping the blade through my arm, but I managed to grasp the hilt of the dagger and rip it from his grip.

The assassin backed away with a snarl.

“She is Altosa, daughter of Kelena, daughter of Altosa, daughter of Treya!” I bellowed. “She is the spawn of queens, and you shall not have her.”

“You can’t fight me, woman.” He visibly twitched. “You’re a barbarian. We won’t have a barbarian queen.”

All the worlds became red. Fury was not unfamiliar, but this was new. All my ancestors, known and unknown, man and woman alike, screamed a hatred into my blood that made it burn. I dropped my daughter upon the bed, and ripped the dagger from my wrist, and leapt for him with a howl.

We went down, and his blade found purchase in his shoulder. We sprawled and I managed to get on my knee, but he kicked. He kicked me in my stomach and, unbit, my stomach emptied its contents on the floor. The room spun and he was crawling for my daughter. My hands slid across bile and blood until I found my hand snatching around his foot.

He tripped, struck the floor, and I pulled. The tear in my arm tore more, but I refused to relent. I pulled that man away from my girl, bawling on the bed, and he finally realised I wouldn’t give up. 

The assassin turned, and plunged his dagger into my chest.

I howled, pulling it right back out, and he stabbed me for the third time. This time in my side, making my whole body twitch, and I felt warmth pump out of me. I was sure I was dying, so I mounted him, closing my hands around his throat. I felt saliva drool out of my mouth, the ecstasy of strangling this man as he stabbed again. It hurt, but it didn’t; My eyes only saw crimson, and his hopeless, desperate stabbing would not stop me.

My other arm. My thighs. My gut. My chest. My neck. But in his eyes, it was terror and horror, and that look in his eyes made me smile. I loved every moment, and that adoration of his killing was all that remained in my mind when the world swirled into liquid and the light inside went dark. 

As I unmade anything that would dare hurt my daughter.