Novels by RmHarrington

Adlartok stood on a hill overlooking the graveyard where Meriwa said goodbye to mom and dad. Both had passed away several years back. The sun glared from a blue sky as Airborne ships came and went, many of them now used by Walkers and their associates. Cupun and his mate reaped the benefits of a home-raising bee in the fields near the worm farms. But once they completed the house, he and Roxanne would join Adlartok and Jamison on another rescue mission. Ever since the merging of the races, reports of stranded humans came in often. Someone had to help. Tulugaak had journeyed back down south. Although he favored the cold weather, he said the ice wasn’t yet the same as it had once been on several return visits. But he wasn’t alone. A few of the original clan had survived. — Meriwa didn’t believe her parents lived in the ground. Neither had they ascended with the angels into the heavens, for angels, like other mutants, were merely genetically altered huma

The Walkers showed no fear of the massive beast, so Bjorn and Nalura stood their ground, staying still, quiet and hopeful. Perhaps someone had restraints on this ancient junkyard guard-grizzly. In the distance, the waterfall roared. From far, far away, the surface world rumbled. Time ran thin.An older female Walker came near. She carried a staff and a mouthful of hand-sharpened teeth. Seductively beautiful in a grimy sort of way, she reminded Bjorn of some of the subterranean fish species common on Cloud.“Why are you here?” she said.Nalura nodded to Bjorn, urging him to respond.“We came seeking my mother,” he said. “She is an Airborne, as are we.”The old Walker grinned, her ears twitching as though in joy. “Then come, young Bjorn. Sira has waited long to see you.”—As soon as Bjorn and Nalura followed the Walker into the hedges near the waterfall, Crystellia stripped a harnes

Hours after the battle in the sky, Bjorn and the party arrived at a mountain waterfall, boarding a Walker’s village near a vast stretch of flatland. Greenery blended into the environment and covered the cascade’s rocky structure as though nurtured and shaped by an experienced Arborist. The scent of fresh blooms whiffed up and into the airship.“Here,” Bjorn said. “We drop anchor here.” A nearby field stretched wide with rolls of wood containers similar to those used when shipping worms to Cloud. Although occupied by living annelids, no yellowish slime lingered on or near the crates. For Bjorn, more of the pieces came together.They readied the climbing gear, and Bjorn and Nalura harnessed up.“I’m going too,” Crystellia said.“Can’t do,” Nalura said. “Edoul is too old, and Bjorn is necessary. We only have two yokes. Although professionally train, you, my impulsive daughter, lack

Bjorn yelped as a three-prong grappling hook slammed across the deck, snagged on a bulwark, snapped tight, and pinned one crew member to a guardrail. A second barb scrapped Kurg’s pelvic fin before bouncing off the deck and whizzing past the Rand Solar balloon system. A musky blood scent splattered through the air. “They want us alive,” Nalura shouted while rushing to the pinned sailor and slicing the anchor rope with a single swipe of her caudal fin. “Fight to kill.” More hooks came down, and an immense shadow crossed over the stern and kept growing. An imperial battleship was upon them. Two imperial guards armed with tasers landed on the shrouds of the main topmast and slid down on the mainstay. More clambered over the battleship’s railing. “Mom,” screamed Crystellia while ducking beneath one rope that had wrapped around the mizzenmast. The sails tightened, billowed, then compressed again, and the schooner lurched hard to port with Nalura body-hugging the n

Cupun’s friendship with Jamison felt second nature, so much so that Cupun wondered why his father still sometimes spoke of hanumans as abominations. Maybe old expressions die slowly, he thought, or perhaps such words merely linger in the mind long after the history behind the link is no longer relevant. Whatever the cause, Nukilik never used the word in the presence of Jamison. His sister’s husband was family and friend.While Adlartok trained Kallik in the methods of various weapons, Cupun and Jamison traveled beneath a prickly canopy of musty-smelling grayish-green rope-foliage growing on trees taller and thicker than any Cupun had encountered. Three grown men with arms extended and hands touching could not wrap the circumference of the sharp-barked hardwood trunks.During the journey from Jamison’s homeland, many new races had joined their group, all working to help one another. But Cupun and Jamison made too great a team to split apart. So from hu

Bjorn’s party tracked upriver, above the treetops, while seeking the source of the river. The quakes and fire no longer advanced, and even the rain drifted away and toward the southwest slopes. No more worms appeared, sick or healthy. As the rise in terrain reached higher and further northward, they passed above groups of Walkers and newly established shelters on the hillsides and in other areas that remained above the core of damage and flooded zones. In the highest ranges of flatland, the Walkers lived on productive farms.“Someone warned them,” Crystellia said. “These shelters and farms are old and established. The beings down there aren’t refugees; they’re immigrant evacuees."Bjorn barely absorbed her words. He was putting things together in his mind, remembering events at old Perd Van’s worm farm and in the marsh near the Kabutar ship docks, including the yellow ooze beneath Mother Tree during the sun-dipping with aunt Su