As head of the U.S. Border Patrol’s Paranormal Operations Unit, Clay Chiles has found a place where he can serve with honor and a surrogate family to replace the one he never truly enjoyed. When he meets Elven warrior Arondel and begins to build the partnership he had never hoped to find, life seems good. Still for two life-long loners to merge their lives, hearts and minds, an occasional conflict is bound to arise.<br><br>Clay’s discovery he has not only a father but a half-brother on Arondel’s home world of Elvenheim creates new and different challenges -- can he accept and trust relatives so different from all he has known? Can they accept him? Finally, faced with incredible tasks and dangers, Clay and Aron are torn asunder. Will the strength of their still- fragile bond be enough to bring them through hell and back to one another’s arms?

Runes of Redemption

Then he went out like a snuffed candle.8


The third time Aron transported to the horizon, he found himself on a ridge line, looking down into a lower area. Although the dim light made it difficult to discern any detail, he thought he saw some kind of jumble, perhaps even a broken stone circle, in the otherwise featureless space. The formation looked too regular and neat to be the construct of nature, although he knew strange things did occur without the intervention of sentient beings. He’d have to view it from a closer range to be sure. This time he walked, a faint stir of doubt making him cautious. It was farther than it had appeared. But, indeed, it was a stone circle.


Chapter 20