LOGINRyan
The family dining room in the private quarters of the castle where Ella and Ryatt spend their time outside of their royal duties is washed in starlight and the faint glow of a chandelier.
It’s probably edging on 9:00 PM, by my estimation. The dinner was long, drawn out, conversations yelled down the impossibly crowded wooden table.
Now, I sit on one end, nursing a glass of scotch, while my mate sits surrounded by my family on the other
IanI know exactly who I am. That’s my problem as I stand in the center of a wide, earthen, circular room somewhere deep underground. An elderly woman rises on her toes to inspect the moon-shaped scars on my wrist. Her touch is gentle but prodding, especially on the older scars. My entire body is thrumming, however, with a new kind of knowledge that threatens to bring me to the floor, and there isn’t a chair or a stool in sight. She looks up into my eyes. “She’s fine. Resting. She stayed out there with you all night.”“No one should have allowed her near me.”“We tried.” She rewraps a loose bandage around the scars. “Do you know where you are?”I don’t bother shaking my head. I’m exhausted. I feel like my bones are worn so thin they’ll break if I so much as take a step. Above all, I feel an earth-shattering kind of guilt that’s woven so tightly between my ribs I find it hard to breathe. “What’s happening to us?” I ask, and the old woman meets my gaze again. “I’m a fox, did you kn
NaomiJuliette is probably the loveliest young woman I’ve ever seen. She’s kind and soft spoken, like her mother, Posey. She’s also very quiet and shy, all qualities she inherited from one of my favorite aunts. She has an underlying streak of rebelliousness, however, that screams allegiance to the Westwood side of our family, even if Great-Grandpa Ryatt refuses to admit that most of the drama our side of the family causes is a direct result of his, and Ella’s, genetics–the two most dramatic people in the Goddess’ kingdom. Julie, however, keeps that part of her safely hidden, which makes her the perfect spy. She’s only twenty, poor thing. She has an old soul and no patience for petty, girlish games and crushes. Her entire world revolves around alchemy, and she is exceptional at it. “It feels nice. I like the weight,” I muse, turning a smooth, silver blade over in my hand to inspect the mother-of-pearl grip I requested. “The alchemized moonstone can hold a good bit of power if you c
OakleyI ebb in and out of consciousness for some time. I’m fully aware, however, of how vastly my surroundings have changed, especially when I begin to regain feeling in my fingers and toes. At some point, the group holding us captive walked out of the forest and into a dense fog. My consciousness began to return midway across a narrow suspension bridge, which was terrifying, to say the least. Mountain air rushes around me now, even closed away in an underground room carved into a mountain side. I vaguely remember a tunnel system and torches. I remember soft murmurs and confused looking people stepping out of doorways or pushing curtains aside. Now, my body tingles all over to the point of pain, but I’m staying as quiet and as still as possible because I’m not alone. An elderly woman, who can’t be taller than four feet at the most, sits on the edge of the bed I was unceremoniously dumped on less than an hour ago. She’s humming an unfamiliar tune while she grinds herbs in a bowl an
OakleyMy body hits the rock wall, but not as hard as I intended when I decide this would be a better way to die than between that monster’s teeth. The contact does knock the wind out of me, though, and I fall backward directly on my ass in a puddle of stale, sulfuric smelling water. The beast snorts and huffs nearby, and those sounds echo into what I quickly realize is a tight space–a cave, a single rift in the rock wall I thought would be my grave. The opening is just wide enough for me to slide my hips through. Once I’m past the entrance, the space opens. I keep moving, instinct spurring me to get as far away as possible. I pause and scrub my hands over my face, taking several deep breaths to try to calm my nerves, but it’s useless. My chest aches while my heart continues to thunder. I have no weapons, no way to defend myself. I can’t outrun this monster, and for some reason, I can’t shift. I just don’t understand how to yet. I rise and creep back through the cave until I can se
OakleyI’m not sure where I am. If it’s the Goddess’s afterlife, Her Golden Kingdom that awaits all true believers when they pass have been massively led astray. I’m freezing. My skin feels like ice as I blink into hazy, silver light that bleeds through the shadows of a forest. Raindrops slither from dark green leaves and fall onto my cheeks and neck, sliding like tears. Or, I’m crying, which would make a great deal of sense, seeing as I feel like I’ve been through a meat grinder. I’m lying on my back when my memories begin to sizzle back into focus. My last lucid memory registers. The thing that rose over the plains, with its black wings and grizzly, terrifying snout. Its teeth, barbed tail, and scale-like armor that was so black it seemed endless. My breath comes in quick gulps. I slowly lift my head, taking in my scraped up, naked body, then my surroundings. I am not in Endova anymore. I’ve never seen trees like this. They’re gnarled and bent at odd angles. Most are evergreens,
OakleyI’ve always loved an Endovan sunset. The skies here are wide and open, and in the right conditions, the clouds burst in the richest shades of gold, orange, pink, and light blue as the sun slips below the horizon. The smoky air makes everything feel slightly hazy and dream-like, even here, about a mile from the village, where the grassy grazing land is now broken up by tents and small groups working as hard as they possibly can to finish shearing hundreds of sheep. Aunt Janis was right when she said it was an all-hands-on-deck situation. Endova experienced quite the baby boom in terms of their herds this year, and while it’s a notable success on all fronts, it means hundreds of sheep to shear and thousands of pounds of wool to process in a matter of days. Naked sheep don’t fare well in the winter, that’s for sure, but by the time the rainy season hits the grasslands, their coats will already be growing in thick again, and next spring, their first shear of the year won’t be a t
*Ryatt*It doesn’t take long for word to spread about what happened at the auction. Especially since I burned it to the ground once all of my men and women were safely out of the building and scattering toward the outskirts of Twin Rivers. I sent Amanda and Ella with Granger. He’d take them back to t
*Maddy*Cassian is in pieces. That’s the only way I can describe him. His chest is flayed open, the bandages holding him together are soaked through with blood. Isla’s magic isn’t working fast enough. She’s leaning over him, her face stained with fresh tears as she pours a fourth vial of that preciou
*Maddy* The ballroom is totally transformed from floor to ceiling. The finest flowers in the kingdom stand in large, marble vases resting on tables covered in light blue tableclothes. Champagne flows, poured into crystal flutes, and graceful string music fills the air, rising above the chatter. I w
*Maddy*Wind whispers over us. Little flakes of silver ice bite into my cheeks despite the fact that it’s summer. Nothing here feels right. The long dead grass sways in a vicious breeze, the air so chilled it stings. The sky is pitch black and moonless, like the night came and refused to ease its gri







