Leyna Book 1: A Fantasy Romance Adventure Read online

  Leyna

  Book one

  Helen E. Peters

  Translated by Jamilla Samedov

  Welcome

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  Leyna, book one

  Transported into a new world, full of magic and stuck in medieval times, Helen will go through numerous adventures to find her way back home…stumbling into her true love along the way. But in this new land, full of elves, magic, demons, and arrogant nobles, the odds are stacked against her. To overcome them, Helen, now called Leyna, will have to rely on her luck, her wit, and her wealth of modern knowledge.

  Some people find themselves in an unpleasant situation now and then, but Helen gets in trouble more often than she would care to admit. It was an ordinary day, she was going home from work, minding her own business—yet destiny had a different plan for her.

  A new fantasy romance is about to begin: to return home, Leyna has to reach the capital of the land she found herself in and find the Master of Probabilities. Yet there is no yellow brick road, and getting there is a lot harder than it sounds. On her journey, she becomes embroiled in the intrigues of the Dark Elven Court, meeting the prince himself, fighting bandits, and making new friends, including guardian demons.

  Leyna is a brand new fantasy romance series by Helen E. Peters, one of the top romance writers in Russia. Now, her most popular and exciting series is available for English-speaking readers all over the world. It is a witty story of a strong modern woman thrown into the epicenter of an epic fantasy adventure and trying to figure out this new world and its fairy inhabitants.

  Contents

  PART ONE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  PART TWO

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  From the Author

  Book Recommendations

  Leyna: Elven lands

  PART ONE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  About Helen E. Peters

  Preface:

  What can I tell you about myself? Some people find themselves in an unpleasant situation now and then, but I get in trouble more often than I’d care to admit. It was an ordinary day. I was going home from work, minding my own business, but destiny decided to send me on an exotic tour into another world. Did it make me happy? No, please take me home!

  Oh, I must find a Master of Probabilities in the capital of Ledoira. Well, that doesn’t seem too difficult. However, I guess I shouldn’t have gotten involved in the intrigue of the Court of the Dark Elves. I am not sure my incredible luck, my guardian demon, or my loyal friends can save me! It looks like I might have to save them instead…

  PART ONE

  Chapter 1

  Man proposes but God disposes

  Thomas a Kempis

  It was the end of the day on Friday the Thirteenth. As if confirming the old superstition, the day turned out to be terrible. I was on the subway, twisted as a Klein bottle, I was in a state of temporary harmony with the surrounding crowd. Unfortunately, it did not last long. The established neighborly harmony was disturbed by a large, aggressive woman who was elbowing people behind my back, trying to get to the exit. The woman’s energetic movements distracted me from my sad thoughts. I sighed and arched my back trying to get out of her way. The thoughts I had were not happy at all. Our small office could not compete with the larger companies and was at the brink of bankruptcy. I would probably have to look for a new job. The thought of running around to interviews made me feel miserable. I had no connections and no hope for finding a cushy job. The subway car jolted before stopping and interrupted my next thought. I started moving toward the exit. The crowd was slowly leaving the car and moving to the passageway to the Circle Line. Deep in thought, I was moving along, rocking slightly to the rhythm of the crowd. A sharp jab in my side caught me off-guard and I had no time to react. I only had time to turn my head and see a dirty subway track coming right at me. My last stupid thought was that I did not want to get my new parka dirty. Then there was only pain and darkness.

  ***

  Light. Although my eyes were closed, I could feel the light. I was relaxed and warm. Strange, I thought, I would have never imagined that Moscow could smell of a summer meadow… I tried to look around but immediately felt an excruciating pain in my head.

  Leyna

  When I came around again, it was almost dark. An odd floating sensation was in perfect harmony with a slight creaking sound and the unusually strong smell of freshly cut grass. I groaned quietly, slowly opened my eyes, and tried to understand whether I was dead or alive. For a moment, I was overcome by a dreamy languor. I was lying on a hay cart that was slowly moving past a small grass meadow and a strip of forest. Next, I felt like an ice-cold wave washed over my heart, making it skip a beat… A summer meadow! In the middle of October! Have I gone mad? At that instant, I remembered the subway, the push, the impact, and the excruciating headache. Raising my hand, I touched my head and found a lump the size of half a lemon. I obviously looked pretty awful. I slowly turned to the side and noticed a disgusting grease stain on my new coat. The thought that the coat was black and that I might be able to remove the stain was of little consolation. Hmm, it looks like I have a concussion.

  “I highly doubt that. To have a concussion you need a brain,” my inner voice said cynically. Aha, at least that nudnik is awake.

  Judging by the position of the sun, shining directly in my face, it was about 8 o’clock in the evening. All I could see was that we were slowly moving to the west. I licked my dry lips and tried to catch a glimpse of the driver. No matter how hard I tried, I could not get a good look at him. I tried to call out, but only a croak escaped my dry throat. The driver was startled.

  “Well,” said my inner voice. “I doubt your vocal talent will help you make friends.”

  The driver turned to me and, holding the reins in his right hand, began making strange circular gestures in the air in front of him with his left hand. Darn, it’s just my luck to run into a member of some strange sect! I doubt he could explain what is going on, where we are and why it is summer, I thought with irritation, looking at the bearded man of about forty-five in a linen shirt with a collar fastened at the side. For some reason, I was not afraid of him, although I knew that in my condition, I would be unable to defend myself. Meanwhile, my unexpected companion looked at me with obv
ious fear and distrust.

  “Tasheron tkha ke?” he hesitantly asked in a deep voice.

  “I don’t understand a word,” I replied in a polite, hoarse whisper.

  The man chuckled, looked at my sad face with distrust and handed me a round flask. Water! I grabbed the flask, and the movement was echoed with pain in my poor head. I started drinking hungrily like a vampire sucking blood from a victim’s neck. After I finished the last drop, I looked at my bearded angel with sincere gratitude.

  “Thank you!” my voice was almost back to normal.

  “Dane… Tkhat rin? Tasheron tkha ke?” my savior chuckled again. There was curiosity in his voice now.

  “I still don’t understand anything… Where are you taking me, Susanin?”

  “Toooo-mar,” the driver said slowly, beating himself on his broad chest. At that moment, he had an uncanny resemblance to a male orangutan during mating season.

  “My name is Helen… He-len”, I pronounced my name clearly and nodded.

  “Helen... Lee-na…”

  I cringed. When I was still in school, my English teacher pronounced my name as Leena and it really annoyed me.

  “No, He-len.” I pronounced my name again putting the stress on the soft Е sound.

  “Leyna,” said the man with confidence. Then he nodded, turned around and nudged the trotting horse with the reins into a faster gait.

  Oh, call me what you will… I thought with sudden indifference.

  I didn’t know what made the driver feel more at ease, but there was no more fear in his eyes. I slumped back in the hay and started thinking. Okay, let’s consider the facts, assuming that I haven’t gone crazy and am in my right mind, if that could be said about me at all. So, it is summer, probably beginning or mid-July. I should probably take off my parka before I die of heat stroke. There are no signs of paved roads, forest clearings, or power lines. The driver and I do not understand each other, his clothes are strange, and we are traveling in a horse-driven cart that you could hardly find anywhere in Mother Russia anymore. Something else was bothering me… That’s it! I had been staring at the sky for a good half hour but hadn’t seen any airplanes. Everything felt strange and suspicious.

  “Let’s not jump to conclusions,” whined my inner voice. “Otherwise, you would start imagining parallel universes, and then we would have to pay tons of money to the shrinks. Maybe we are in some God-forsaken backwater area. Let’s get to the nearest city, village or community and then decide.” I grumbled inwardly but decided not to argue. Suddenly, I felt extremely tired and dozed off as soon as I closed my eyes.

  I woke up because the cart jerked to a stop. It’s pitch dark! It took my eyes a moment to adjust…and then I saw a beautiful sky covered with clear, bright stars that formed constellations totally different from the constellations of both hemispheres I was well familiar with.

  “Now you can start panicking,” said my inner voice calmly. I was just about to… I thought groggily in reply.

  Somebody leaned over me, and I could not see the stars anymore. It was my road companion. What is his name? Toumar, I think. The man shook me slightly by the shoulder.

  “Leyna, lae dar,” he said gesturing me to get up.

  Groaning like an old woman, I slowly sat up and started crawling off the cart. Smiling in his beard, Toumar lent me his shoulder. We were both surprised that he stood half a head shorter than I did. Teetering slightly and holding onto my companion, I walked slowly toward the porch of a wooden house barely visible in the darkness. The house stood on the outskirts of a small sleepy village. My head felt completely empty. I did not want to believe my eyes, hoping to wake up any moment on a hospital bed…

  The door opened, and a short, elderly woman in a long dress stepped out onto the porch. She raised a lantern she was holding a little higher, trying to get a better look at her unexpected guests, said something quickly and waved us in. Toumar nodded and without saying a word dragged my barely alive body into the anteroom. He lowered me onto something that looked like a bed covered with pelts. A stern-looking woman leaned over me. She smiled, gently stroked my cheek with a dry, warm hand, and whispered something. My eyes closed by themselves. I didn’t even notice Toumar leaving.

  The time dragged and twisted like an infinite Mobius strip… During the brief moments when I would wake from my semi-delirious sleep, I could see a gray-haired woman who was giving me strange-tasting brews. They did not taste bad, just different. I could hear her talk and felt as if I could almost understand her. I could feel the last hope of waking up at home slipping away…

  When I finally woke up, I could feel no pain anywhere in my body.

  “How do you feel, Leyna?” I heard the voice from my dream.

  “I am fine, thank you… Do you understand me?”

  “Well, yes. After all, I am a real witch, not a fraud.” The woman smiled and gave me a clay mug with some brew. “My name is Mariah. My grandson knew that I would be able to help you!”

  “Your grandson?” I took a better look at the woman. She had bright young eyes surrounded by a network of wrinkles and looked no more than sixty. Wow!

  The woman understood my confusion and laughed. “Oh, thank you. I will take that as a compliment!”

  “Where am I? How did I get here? How do I get home?” I asked quickly.

  “Our village is called Zalesie, and you are in my home. I am a local healer. Toumar told me that he found you not far from the road inside a witch circle. You were unconscious. You have been asleep for the past two days. I believe you had a concussion and shock,” replied the witch and smiled. “I can only guess that you were in grave danger, and those who have the Gift can spontaneously transport themselves from their world into another through the Probability Matrix. It happens. I can tell you no more. I just don’t know. Tell me what happened to you?”

  Should I tell her the truth? She did take care of me when I was sick. Maybe telling her my story was the only thing I could do to repay her kindness.

  “…and when I woke up, I realized that I could understand your language, I had no pain and … I still hoped that I was dreaming,” I concluded my story.

  “I am sorry to disappoint you, my girl, but I have never heard of Moscow or Sabwhay. You need to get to Thirillon. It is our capital and the city of magi. Find the Master of Probabilities. Elven Masters, of course, know much more about the probability worlds, but I don’t think they will be eager to help a human.”

  “What are you talking about? Elves? You have elves here!” I started giggling hysterically.

  Many years ago, when we were about thirteen, my friends and I were into James Schultz. We imagined that we were Indians and often played and shot arrows in the nearby forest until we dropped. Later, people started calling us Tolkien crazy and thought we were into elves and other fantasy world races. Well, some of us did go Tolkien crazy. I was a bow enthusiast until I was fifteen. For some time, my friends even called me El. It was annoying, and after I taught some of my friends a lesson (dull-pointed arrows helped), they stopped calling me that. While I was remembering those happy times, my smile became truly genuine, or better yet, mischievous.

  “Of course,” Mariah sounded surprised. “Don’t you have elves in your world? Dark and High Elves inhabit most of the worlds of the Probability Network.”

  “No. We have neither elves nor other races, just humans. Each of our countries has its own legends and fairy tales about elves, dragons, werewolves, dwarves, orcs and many other non-humans. I loved fairy tales when I was a child!”

  “Then you are going to love our world. Here your fairy tales come alive… Only sometimes, they are quite scary.” The witch smiled sadly.

  “Mariah, why would the elves not help a human? Are you at war?”

  “There is no war,” the witch frowned. “It is just damned politics! The elven forests are famous for their trees but our king Rion the Third, having signed the Non-aggression and Peaceful Cooperation Treaty, turns a blind eye to poaching. In retali
ation, the High Elves increased the number of the border patrols that catch the “lost nature enthusiasts” and march them out of the forest. But before that, the elves shave the poachers’ heads. It is a great dishonor in the eyes of the elves. Now, ordinary people can’t go to the elven forest, and some herbs grow only there,” sighed the witch.

  “These are the High Elves… What about the Dark Elves?”

  “Drow? They live further down south, closer to the sea. They do not care as much about the forest. It is best to keep away from that race, too. They are vengeful.”

  “How far away is Thirillon?” I chose the most innocent question among those I had on the tip of my tongue. I decided to think later about the fact that Mariah, a simple village witch, knew so much about politics, elves, and some unknown Probabilities.

  “Three weeks on horseback or five to six weeks on foot, depending on how fast you can walk.” The witch looked at me with her dark green eyes. “You told me that you were on Sabwhay. Is it a riding animal like a horse or a sylph? Or maybe it’s a garr’krashi demon?”

  “Subway…” I did not know how to explain a subway to a person living in the age of cart and bow. “Subway? It’s a type of public transportation. There are no horses or other animals, just carts that carry people.”

  “Is it magical?” the witch asked with curiosity.

  “No, it’s technology. We don’t have real magic, only charlatans,” I replied. “Well, maybe we do have real magi, only they keep a low profile.”

  I said that aloud and, noticing the witch’s surprised look, explained, “They hide. Two or three hundred years ago, they burned anyone suspected of magic at the stake. It was a scary time. Middle Ages…”

  Unlike many people who idealized the Middle Ages, I never wanted to end up in King Arthur’s time or in Renaissance Venice… Should I reconsider? Well, let’s get back to the matters at hand.