Hi all,
I thought I'd share the first chapter of
The Season of Lightning, my newest book that releases on Feb 20 (and
available now for pre-order on Amazon). The book will be releasing on Nook and in paperback as well.
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THE SOLDIERS HAD their guns
pointed straight at me.
The sky was
cloudless and blue as azure above us, the air dry and hot with late summer
heat. I was bruised from falling off Gryphon, my horse, and my temper was as
short as the hair of a newly articled servant.
I’d escaped
from the house on horseback after another argument with the housekeeper about
my inability to keep shoes on while walking the grounds. Riding Gryphon hard
across the gold-brown flatlands outside the fields of the plantation made my
head clear, so I’d given him slack in the reins, and that brat took the bit in
his teeth and ran wild for the Jessu River, which cut like a jewel-green snake
through the hills between our land and the port city at the edge of the sea.
He’d been startled by a hawk in the foothills and thrown me, and then my
companion, Trilly, had shown up with the air of a martyr and the scolding of a sergeant
to usher me home on foot.
We’d been
arguing about the propriety of my actions when the soldiers appeared, guns
slung across their arms, on patrol against smugglers that sometimes roamed the
river at night. I’d known immediately by the expression that crossed the big
one’s face that we were in trouble.
Now, he was
toying with us like a cat plays with an injured sparrow.
They were young
soldiers—new ones I’d never seen before—the buttons on the gold-embroidered
uniforms still sparkled clean and bright in the sunlight, the fringe on their
belt-ends still hung straight and soft and clean, unstained by the dust of the
canyons that edged the river. Their faces were sunburned, their eyebrows drawn
together like locked gates as they looked at me. One was tall, with bright
blond hair that marked him as barbarian-blooded somewhere in his past. A
foreigner. He jerked his chin at me.
“What’s your
business on this road?”
He spoke
with the lazy drawl of a man who knows he will be having some fun and who wants
to take his time so he can savor it.
The second
soldier, who was smaller, swarthier, and darker-haired, an Austrisian, looked
away at the twisted trees lining the water of the Jessu instead of the
boardwalk we stood on. One of his eyebrows lifted a little, as if he wanted to
say something, but couldn’t find the courage to speak in front of the blond.
“I was
riding my horse, and I fell off when a bird flew up from behind a rock and
startled him. He reared, dumping me. We were walking home, where he has surely
already gone.” My words came out stiff and hoarse instead of cold and strong like
I wanted.
The
yellow-haired soldier frowned. “Let me see your papers.”
This was, of
course, an outrage. I wasn’t carrying papers because I didn’t have any, because
I wasn’t a bonded servant or a silvra freewoman, or a tyrra like these men
assumed. My hair might be curly with a hint of red-brown and my skin milky with
a touch of bronze in the summer like a tyyra, the river people who lived in our
land as immigrants and strangers, but I was the daughter of a plantation owner,
an Austrisian, and I had every right in the world to be walking on this road
with my companion.
“Didn’t you
hear me? I want to see your papers.”
“I don’t
have them, you idiot. I don’t need them.”
“Oh?” His
mouth turned down, but his eyes sparkled. The malice in them made me furious
instead of afraid.
“My name is
Verity Ely—”
“Shut up. I only
want to see the notification that you have the right to escort this seevver along this route. I don’t want a
sob story.”
I quit
feeling frightened when the word seevver
left his lips like a breath of smoke.
“You pig,” I
snapped, drawing in a quick, sharp breath. “We don’t need papers. Get your guns
out of our faces before I have my father arrest you. I—”
“I said shut up!” He stepped forward fast,
grabbing my shoulder hard. Trilly screamed, and the other soldier started to
raise his gun at Trilly.
The soldier’s
hands dug into my arm. His eyes blazed as they stared into mine, and out of the
corner of my eye, I saw his weapon in his hand, and the way his fingers
tightened reflexively over the trigger. His breath was hot against my chin.
“I’ll teach
you to insult me, you little minx. Your father, you say? He’s probably dead in
a ditch somewhere, shot for insolence against a patrol. You need to be taught a
lesson.”
I heard the
sharp rap of a horse’s hooves on the boardwalk, and my mind screamed out for
salvation from this new person, but the soldier ignored the sound of hoofbeats,
drunk with his station and the power that came with his firearm. He knew as
well as I that no farmer would mess with him, not with a gun in his hand, not
with the uniform he wore on his back, not with the fury written all over his
face.
My heartbeat
pulsed in my throat. My shoulder ached beneath his hands. I saw the way his jaw
tightened as though he was holding his temper in check, but just barely.
“For the
last time, girl,” he growled. “Your papers.”
The hoofbeats
halted behind us, and a cool voice cut in. “I knew that the regiment had taken
to importing barbarians to do its dirty work, but I was unaware that it had
begun recruiting the brain-injured.”
I knew that
voice. My heart sank.
The soldier
swung around with a swagger of confidence, lifting his gun. As he caught a
glimpse of the man who’d dared to interrupt his interrogation, his hand slipped
on my arm, and I yanked away.
“Sir,” the
soldier muttered, his tone grudgingly deferential.
The nobleman
on the horse tapped one gloved hand against his thigh as his lips pursed in a scowl.
He darted a look at me that embodied pure scorn before returning his attention
to the two soldiers before him.
“I am of
course assuming that you were unaware that you were accosting the beloved and
only daughter of General Elysius?”
Their faces
turned ashen as they realized their horrible, horrible mistake, and I smiled
tightly at the way they darted furtive glances at me, their mouths snapping
open and then closed, as if they were holding in curses. The dark-haired one
stepped away from Trilly hastily.
“Give me
your regiment numbers,” the young nobleman snapped, looking disgusted at having
to continue even conversing with them. “I’ll report you myself. If you are
lucky, you’ll get by with only a caning instead of a full dismissal.”
He remained
astride his horse and watched as they wrote down their regiment numbers and
gave them to him. My eyes lingered on the pistol strapped to his leg, the fine
lambskin boots that came almost to his knees, the crisp white gloves that
covered his hands. Lords, I had such terrible luck. Of all the people to have
rescued us, it had to be him.
After the
soldiers scrambled away, not daring to look back, he turned to us, his mouth
folding back into its characteristic smirk. “Ladies.”
I wiped the
beads of sweat from my upper lip, avoiding his gaze. I was thankful, naturally.
But...
Trilly, on
the other hand, gasped out a sigh and snatched up the fallen bonnets and basket,
trying without success to smooth out the wrinkles from the bonnets. “Lord Roth,
I don’t know what we would have done if you hadn’t shown up.”
I swallowed
the snarl that came to my lips, because, after all, he had just saved us.
Gratefulness was in order.
His lordship
dismounted smoothly, and his eyes found mine. There was a lazy sort of
appraisal in them, as always, as though he’d measured my talents and faults and
found me wanting in every way. I busied myself with brushing a bit of mud from
the full bodice of my gown.
“Thank you,”
Trilly said to Roth.
“Oh, it was
nothing. I’m sure Verity would have been able to find something to say to keep
that lackey at bay.” He folded his arms, as if waiting for my smart reply.
“That’s Miss
Elysius,” I snapped, feeling stupid for being unable to think of anything
wittier to say to him. “Anyway, we really must be going. We’ve lingered here
long enough, and Mimi is probably frantic about us. Goodbye.”
Roth tsked cheerfully under his breath. Now
that the soldiers were gone and the danger was over, he was sarcasm as usual.
“Is that any
way to thank me?”
I grabbed
Trilly’s arm and pulled her down the pathway for my father’s plantation, my silk
shoes barely whispering against the planks of the boardwalk that carried us
safely over the waters of the Jessu.
“I could
send a baou, so you wouldn’t have to dirty your shoes,” Roth suggested.
I knew he
was upset with me for getting myself into trouble with the soldiers like an
idiot, no doubt, and I knew he was probably also upset that I was being nasty
to him about rescuing us.
Perhaps I should
care, but it was Roth.
I left him
standing beside his horse on the boardwalk without a reply, and his chuckle
rang in my ears, infuriating me.
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