City on Clouds

When Alisha chose to write her thesis on the Children’s Crusade it was just an adventure on paper. She never expected to become part of something similar. Stuck on a blank page, she tries her luck with a clean slate, only to get more than she bargained for. Two stories instead of one. With all the dark magical realism of a medieval tale. Only, one of them isn’t medieval.

1212. Born together, Azemar and Alazais share an uncommon bond. One that can only lead to mischief and sin. When their brother Duran joins a crusade against the Cathar heresy, they secretly follow him out of childish curiosity, and barely survive ensuing the massacre. While Duran goes on to fight with the crusaders, Azemar and Alazais are forced to flee from them. Joining a crusade of innocents to free the Promised Land by prayer, they are separated at sea in a storm, only to end up on the slave markets of the East...

2004. Some mortals are born with a guardian angel, but Alisha has reasons to believe hers plays on the other team. She always seems to loose her shoes, and only survives 9/11 because she is mugged on the subway. When she volunteers to teach English in a remote village in Sudan, she’s about to put this to the test as never before. Assigned to a remote, dusty village without water, a violent raid turns her into just one more black refugee. But a genocidal civil war, a 2000 mile barefoot trek across the desert, and a precarious illegal crossing into Europe on a rubber dinghy, pale in comparison to what awaits her there...