Storm Hawks Chapter 82: Malatchee the Spirit Runner

This is a chapter I kept arguing with myself whether to include or cut.

On the one hand, we’re building toward the climax of Legend of the Storm Hawks. The momentum is keeping pace with the drumbeats of war. So why leap across the ocean to Tallu for one chapter?

Because it felt needed.

Malatchee, Tobias, and the Este of Tallu are pivotal and a compelling new setting in the next book, Path of the Spirit Runner. Sparks of the Awakening and the Joining are kindling there, as well, not just in Rhynn. Introducing them now is a hint of the expanse of locales and cultures to come.

And it established the connection.

Tobias Buchanan and Murdoch Connor.

Murdoch Connor and Ahyota of Wind Clan.

That’s why this chapter survived.

That, and I’m really not a fan of prologues.