Title: The Uncovering
Author: Jes Young
Genre: Paranormal Romance / Urban Fantasy
MM Publishing USA
“Tab Bennett is normal — unusually, excessively normal. Her job as a bank teller is safe and secure, her grandfather finally let her move out of the house (at least to the cottage at the end of the driveway), and her fiancé fiercely guards her chastity, whether she wants him to or not.
It's something of a shock, then, when Tab learns that she is the elvish queen of the fabled kingdom of the Inbetween. Also shocking is the appearance of the staggeringly confident and gorgeous elvish warrior who claims to be Tab's true betrothed. Even amidst a steamy love triangle, Tab must tell friend from foe in an unknown world of danger, deceit, magic, and sex.
The first in the Underneath and Inbetween trilogy, The Uncovering sparkles with wit and unadulterated fun.”
Book Excerpt #3
That night I had a dream that Rivers and I were walking in the deep forest. I wasn’t afraid. She was like a beam of sunlight in the darkness, glowing, leading me by the hand the way she did when we were little. She pointed out rocks that might trip me and held back branches that would otherwise have tangled in my long, dark hair.
“I always protected you,” she said, looking back at me, her eyes big and black. “But you didn’t protect me.”
“I didn’t know how.”
With a shrug, she continued leading me deeper and deeper into the woods. The further we went, the less careful she became about the rocks and the branches. I stumbled and the trees lashed out and pulled at my hair and cheeks. She didn’t seem to care.
“Maybe we should go back.”
“We can only go forward from here.” Her hand was very cold in mine. Icy cold. “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “I’ll protect you from the monsters in this forest. Even though you didn’t protect me.”
Rivers wasn’t glowing with sunshine anymore. She was pale as the moon. She was growing dimmer by the second.
“I want to go home.”
“I’m never going home,” she said.
The trees blocked out the sky. The branches twisted together above us, seeking something that would always be out of their reach. There were birds perched on the limbs, shiny black birds that called to each other with human voices.
home, never going home
“Hush, you silly birds,” she said. “You’ll frighten the queen.”
frighten the queen, frighten the queen. Their call echoed from bird to bird and branch to branch.
“The starlings like you,” she said, looking up into the sea of glossy red eyes above us. “They don’t want the monsters to get you.”
They didn’t look friendly. Rivers didn’t look friendly either.
“Will you let the monsters to get me?” I asked.
She shrugged. “You let them get me.”
frighten the queen, frighten the queen
“I didn’t know about them. I would have protected you if I knew.”
never going home
“That’s a great excuse,” she said, “but I’m still dead.”
“I’m sorry,” I cried. “I’m so sorry.”
She started backing away from me. She spoke in a whisper that grew louder and louder which each word. “There are monsters in these woods. Some of They eat princesses for supper, but most of They prefer to make them suffer.”
The birds took to the sky, flying around us, feathers brushing against my cheek and throat and hands.
suffer, make them suffer
“I’m not a princess,” she whispered, “so what do you think They did to me?”
suffer
never coming home
“I’m sorry, Rivers. I’m so sorry.”
The starlings twisted around her, swirling as one, a mass of black wings and ruby eyes.
“Make them suffer,” she said. Her eyes were like the starlings’, glossy and glassy and empty, the deep color of bad blood. The birds drew close around her and then shot off, like a hundred thousand feathered arrows, into the sky.
I woke up in my bed, alone and scared, with tears streaming down my face.
***
Jes Young holds a BFA in creative writing from Emerson College. She writes Urban Fantasy and Paranormal romance because, in spite of a complete lack of supporting evidence, Jes still believes in fairy tales, happy endings, and true love.
Links
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https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5827855.Jes_Young
Purchase Links
Print copy ISBN 978-1-84982-239-8:
MMPublishing | Amazon | BN | Chapters Indigo | Powell's | Indiebound
Ebook copy ISBN 978-1-84982-289-3:
MMPublishing | Amazon | BN | Ebooks | FirstyFish | Kobo | Sony
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