What Lies Beyond the Veil
Harper L. Woods
(Of Flesh & Bone, #1)
Publication date: February 22nd 2022
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Once, we’d worshipped them as Gods.
For nearly 400 years, the Veil has protected us from the Fae of Alfheimr. In their absence, our lives have shifted from decadence and sin to survival and virtue under the guidance of the New Gods. I’ve spent my entire life tending to the gardens next to the boundary between our worlds, drawn to the shimmering magic like a moth to the flame.
Then, we died on their swords.
All of that changes the day the Veil shatters, unleashing the fae upon our world once again. The magic of faerie marks those of us they mean to take, but the Mist Guard protecting Nothrek will kill us all before they let the fae have us. There’s no choice but to flee everything I’ve ever known, not if I want to live to see my twenty-first birthday as a free woman.
Now, they’ll claim what’s theirs.
But before they capture me, Caelum saves me from the Wild Hunt. Fae-marked and on the run, he is able to fight back in ways I only dream of. From tentative alliance to all-consuming passion, our bond strengthens as the fae close in and evil lurks ever nearer. With my life on the line, he is everything I shouldn’t dare to want and a distraction I can’t afford. I can’t seem to stay away, not even with something greater on the line.
My heart.
Author’s Note: This book is intended for readers who are 18 and older. It contains mature language, graphic violence, and explicit content with darker elements. This is book one in a series and ends in a cliffhanger.
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EXCERPT:
I lifted the first bite of cake to my mouth, flavors of vanilla and cinnamon on my tongue as I chewed. There was nothing hidden within it, just the sweetness of the cake itself as I watched the others around me chew theirs.
I was through my second bite before something struck my tooth and I raised a hand to my mouth to pull it out. The ring glimmered in bronze against my palm, a sign of the shackle I’d spent my entire life knowing was coming.
Death or prostitution were the only escapes from marriage in the Kingdom of Nothrek. Still, the clear symbol in my palm felt like a noose around my neck, like a death all its own.
“Congratulations are in order; I see?” Adelphia said, her voice tentative. There was no joy on my face at the prospect of my pending nuptials. It didn’t matter that I had no knowledge of who my husband might be.
Men were almost all the same, in the end. Looking for a warm place to stick their cock and a trophy to sow their seed.
“It would seem so,” I said, smiling and trying to shrug off the dread coursing through my veins. I’d never believed in the fortune tellers who worked at the market every week, predicting which of the thirteen lives a person found themselves on in the cycle of reincarnation before the true death. I’d never put any stock in the magical items a person could purchase if they spoke the right words at the right stands.
I wouldn’t start believing in prophecy just because it predicted something I’d always known was coming anyway.
There was a soft thump behind us, the group going still as they looked over my shoulder at the circle. I turned slowly, following their gazes to where a single candle had fallen off its stone and extinguished the moment it touched the grass, as if by an unseen force.
I swallowed, working out the placement for a moment before I turned back to the group with a shaky breath. The silence between them as they watched me rise to my feet spoke volumes about their belief in their Samhain traditions and the clairvoyance they brought.
“I should get home,” I said, looking at the sun just cresting the horizon through the trees.
Adelphia nodded, not even bothering to argue with me. There was nothing left to say.
The only candle that had fallen was mine.
Author Bio:
Enraptured by love. Captivated by fantasy. USA Today Bestselling author Adelaide Forrest writing spicy fantasy romance as Harper L. Woods.
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