Season Avatars #AtoZChallenge: Avatar and Anilink

It's time for the 2017 A-Z Blogging Challenge! If you missed the reveal, my theme this year is my Season Avatars fantasy series. Currently there are four books available: Seasons' Beginnings, Scattered Seasons, Chaos Season, and Fifth Season. The final book, Summon the Seasons, will be published later this year. The first book is permafree (universal store link is in the sidebar); I'll be putting each of the other books on sale (one per week) starting on 4/10/17. Throughout the month, I'll be going over important people, places, and things in the world of this series. I'll also list book references for each item. Finally, I'll be giving away the series on my birthday, which is near the end of the month.

Since "Avatar" is in the series name, it makes sense to start with it. With a couple of exceptions, every country in this world has one or more deities. Every God or Goddess chooses one or more Avatars, humans that represent their God/Goddess and are gifted with magic. Every deity has a different way of choosing Avatars and provides them with different types of magic. For example, the Four Gods and Goddesses of Challen each have three Avatars that reincarnate over successive generations. The Fip God of War chooses an Avatar from the royal line. The War Avatar handles the Allweapon and is skilled with strategy. The Grandmother of Stories provides smaller gifts of magic (mostly charm and storytelling), but She spreads them among many Avatars. However, this series focuses on the Season Avatars of Challen; they appear in every book.

"Anilink" comes from the words "animal" and "link." An anilink is a magical animal, typically smarter than others of its species, that links with a Fall Avatar. Anilinks sense when Chaos Season strikes anywhere in Challen and warn their Avatars so they can take action against the magical weather storm. In addition, anilinks help extend the range of their Avatar's magic so she (Fall Avatars are always female)  can aid animals all over Challen. Although anilinks can communicate telepathically with their Avatars, they don't have a full command of human language. There are two anilinks featured in this series. One is a crow named Brighteyes who is bonded to Sophia. The other is a housecat named Pouncer and bonded to Ysabel. They appear in Scattered Seasons, Chaos Season, and Fifth Season. Pouncer is even on the cover of Fifth Season.

If you're here for the A-Z Challenge, please leave a comment so I can return the visit. We'll resume the challenge on Monday.