What will CLOAK OF MASKS be about?

I am now 43,000 words into CLOAK OF MASKS, which puts me on Chapter 8 of 21.

What will the book be about?

Let’s have a look at the Inciting Incident of the plot!

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Lydia Valborg’s number appeared on the phone’s screen.

I hadn’t talked to her for over a year. She was my brother Russell’s former girlfriend – pretty, a bit arrogant, but mostly good-natured, and quite naïve. But she had been forced to wise up in a hurry when her former computer science teacher Paul Rampton had tried to frame her for murder.

So why was Lydia calling me now?

This couldn’t be good.

I accepted the call and lifted the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“Mrs. MacCormac?” It was Lydia’s voice, calm but with a hint of fear.

“Yeah. What’s going on, Lydia?”

“I’m in trouble,” she said. “I think someone is following me.”

“Okay,” I said. “Get to a public place, somewhere with a lot of people, stay there, and call the police.”

“I am in a public place,” said Lydia. “A table at the food court at the Ducal Mall in Brookfield. And I don’t think the police can help me.”

“Why not?” I said.

“Because the guy who’s following me,” said Lydia. “I think I saw him two years ago. You know? When I went on…that little trip to that creepy mall place.”

I have to admit that my first reaction was surprise that Lydia was smart enough not to talk about the Shadow Waypoint in public and over the phone.

But like I said, she had been forced to wise up in a hurry.

My second reaction was alarm. The Shadow Waypoint was a neutral market and resting place in the Shadowlands, with the neutrality enforced by a mysterious creature called the Intermediary. Singularity had an outpost there, but the High Queen couldn’t do anything about it, because even with all her power she couldn’t oppose the Intermediary on his (or possibly hers, no one knew for sure) home ground. Lydia had been taken there during that mess with Rampton.

And if she saw someone from the Singularity outpost following her around the mall…

-JM