by Ben Zackheim | Jul 10, 2014 | The Camelot Kids, Writing |
If you think you know Merlin, it may be time to meet The Camelot Kids’ Merlin.
He’s a hair over 7-feet-tall.
His torso pushes 4-feet-wide.
He’s 3276 years old.
He’s not a people person.
Merlin’s love of England is the force behind his immortality. He won’t rest until the prophecy of King Arthur‘s return comes to pass. Now, as he senses danger surrounding his beloved New Camelot, Merlin gathers the descendants of the Knights of the Round Table. But since when was an army of teenagers a good idea? Merlin has defeated dark wizards, angry elves and dragons 145X his size. But can he handle The Camelot kids?
In this excerpt, Simon is on his butt, with his head between his knees. He’s been training with the notorious knight Hexter all morning and he feels like hurling. But when he raises his eyes he finds that the training arena is empty. A moment ago, it was teeming with teenagers, onlookers and about two dozen talky chickens.
Now, nothing…
Excerpt from The Camelot Kids
Simon stood quickly and lifted his training sword in front of him. He turned in circles for a moment, watching out for any movement. He had a sense that things weren’t right. Something dangerous was nearby.
“Who’s there?” He felt silly for talking to no one. It was probably teatime or something, and he’d passed out and missed everyone leaving. He imagined that they’d stepped over his unconscious body, laughing.
Merlin’s humongous shape emerged from the castle’s shadows. His stick click-clacked on the cobblestones.
“Put that thing down before you hurt yourself,” the wizard said.
Simon lowered his sword, but his instincts told him not to. Ever since the sword fight, when his muscles had done things they’d never done before, Simon felt heavy, wary. He saw the world as one big adversary.
“Where did everyone go?”
“Oh, I sent them home. It’s a clever little trick I picked up in India.” Merlin’s eyes lit up. Simon could almost hear the smile in the old man’s words. “You did well today.”
“Yeah. I was real chivalrous.”
“What’s wrong with you?” In an instant, Merlin had turned combative again.
“Nothing… My dad once said that praise from Merlin had a price.”
Merlin chuckled. Simon’s gut relaxed a little. The wizard put his hand on Simon’s shoulder and led him out of the courtyard.
“I do have a reputation for getting my way. But let me give you some context, Simon. I’m several thousand years old. That requires a strong body and a strong mind. It would be very easy to go mad after all I’ve seen.”
They stepped into the castle and Merlin grabbed a torch from the wall. “Actually, I have gone mad a couple of times.” His voice softened. “But one thing always pulls me out of the darkness. One thing keeps me focused and strong. Did your father tell you what that is?”
Merlin stopped abruptly and looked at the wall, up and down.
“Do you have a chainsaw?” he asked Simon.
“Um, not on me.”
“Bother.” The wizard furrowed his brow. He raised his staff, held it sideways and shook it. Suddenly, Merlin was trying to stay on his feet as the weight of his walking stick threw him off balance. Except it wasn’t a staff in his hand anymore. It was a chainsaw.
Without a word, the old man lifted the huge thing, yanked on the cord and revved it up. The explosive sound of the tool forced Simon to cover his ears. Merlin shoved the saw into the stone wall.
Except it wasn’t stone.
It looked like stone, but the surface splintered like wood, white chips flying everywhere. Merlin laughed, maniacally, as he carved out a door shape. The whole scene made Simon want to run to his bed and hide under the covers.
Merlin stepped back, turned off the chainsaw and handed it to Simon, who immediately dropped it because of its weight. The wizard stood still in the uncomfortable silence, looking at the large rectangle cut he’d made. His hair was a wispy mess, long strands of it falling over his face and sticking straight up.
“Merl-”
“Sh!”
Then the rectangle fell down into the hall with a thud.
“The door has moved since I last used it,” he said, as if that would explain everything. Merlin slipped into the hole he’d made in the wall and gestured for Simon to hand him his saw back.
Except it was a staff again.
“Thank you,” Merlin said in a way that made it very clear that he was enjoying Simon’s exasperation.
They took a step into a narrow spiral stairwell that curved down into darkness.
“As I was saying. The one thing that keeps me focused and strong is Camelot. My home. It has deserved better for more than a thousand years and now, in the midst of great danger, its time has come.”
“What danger?” Simon asked. But Merlin didn’t answer. “Where are you taking me?”
“To the dungeons. Should be fun.”
That didn’t calm his nerves any. “What’s down there?”
“Someone who is the key to finding our enemy’s weakness.”
“He’s a weird one, though,” came a girl’s voice from behind Simon, startling him. It was Maille.
“Don’t do that!” Simon barked.
“What? What’d I do?” Maille shrugged her shoulders.
“You snuck up on me!”
“I’ve been here the whole time, excuse me very much.” But her cocky smirk gave her away.
“Enough bickering!” Merlin barked. “We don’t want the prisoner to hear. It would give him an edge we can’t afford.” When they hit the bottom of the stairwell, Merlin lit a wall of torches with one wave of his walking stick. They passed empty cells that Simon would not have wished on an enemy, of which he had a number, growing by the hour.
At the end of the long, stone hall was a cell with a small flame’s light flickering through its bars.
The prisoner was hard to see, just a slight figure in the corner, whimpering like a caged animal.
Simon recognized him immediately.
~~~
And check out these previous character introductions:
Simon Sharp
Maille Rose
Caradoc the troll
by Ben Zackheim | Jul 1, 2014 | Writing |
I am so pleased to announce the team behind my new Fantasy book series, The Camelot Kids. The ebook series will arrive on Amazon this August!
When I started writing the story years ago I’d hoped to gather an Ace team of illustrators to flesh out my world.
Looks like my wish came true.
The Camelot Kids team
Nathan Fox is our Art Director and cover artist for the series. You’ve probably seen Nathan’s work in Rolling Stone, Wired, The New Yorker or a multitude of Marvel/DC/Image/Dark Horse comics. Let’s just say that having Nathan Fox on your team is like having a Hulk.
Here are some recent illustrations.
So yeah. It’s good to have Nathan Fox on board The Camelot Kids…
And then…Ian Greenlee. Ian Greenlee is an up and comer if I’ve ever seen one. You have never seen work like his. Click on this link, and you’ll see what I mean:
Ian Greenlee
Ian’s work on The Camelot Kids is blowing everyone away. He’s doing the book’s interiors. I can’t wait to roll out the character studies and sketches he’s done so far. I’ll keep showing off peeks here and there, so keep on coming back.
I can’t take it anymore. Just go to his site. Amazing. And wait until you see what he’s doing with The Camelot Kids! I’ll be rolling out peeks at his work in the coming weeks.
Wrapping it all up into a package that will astonish is Raymond Buetens of Slub Design. Ray is an old friend who also happens to have an impeccable eye for book design.
When the softcover comes out, it will be packed with surprises around every chapter. This guy knows how to have fun with a book. Seriously.
On the marketing front is Jeff Rutherford. Jeff works on the deadly-sharp cutting-edge of online marketing. He’s come up with some ideas that are going to get The Camelot Kids in front of every eyeball looking for something, ANYTHING Camelot.
Off we go! The Camelot Kids series will be released in four ebooks from August to November. Then, in December you’ll be able to buy the full book as a softcover or ebook boxed set.
by Ben Zackheim | Jun 28, 2014 | The Camelot Kids, Writing |
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by Ben Zackheim | Jun 27, 2014 | The Camelot Kids |
The Camelot Kids are coming!
I have a big announcement on July 1st that should make fans of comic books, Fantasy and great art happy. The full details (and sneak peeks at the artwork) will be in my July 1st newsletter, which you can sign up for here.
If you love Camelot, Merlin and Excalibur (or if you always thought you maybe-kinda-possibly-could) then check back here often for news about the series launch. I’ll be rolling out fantastic imagery that top-tier talent is crafting just for the first book in The Camelot Kids series.
So excited, I think I just giggled a little.
(Oh yeah, snoop around my site to get an early look at some of the characters.)
See you July 1st!
___________
by Ben Zackheim | Jun 18, 2014 | Writing |
Tommy told her to stay away from the edge seven times. But Beth didn’t listen. He couldn’t very well stop her from being a fool when she was clear on the other side of the barn, could he?
“Mom told you to be careful,” he repeated. Usually, using the “M” word was the only thing that could make her listen. Many moms can make us behave with just a faint warning from the past. Tommy and Beth’s mom was most definitely that kind of mom.
But Beth wasn’t like you or me. Beth was, and still is frankly, a misbehaver from toe to hairtip.
Tommy, too, was no sample of sweetness, and frankly still isn’t, but he fancied himself packed with sense. Or, as he liked to call it, Sensibles — because that made him sound blessed by spirits.
They were in the barn that Mom told them to stay clear of. They were doing things Mom told them not to do inside the barn (the one that she told them not to be in). All in all, it was a disaster waiting to happen.
The roof, as it was, wore more holes than Mrs. Whisker’s swiss cheese. Sunlight poured into some areas of the barn, and not at all in others. The resulting shadows could move, dance, fly or do just about anything else your imagination allowed them to do.
Old piles of damp hay emerged from the floor like warts. They stunk the place up in that dreamy, moist cloud of decay that’s somehow pleasant if you’re in the mood to enjoy it.
So, inside this nest of wretchedness, Beth fell from the second floor.
It was a short fall, as most falls are. But Beth’s brain, being a rocket, managed to pack a lifetime inside three seconds.
When she first lost her balance and her right foot didn’t feel the floor in that special way it does when we’re grounded, she thought, “I wonder if my funeral will be sunny.”
She saw her parents sobbing. Her little casket perched above a hole in the ground in such a way that it could be shoved off its pedestal and slid straight down into the Earth.
She spotted Tommy playing her Nintendo DS while the priest spoke about what happens to girls who don’t listen to their mothers. Tommy winked at her, which meant he knew she was watching her own funeral. Then he dove back in to try to beat her high score in MarioKart.
By the time she was pondering the barn from an angle she’d never considered before, namely upside down while twirling, her thoughts had turned to the barn.
It upset her, as she fell to her death, that they would likely respond to her accident by tearing the old place down. Which would hardly be a reasonable way to face such a tragedy!
After all, if one girl could die in an abandoned building at any time then couldn’t all empty buildings be killers-in-waiting? Why not tear all of them down? The barns, the warehouses, the schools…
School.
That’s where Beth’s head settled as she saw the ground below her get significantly closer at a good clip. She wouldn’t really miss school. Not only because she’d be dead and wouldn’t be around to miss it; but also because school was her least favorite way to measure the day:
Meeting
Math
Reading
Lunch
Science
Goals
Pick up
Then, weekends:
Play
Read
Play
Jump in mud
Read
Eat whatever
Hit Tommy
Read
Play
Dinner!
That’s a thousand times better than any school day, even one with a substitute teacher.
She caught a glimpse of Tommy the moment she hit the ground. He was yelling something. Probably, “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
Beth felt bad for her brother. He’d probably feel guilty when she was gone. He might not even play video games for three whole days. Okay, maybe more like two days. But still, their parents would…
Oh no!
Would they blame him? Would they blame Tommy? Would it be like the time Tommy let the dog out by accident and she got caught in the fence?
They wouldn’t!
They might.
So Beth did what any other sister would do in her situation. She hit the ground hard. But as she hit the ground hard, she thought, “How strong are these floorboards anyways?” And, as if to say, “We’re not very strong at all, Beth,” the floorboards cracked under her butt, dropping her straight into a muddy soup below the barn.
Time slowed down to normal, as did Beth’s brain. Or what passed for normal, as there was almost nothing normal about what had just happened.
Tommy was still hollering above her, his fingers clenching his hair. Finally, he managed, “ARE YOU OKAY?”
“I think so,” Beth said, a little short of breath.
She didn’t really hurt anywhere at first. But later on, when the excitement had died down, she found a large splinter in the back of her leg. The scar would always be there to remind her to mind her brother.
On the long walk home they decided to keep the whole thing to themselves. Most parents will grimace at such a decision, but tough luck. The brother and sister had a secret and it welded them together in all the ways brothers and sisters should weld.
“Did your life flash before your eyes?” Tommy asked as they walked up the steps to their back porch.
“No, but the future did. And I’m having none of it.”
That, Beth thought, will be my secret for me, myself and I.
