Less than one week until the launch of The Defiance!!

I am so excited for you all to read it. In the meantime, here’s another teaser from the book. Leave a comment here on the blog about the teaser, (or about whatever is on your mind), and I’ll randomly choose one commenter to receive a free ebook of The Defiance.

Teaser from The Defiance:

The morning passes quickly. There was more wood to move into the storeroom in the caves this morning, new stores of salt meat and dried beans to deliver, and our herbalist, Marjoram, told me she has some poultices and teas she wants me to bring in. Marj was underprepared for the accidents and illnesses resulting from such a long confinement last time. She won’t make the same mistake again.

There’s plenty of space in the storeroom—it was almost empty by the time we left the caves after the Reckoning. It’s an easy job to stow the supplies neatly along the natural stone shelves. My stomach rumbles, anticipating a midday meal, as I cross the cavern to the storeroom carrying the second-to-last load of wood. Even the lingering stench of crampberries doesn’t deter my appetite.

 “Fennel.” The word whispers across the cave.

 I freeze. “Who’s there?”

 “Stay away from the Lofty. Groundlings and Lofties aren’t meant to be together. You’ve been warned.”

 I can’t tell anything about the speaker—man, woman, their age. But quiet as the person’s words are, it’s hard to miss the implied threat. I drop most of the wood, keeping one thick log as a potential weapon. The person is between the passage out and me.

 I hold the log firmly in front of me, trying to tame my wild breathing so I can hear. Fear strangles my thoughts. An indefinable amount of time passes. Finally wrestling the courage to move, I step forward, keeping the log at the ready.

 And I cough.

 The air is wrong, and not simply human-waste wrong. Something else. There’s light where there shouldn’t be, and . . . smoke. That’s what I’m tasting and smelling.

 There’s a fire in the passageway, and it’s blocking my way out. Terror doesn’t steal through me. It rips my head off.