Dead Beat (42 page)
Authors: Jim Butcher
Tags: #Fiction, #Juvenile Fiction, #Fiction - Fantasy, #United States, #Fantasy, #Wizards, #Harry (Fictitious character), #Chicago (Ill.), #Magic, #General, #Science Fiction, #Dresden, #Detective and mystery stories, #American Science Fiction And Fantasy, #Fantasy fiction, #People & Places, #Contemporary, #Fantasy - Contemporary, #Harry (Fictitious cha
"What's this?" I asked.
"Your first paycheck," Morgan said, and he didn't look happy to be saying it. "Monthly."
I opened the envelope and blinked. It wasn't a fortune, but it sure as hell would be a nice little addition to my earnings in the investigation business. "I never thought I would hear myself say this," I said as he started to leave, "but thank you, Morgan."
His face twisted up into something bitter, and he managed to spit out the words: "You're welcome." I think he fled before he started to puke.
Several weeks later Butters showed up at my door with a big box wrapped in Christmas paper. I let him in, and he carried it to the living room and presented me with it. "Go ahead. Open it."
I did. Inside the box was a guitar case, and inside that an old wooden guitar. "Uh," I said. "What's this for?"
"Therapy," Butters said. He'd been having me practice squeezing a squishy ball with my left hand, and, just as he'd predicted, I had slowly gained a little more control of it. "You're going to learn to play."
"Uh, my hand doesn't work that well," I said.
"Not yet," Butters replied. "But we'll start slow like everything else, and you can work up to it. Just do the lessons. Look, there's a book in the bottom of the case."
I opened the case and found a book entitled
Guitar for Total Idiots
, while Butters went on about tendons and metacarpal something-or-other and flexibility. I opened the book, but night had fallen and the fire was too low to let me read it. I absently waved a hand at the candles on the table beside the couch and muttered, "
Flickum bicus
." They puffed to light with a little whoosh of magic.
I stopped and blinked—first at the candles and then at my burned hand.
"What?" Butters asked.
"Nothing," I said, and opened the book to look over it. "You know, Butters, for a mortician you're a pretty good healer."
"You think so?"
I glanced at the warm, steady flame of the candles and smiled. "Yeah."
Author's Note
When I was seven years old, I got a bad case of strep throat, and was out of school for a whole week. During that time, my sisters bought me my first fantasy and sci-fi novels: the boxed set of
Lord of the Rings
and the boxed set of the Han Solo adventure novels by Brian Daley. I devoured them all during that week.
From that point on, I was pretty much doomed to join SF&F fandom. From there, it was only one more step to decide I wanted to be a writer of my favorite fiction material, and here we are.
I blame my sisters.
My first love as a fan is swords-and-horses fantasy. After Tolkien I went after C. S. Lewis. After Lewis, it was Lloyd Alexander. After them came Fritz Leiber, Roger Zelazny, Robert Howard, John Norman, Pol Anderson, David Eddings, Weis and Hickman, Terry Brooks, Elizabeth Moon, Glen Cook, and before I knew it I was a dual citizen of the United States and Lankhmar, Narnia, Gor, Cimmeria, Krynn, Amber— you get the picture.
When I set out to become a writer, I spent years writing swords-and-horses fantasy novels—and seemed to have little innate talent for it. But I worked at my writing, branching out into other areas as experiments, including SF, mystery, and contemporary fantasy. That's how the Dresden Files initially came about—as a happy accident while trying to accomplish something else. Sort of like penicillin.
But I never forgot my first love, and to my immense delight and excitement, one day I got a call from my agent and found out that I was going to get to share my newest swords-and-horses fantasy novel with other fans.
The Codex Alera is a fantasy series set within the savage world of Carna, where spirits of the elements, known as furies, lurk in every facet of life, and where many intelligent races vie for security and survival. The realm of Alera is the monolithic civilization of humanity, and their unique ability to harness and command the furies is all that enables their survival in the face of the enormous, sometimes hostile elemental powers of Carna, and against savage creatures who would lay Alera in waste and ruin.
Yet even a realm as powerful as Alera is not immune to destruction from within, and the death of the heir-apparent to the Crown has triggered a frenzy of ambitious political maneuvering and infighting amongst the High Lords, those who wield the most powerful furies known to man. Plots are afoot, traitors and spies abound, and a civil war seems inevitable— all while the enemies of the realm watch, ready to strike at the first sign of weakness.
Tavi is a young man living on the frontier of Aleran civilization— because let's face it. swords-and-horses fantasies start there. Born a freak, unable to utilize any powers of furycrafting whatsoever, Tavi has grown up relying upon his own wits, speed, and courage to survive. When an ambitious plot to discredit the Crown lays Tavi's home, the Calderon Valley, naked and defenseless before a horde of the barbarian Marat, the boy and his family find themselves directly in harm's way.
There are no titanic High Lords to protect them, no Legions, no Knights with their mighty furies to take the field. Tavi and the free frontiersmen of the Calderon Valley must find some way to uncover the plot and to defend their homes against a merciless horde of Marat and their beasts.
It is a desparate hour where the fate of all Alera hangs in the balance, where a handful of ordinary steadholders must find the courage and strength to defy and overwhelming foe, and where the courage and intelligence of one young man will save the Realm—or destroy it.
Thank you, readers and fellow fans, for all of your support and kindess. I hope that you enjoy reading the first book of the Codex Alera, Furies of Calderon, as much as I enjoyed creating it for you.
—Jim
Furies of Calderon
will be available in paperback in July 2005 from Ace Books.
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