J.R. Pearse Nelson's Blog, page 20

Is It Spring Yet?

Spring is right around the corner. I keep feeling hints of it in the air. We've had two blessed Saturdays in a row where the weather was about sixty degrees and sunny. It feels magical after so many long weeks inside. 
My creativity seems to be bursting forth like snowmelt feeding a river. I'm making progress on writing two books simultaneously. One was planned -- the other, not so much. But as long as the words are willing and I'm cozy in my nest during the last fits of winter, how can I resist?
Here's an update on my progress since Wednesday:Thursday: 600 words on my "just for fun" project. (Even though I said on Wednesday I'd be forcing myself to write on my primary WIP first…I never follow my rules. That would be too boring.)Friday: A torrent!! 2,300 words on my primary WIP, with big happenings afoot in my made-up world. Fun, fun, extra fun. :)Saturday: 900 words on the primary WIP.Sunday: 800 words on the primary WIP so far today. I'll hit my "just for fun" project next if I have more time to spare. 
In the last week, I've written 4,000 words on the second Foulweather Twins book (my primary WIP) and 1,200 on my other project. I'll take it!
In the coming week, I want to finish up my first run at formatting Queen Witch for paperback. I need to fix the beginnings of chapters the way I want them and add page numbers, and then I should be ready to submit it and order a proof copy. Speaking of, anyone know how long the turnaround for a proof is? Once my formatting is basically done, how long until I actually have books in my hands?
I also need to start incorporating revisions to Flight, the third novella in my paranormal romance series. This week I'll yank my head out of the flow of the creative river, where I've been submerged at every opportunity, and fit in a couple of hours of work on that.
Alrighty folks. Real life calls. My poor hubby is working like crazy around the house today, and being SO nice to me while I write and dream, and ditch out on real life duties. I'm starting to feel guilty, so while my youngest naps I should probably start the laundry folding of epic proportions, and in general tidy up my happy little home. 
Have a great week, everyone!

Quick Update

The words are really flowing this week. I'm looking for any opportunity to write, and it shows.

Sunday: 900 words on my main WIP, and 500 on my "just for fun" project.
Monday: 600 words on the "just for fun" project. I know I'm cheating, but Mondays are tough with my 60 mile commute and I rarely write. So I went with what was feeling best at the moment.
Tuesday:  Added to outline for "just for fun" project. Spent an hour formatting Queen Witch for print.

I haven't made any progress on revisions for the next book I'll publish. Bad me! I'll do better in the last half of the week. I'll also adjust and after Wednesday be making myself get in at least 1,000 words on my primary WIP before doing the "just for fun" thing. This little trick will probably result in more words written overall. And I'm fine with fooling me. :)

How's your week going? Any writer news or biz stuff to share?

Tribute Now $0.99

I'll be publishing the third novella in my Children of the Sidhe paranormal romance series in May. The first book, Tribute, just came off of a free promotion on Amazon. I've decided to make Tribute $0.99  for the next few weeks. If I sell a decent number of copies in the next bunch of days, it will help my ranking as the book makes it back to the paid ranks. And since these novellas are a hell of a lot of fun, I'll benefit in the long run from more people taking a chance on the first book in the series.

Promotion, Production and Procrastinating

Hi there! I chose three p's for the title today. I'm feeling a little Sunday morning spunky. So far on this bright day, my husband has made a delicious breakfast and built a big fort in the living room with the kids. I've done very little. Awesome. :)
(Update, since I wrote this part an hour and a half ago -- since then, we've played a new kiddo board game that was really fun, and a couple of us have gotten dressed. I'm not one of them.)

My novella Tribute is free right now on Amazon, so that's the promotion part. I paid $25 to James at ebookbooster.com to fill out the forms on 50+ websites that list free books. I've just visited, and it looks like the price for this service has gone up in the last two weeks, to $45. That's not surprising, because ebookbooster.com was referenced on Joe Konrath's blog (here) in a post about the KDP Select free days and getting the most out of them. I read that post the day it went live, set the date for my Tribute promotion, and got in touch with James. I'm glad I did, because it definitely increased the visibility of my promotion. I've had 500 plus downloads (which isn't a ton, but I'm only halfway into the five day free stretch), and I've been on the top 100 free lists for fantasy and futuristic romance and paranormal romance for the past two days, meaning that more people searching for books in these genres will run across my title. I'd planned to contact James again for my next promotion, but $45 is a bit higher…I'll have to see how the rest of my free period works out and whether it turns out to be worth it. I definitely appreciated his assistance and it was well worth the $25 I spent.

In terms of production, I'm really into my WIP right now. I gave myself permission to work on that nifty fresh project if I needed to blow off steam, but every time I open my manuscript I find it easy to make progress. Sometimes having a possible source of relief is just the ticket. This week I wrote:
Monday - 400
Wednesday - 300
Friday - 1,000
Saturday - 1,600
And on Tuesday I wrote 400 words on the fresh new WIP. So in total I hit my 3,500 word mark, but I didn't quite get there on the book I'm supposed to be writing. But like I said, I'm feeling particularly into the groove on my main project, and I anticipate a high word count this next week because I'm eager to write the next few scenes. Yay!

And we've reached…procrastination. The topic here is the print version of Queen Witch. I've never done a print edition before, and I'm nervous about it. I've done an initial run at the formatting, but I need to do a bunch more reading on CreateSpace to make sure I have things correct. I definitely need to move this up my priority list. I WILL make progress this week, hopefully resulting in submitting the book so I can get a physical proof.

I also need to prioritize the revisions on my novella Flight. I want to publish this in May, so I need to get cracking.

The challenge this week will be fitting in both writing new word count and progress on revisions and formatting a print manuscript. It's a lot to juggle, but I feel like I'm at a point where I need to make progress everywhere.

Best of luck to everyone in the coming week. Spring is on its way, I can feel it in the air! :)

Tribute FREE on Amazon!

I'm happy to announce that my paranormal romance novella Tribute is currently FREE on Amazon! 


Tribute is a fae-filled paranormal romance, an action-packed romp to the Otherworld, and beyond.
Hazel Fintan is the reluctant daughter of the Irish love god, Aengus. She’s never cared for her father’s world, especially its men. So who could expect her to be happy when she’s drawn into a conflict with a legendary race over an impossible tribute?
The tribute may be what brought them together, but Ian MacIlroy knows destiny when it stares him in the face with stunning green eyes and a gorgeous smile. Now he has a new mission. Hazel will be his, at any cost. And the cost could be high when Otherworld’s enemies are denied what they seek.
Children of the Sidhe
The Sidhe dwindle. Slow to breed and quick to war, the ages have worn away their numbers. An old enemy threatens Otherworld, fearsome in numbers and in newfound magics. The Sidhe’s unloved part-human children strewn about the mortal world are suddenly their greatest source of hope.


Excerpt:
Getting her oil changed wasn’t exactly Hazel’s idea of a fun chore for Friday afternoon, but the sixteen-year-old drooling over her made it nearly unbearable this time. Literally, drooling.She shot him a short-tempered look as she put on her sunglasses, the Portland sun requiring it for once, though a deep gray line of clouds already clustered along the western horizon. “Can you just finish with the car already?”He gulped. “Hey, when I’m done do you want to go to dinner or something?”Hazel sighed and cast him a sweet smile. “You don’t want anything to do with the likes of me, kid.”He just smiled at her and nodded, his brain obviously addled.“So that’s a no. No dinner. Just finish my car. Thanks.”Confused and deflated, he shook his shaggy hair into his face so she couldn’t see his profile as he worked. He called out to his pit crew, his tone wistful and sad.Gods. Wouldn’t it be great to be normal?Crushing men wasn’t Hazel’s idea of a good time. It was just that many of them had no control over themselves when she was around. The drooling was not attractive. But they didn’t know that. They didn’t even realize how silly they looked. It was part of her draw; men tended to be totally focused on her, unable to string together more than a sentence, much less keep her entertained for a date. They were compelled to look, to touch if she’d let them, hovering over her the entire time.She’d heard she was lucky. Some Sidhe drew humans to madness, despair – even violence. They just wanted to love her.Still, it was annoying.A buzzing from her purse cast a wave of relief over her. Blessed distraction. She looked up and caught the boy staring again, and frowned at him as she reached into her purse.Checking the number that had just flashed on her cell phone, Hazel sighed. The age-old question: to answer, or not to answer? Swallowing, she hit send.“Hello?”“Hazel. Glad I caught you. Got a little problem I could use your help with.”“Thankfully, your problems don’t have anything to do with me anymore.”“They do when they’re not mine specifically, but more, you know, ours.”“Great,” Hazel said. If he meant what she thought he did, her hope of getting out of whatever this was had just faded fast.“There’s a human over here who needs to get in touch with the Fomorii. Has to pay a tribute of some kind, but hasn’t been able to get through. Think you could take him?”“Can I take him?” Like she didn’t have enough to do. “Drake, this is your job. You know I was never into this stuff.”“You’re missing the point. He needs to go. I can’t take him, so I thought of you.”“Why can’t you take him?” Drake was the obvious choice. After all, he worked for the Sidhe Authority, taking care of the Otherworld government’s business in the human world. Hazel had as little to do with Otherworld affairs as possible. “Let’s call it a little interpersonal issue between me and the Fomorii contact. I’m waiting another decade at least before I meet up with that guy again, for everyone’s sake. I’m supposed to be smoothing relations, remember?”“See, that’s what I’m talking about. When we were together, I dealt with your interpersonal issues. Now that we’re not, I don’t see what this has to do with me.”“You’re Sidhe, so you’re in. Our problems are your problems, and this falls into that category. Just think, what would Aunt Brigit say?”“Damn,” she growled. He had to bring her aunt into it. Of course she knew what Brigit would say. You get the benefits; a certain amount of dirty work comes with it. Help your people. “Tell me what I’m supposed to do again?”
Tribute is FREE now on Amazon Kindle! Happy reading! :)

Sunday Update: Fresh Words

It feels good to be slipping back into a writing routine after the release of my latest book. I floundered for a few days with attempts to market the new book, and a few more with wondering how much more I could do to promote the release. I found my balance this week. I'll continue to promote Queen Witch as opportunities arise, but I truly believe the best use of my time is on the writing side. I have more releases planned this year, and the best way to promote my work is to keep on writing kick-ass stories. So I'm back at it!

It helps that I'm writing the sequel, and since a fair number of family and friends have just read the first book in my fantasy series, they're starting to pester me for book two. Good pestering. The helpful kind. In fact, I caught zero eye-rolling for skipping a family breakfast at my folks this morning in preference of getting 1,600 words on the page. I think it was the right decision. :)

My goals for the first three months of the year were:


1) Publish Queen Witch -- Check!
2) Revise Flight, the third Children of the Sidhe novella -- I've been through my draft on paper, and now that Queen Witch is out I need to spend at least an hour twice a week revising this baby so I can publish it this spring.
3) Write an average of 500 words per day on the second Foulweather Twins novel -- I haven't kept up with this one in recent weeks, but as I said, I'm getting back into the rhythm. To make this goal, I need to write more days of the week. I wrote 1,600 words today and 700 on Friday, for 2,300 total this week. That's not too far off my 3,500 weekly goal. But I'll do better this week, I swear! :)
And here's a BONUS!! Yesterday I felt like blowing off my main project, even though I had plenty of time to write. So did I sit on my butt? Well…er…yes, but in that good, butt in chair, producing words way. You see, Friday night my hubby went out with friends and I put on a movie and dug into some plotting notes for a fun story idea I played with about a year ago. I realized I had an entire outline, so yesterday I wrote the first scene, about 1,000 words! It felt good! It's something completely different, and I think it will fill a need for "blowing off steam" during the writing of a novel. Novels take soooo long!!! But I hate to lose a single day of productive writing. Not sure how often I'll play with this one; it's totally a joy thing, so probably as often as I need that. :)
Best of luck this week, ROWers!

The Roots of My Foulweather Twins

Stories develop in strange and convoluted ways, and each is unique. At least, that's how it is for me. :)

I have long found the idea of twins intriguing. I was never close to a twin, so I didn't have a first row seat to watch the dynamics between twins play out. However, from what I did see, I often thought they got a raw deal. People seem to think twins would automatically like to be around each other, and like to share all that they share by default, through no choice of their own.

I started thinking about twins with powers. I made my first notes on the subject in 2003. Yep, that long ago. At first, my twins were just oddities, born to a witch who was part of a reclusive coven -- back then, my twins were the first of their kind. One of them could astral project, and the other used psychokinesis.

That was before the name. I am certain I read the name on that sign on Highway 101 as a child. I'm a lifelong Oregonian, and my family spent time on the coast. My freshman year roommate in college (also a high-school friend and volleyball teammate and one of my best friends to this day) had spent a lot of time as a kid just fifteen miles north of Cape Foulweather. We drove that strip of coast often in college. Often. It was just over an hour's drive through farmland and over a curvy mountain pass before dropping down to the coast. We loved that drive. We're the type of friends who can just be together in silence, or any manner of goofiness, and many times we ended up atop a cliff at one of her favorite childhood spots, watching the ocean spray and the sea for ships and whales. However, the first time the name Cape Foulweather really stuck with me was when I met a coffee roaster at a farmer's market from Cape Foulweather Coffee Company. Their coffee was AMAZING, by the way, which is why I included a link. :)

Trees bent with the constant wind
A historical sign from Cape Foulweather
The view looking south from Cape FoulweatherHow did that name and my twins get all wound up together? Well…Cape Foulweather is on that stretch of coast where I played with so many ideas about my reclusive coven, where I was inspired by the idea of caves and caverns to combine my coven with the Lady of the Lake, from Arthurian legend. That is a story I've read from many points of view, my favorite being the Mysts of Avalon. Cape Foulweather is also a place of immense natural power, in the form of churning waves and hundred mile an hour winds -- it just fit with my developing story of storm-born twins who were part of a very odd family.

Those twins are now a reality in my Foulweather Twins fantasy series, which starts with Queen Witch.



Stubborn and suspicious are two qualities that don’t go over well in the Queen family…
Where does my story truly begin? Maybe with the birth of twins to a soon-dead witch. Or possibly with the name bestowed on me by the Lady, the immortal we serve. She called me Sage, and my sister Wren. The Foulweather twins. As I choose to see it, my story begins when I first participated in the course of my life. When I started making my own decisions, despite everything I’d been taught. Forced recluse with a secret life? That’s me.
Sage Brighton is a young woman of incredible power, but she doesn’t decide how that power is used, or anything else about her life. As a witch of the Queen family, and a twin, Sage will serve the Lady all her days. The immortal has plans for Sage and her twin Wren. They are to be her Hands, her enforcers in the mortal, modern world. But first Sage must survive her training, learn to control her sociopathic sister without getting maimed in the process, and all the while try to keep something of her life for her own.

Mid-Week Update: Goal #1 -- Check!!

Hello ROW80 friends. This update is super late, because yesterday was the monthly Indie Life post hosted by the Indelibles.

Big news! I published my fantasy novel Queen Witch, which was my first and largest goal for the winter round. Yippee! Celebrate! *dances nifty little jig*  If you want more info on that, you can go here.

I still need to format the book for paperback and go through that process with CreateSpace. This will be my first paperback, and I'm finding it's a thrilling and also excruciating thing to ponder. It will be amazing to hold a physical copy of the work I've produced. Now to get the formatting right….I'm going to print out a fresh copy of the instructions, instead of the coffee-stained one I printed months ago, and take it with me to Bend this weekend.

LIFE has also been big lately. I've been sick all week, for one thing, so hanging on with a WILL. Today is Valentine's Day, of course, and also a big family gathering to celebrate February birthdays. My sister and her kids are in town (six hour drive) because my niece has a concert here on Saturday, so it works out to get together. Tomorrow is my 33rd birthday, and my brother has kindly offered to take care of my girls even though I have the day off. I might do some shopping, might see a movie, might go for a hike…On Saturday, we go to Bend, Oregon, until Monday. Hubby's band is playing at a big festival there called Winterfest, so he's been brushing up on guitar and fixing the cranky theramin. All sorts of raucousness in the Nelson household this week. I'm looking forward to a nice relaxing holiday weekend, it's just what I need!

Best of luck to all of you in the coming week!

Indie Life: No One Else Gets This

Welcome to another Indie Life post -- where indie authors get together to inspire, motivate and inform one another. You'll notice the linky tool at the bottom with links to other indies' blogs -- we're posting the second Wednesday of every month. Go to the Indelibles site if you want to participate. It would be awesome to have you!

I just reached a major milestone. I published my first fantasy novel. This is the genre I always dreamed of writing in. It has taken me a long time to hone my craft to the point I felt I could release a fantasy book. I kinda screwed up my first couple of attempts, actually. All part of the game, my friends. To write a book, you must ere. You must.

I have published the first two novellas in a paranormal romance series, with two more books written that will be published in 2013. In some ways writing paranormal romance comes easier to me, even though it isn't the work that touches me most.

I JUST released this fantasy novel. And people are so cool! They popped out of the woodwork to help me promote the release. People amaze me with their generosity and kindness.
I could leave it at that. It's a big thing I've learned in my nearly two years of blogging. I learn it from my real-life friends, too, on big days like this. People are amazing; their willingness to share and their enthusiasm for the work that gives me such joy….people continue to surprise me in wonderful ways.
And yet, no one but another new indie author really understands what we're doing here. There's plenty of guidance, but no one road to indie success. It is a truly entrepreneurial venture. My friends and family are incredibly supportive, and I know I'm lucky in that. They support this independent publishing because they know it makes me happy, and they care. So I'm lucky. 
When it comes to late nights working on blog posts or early mornings waking with thoughts of all I could do for my writing career if the day was mine….and then I go to work; you know, the day job. After that I pick up my kids, make them dinner and spend some quality time together, and before I know it 8:00 has rolled around, and I can tune into my business for 20 to 90 minutes, depending on other priorities.
I will tell you this: other indie authors get this stuff -- the struggle to fit in everything we feel we should do. We have to juggle progress on our writing with promotion of books we already have out, with keeping a live platform so people can find us in the midst of everything out there, with connecting with more and more likeminded people. It would be a lot of fun to have more time to focus on the business side. However, we also understand if you have a day job, and family commitments you will not sacrifice to meet the whim of the social media now. We get it, even if no one else does.
Have a great month indies! Keep it rockin'! I can't wait to see you succeed. :)

Queen Witch Available Now

I like that title; makes it sound like I'm available for hire to take care of your dirty work or something. But in fact, that isn't the case. The truth is….drumroll, please….

My fantasy novel Queen Witch is available now! You can find it on Amazon, Smashwords, Kobo, and Barnes and Noble. I will also be making it available as a paperback, but that will take me a few weeks.

There are a couple of reasons I'm super excited about this release. It is the first full-length novel I've published. It's also my first publication in my most-loved genre; fantasy. And to top it off, my 33rd birthday is Friday, and Queen Witch is out in the world before I hit that landmark. Yippee!!

Enough of my goofball author celebration -- you probably want to know more about the book. Here's a description and an excerpt from the first chapter. ("Yippee!" this author is still shouting in the background. :))

Queen Witch 
The first book in the Foulweather Twins series

Stubborn and suspicious are two qualities that don’t go over well in the Queen family…


Where does my story truly begin? Maybe with the birth of twins to a soon-dead witch. Or possibly with the name bestowed on me by the Lady, the immortal we serve. She called me Sage, and my sister Wren. The Foulweather twins. As I choose to see it, my story begins when I first participated in the course of my life. When I started making my own decisions, despite everything I’d been taught. Forced recluse with a secret life? That’s me.
Sage Brighton is a young woman of incredible power, but she doesn’t decide how that power is used, or anything else about her life. As a witch of the Queen family, and a twin, Sage will serve the Lady all her days. The immortal has plans for Sage and her twin Wren. They are to be her Hands, her enforcers in the mortal, modern world. But first Sage must survive her training, learn to control her sociopathic sister without getting maimed in the process, and all the while try to keep something of her life for her own.
Excerpt:
“Wren, take it easy!” I shouted to my sister over the howling winds that whipped along the rock-studded beach and stirred the crashing waves into froth.
Instead, my twin threw all of her power against me, knocking aside the rock I’d held there for her, hovering in mid-air despite the fierce wind. I scowled, but played along, raising rock after rock as she dashed them back to the earth.
Wren’s expression was a mirror of my own as we faced off. We were identical, on the surface, even if we had little in common outside the physical. The wind had already stripped strands of Wren’s long dark hair out of the braid I’d done for her not half an hour ago. Deep gray clouds studding the horizon spoke of a rainstorm on the way.
Finally, Wren threw one of the stones far. It flew past me, into the waves. I made sure not to gape; she loved to show her superior strength in these games, and I wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of knowing it bothered me.
“My turn.” I told her, watching the trail behind her for any sign of movement. If the aunts caught us at it, we’d be days recovering from the pile of chores that would result. Since we hadn’t started twin school, we were supposed to use our powers sparingly. Too many twins explored their powers in dangerous ways without the proper training and ended up dead before they could be of any service to the Lady at all. But tell that to a pair of fourteen-year-olds who could move matter with their minds. We couldn’t resist.
Wren raised a boulder first. A bead of sweat rolled down her temple as she concentrated her energy on the single rock. Instead of doing as she’d done, I twisted it, raising my own rock and beating it against the boulder, attempting to dislodge it and send it back to sea or sand. One rock wasn’t enough, so I was in the middle of raising an army of rocks – not one of my better ideas – when we were interrupted. A ball of white fur hurtled toward us. The dog had gotten pretty close before I noticed it, and Wren’s back was to it. It started barking before I could warn her, a sharp yip that made Wren jump. She dropped the boulder, which shattered into two pieces as it hit the rocks below. I stared at it for a split second. Breaking rocks. Now thatwas cool.
I didn’t have time to say anything before Wren twisted to face the dog, now a scarce ten feet from her. She threw up a hand and a wave of sand and rock lifted the dog off its feet, and sent it flipping through the air.
It was then that I noticed a man running toward us from farther down the beach, obviously coming after his dog. He stopped, confused, when he saw Wren’s action. I couldn’t be sure what he thought he saw, but I let out a little shriek that alerted Wren to his presence. If there was any rule that governed our lives, it was don’t use powers around strangers.
The dog landed on all fours and gave a final yip before scurrying off with his tail between his legs and his ears flat against his head.
I grabbed Wren’s hand, holding tight despite her protest, and ran toward the wooded trail. I expected to hear the man yell behind us, but if he said anything at all, the wind tore the words away before they reached my ears.
Around a bend in the trail I slowed and dropped Wren’s hand angrily. She clasped her hands together and looked at the ground. She could tell I was mad, but I knew she had no idea why. That frustrated me even more.
“Wren! You cannot lash out like that with your power. Don’t you know you could hurt somebody?”
“It was a dog. An annoying dog,” she told me resentfully.
“Did you see the man running toward us?” I didn’t even have to ask. “Wren. We’ve been over this. We’re not even supposed to use our powers like that around the aunts, much less around a stranger. You can’t act like that. We don’t own the beach, you know.”
“We were there first.”
“No matter. If you can’t control yourself, I’m not playing.” I stalked off, too upset to say more right now. I might say something I’d regret. Not that my sister would notice. She could be selfish, not to mention dangerously out of control. Our temperaments were polar opposites. My sister was quiet, shy, and didn’t care for people. In fact, as she’d just shown, she could be dangerous. It wasn’t that Wren actively disliked people; it was that she didn’t care. Another person’s joy, or their pain, never really got through to her.
I stayed ahead of Wren the whole way home, taking our usual path alone. I don’t know if she trailed me or took another route. Sometimes I got tired of caring. She could find her own way home. She was capable of that much.
I strolled by my friend David’s house, but didn’t see any signs of life no matter how slow I walked. I hadn’t seen him in weeks, which was unusual for the summer months. His family lived in the city, but came to their coastal cabin for many weekends, regardless of the time of year. In the summer even more so, as his mom exchanged the heat of city sidewalks for the serenity of a beachfront paradise, taking her kids along. David’s mom always dressed in flowery prints, bright and sunny, just like her smile. David was lucky; his family was nice. Normal.
I’d known David since I was six. When he stayed at his family’s cabin, we had a secret way to exchange messages, and several secret places we loved to meet.
I hoped he’d be back soon. I was getting lonely with no one but my twin for company. You might think that would be enough, a twin to share everything with. I loved my sister, but sometimes she wasn’t great company. And I had no normal friends, not the way most kids my age had friends, from what David said. I didn’t go to school. A cousin who lived in the cliff-top house with us home schooled Wren and me. We didn’t really see anyone besides cousins, aunts and uncles. Some of the cousins were close to our age, but none of them were twins. That set us apart, in our family.
Among the Queen witches twins were precious and saved for the family’s immortal patron. Twins like us were raised to serve the Lady, as her Hands. In some ways, my twin was the only person I was taught to rely on. Our duality shaped our world and our obligations. I was only a kid and already I’d noticed that. The rest of the family held us apart, somewhat reverently, but that didn’t help children who just wanted to get in on their cousins’ games.
I continued along the small winding road toward home, a chill running through me when I considered what had almost happened on the beach. Wren had almost hurt someone. Would she ever learn caution? Would I always have to remind her to control her emotions, and her power? Would I always be there when she needed reminding?
These thoughts woke a fear that had long lived under my skin. What would the Lady do if she knew how Wren sometimes lost control and struck out with her power? The Queen witches hid their powers from the world. We lived outside of everything, having only as much contact with the mainstream as necessary. We didn’t mix, it was just too dangerous.
The Lady made her family from distinguished magical bloodlines, adopting and even rescuing witches as they were persecuted across the centuries and around the world. Regular people didn’t understand witches; especially witches bred to their powers like thoroughbred horses to the race.