A Wildflower in the Wind

A Wildflower in the Wind BOOK ONE OF THE MAGIC OF THE WILDFLOWERS TRILOGY By Megan Shade Copyright This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. A Wildflower in the Wind. Copyright © 2023 by Megan Shade All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. Published by: Shade Made Publishing LLC First Edition ISBN: 9798987832400 Editing by Sara Coombes: https://saracoombescom.wordpress.com/ Interior art by Brianna Strahsburg: @busybri.art on Instagram and Tiktok Cover Art by SeventhStar Art Services Authors note: This is the first book in the Magic of the Wildflowers Trilogy and ends on a cliffhanger. It includes adult themes including language, severe physical assault, and sexual content, and is intended for readers 18+. Contents Dedication Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Chapter 40 Chapter 41 Chapter 42 Chapter 43 Chapter 44 Chapter 45 Chapter 46 Chapter 47 Chapter 48 Acknowledgments Dedication T o Andrew, Who, instead of questioning me when I told him I wanted to write a book, bought me a laptop and made sure I had time to write. I love you. Prologue Rain drenched the ground as the cloaked woman picked the pure white petals from the dark, thorny vine. A smile crossed her face at their beauty, only for a moment, before the blade of betrayal sliced silently across her throat. The gods’ own blood pooled from her neck under the glow of the moon, the magic within feeding the roots of the moonflowers she’d waited on through the night. Death left only a moment to see who had ended her life—a man with familiar green eyes that swirled with darkness, so similar to the shadows she ruled. He escaped into the night as the petals floated softly toward the ground, falling from her hands and dropping into the puddle of deep red blood. As her soul severed itself from her earthly body, preparing for its journey beyond the veil, she watched as the petals turned black and rotted into ash, taking with them all hope that remained of bringing peace to her people. At the very moment the flowers and the woman ceased to live, a seer in a kingdom far away woke from her slumber, eyes glowing white as the words of the gods were pulled from her throat. “With the blessing of the goddess, evil will fall at her feet, and death will follow where she commands.” Chapter 1 Lea needed death to wait. But it had never been considerate enough to give her time before. Time to say goodbye, time to make amends, time to take even a single breath before it ripped away pieces of her soul and dragged them back to wherever anger and pain and sorrow dwelled. Its greedy fingers had taken enough from her village in the past year—snatched away innocence and joy, deprived children of the peaceful dreams they’d once had as they slept safely in their beds, stolen mothers away from their daughters… her mother. She crouched in the soft, tilled soil of her garden, rubbing her arms as shivers racked her body and goosebumps rose along her skin in the cool, spring air. She should have brought a sweater, but tonight she’d been pulled from her dreams, summoned, something drawing her to the darkness like the tides to the moon. Lea had known without a doubt as she’d raced into her garden in her nightgown and bare feet what had called to her—what had caused the sense of urgency that had floated in through her open window and woken her from her dreams. The moonflowers—her only hope at saving the boy who had been infected three days ago—were close to waking from their slumber. She’d planted them the moment she heard the news, had pressed the small crescent-shaped seeds deep into the dark, damp soil with a prayer that they would grow quickly enough to stop the Lonely Death. Lea couldn’t believe the illness had found her village again so soon, and a cry wrung from her throat at the thought of her young neighbor locked inside his room, dying alone to prevent the contagious disease from spreading. The wind whistled off the mountaintops surrounding her village as she waited for the small buds to unravel, the low chirping of crickets and melodic croaking of frogs a harsh juxtaposition against the erratic pounding of her heart. These moonflowers will bloom in time, she thought. She would make them. There wouldn’t be much time to pick the petals and deliver them to the boy once they bloomed. Minutes—if she was lucky—that the small white flowers that bloomed only once would be free from their prison of fibrous leaves before turning a deep black and dissolving into ashes along with the magic held inside them. “Wait until they’re ready, Wildflower,” her mother, Adelaide, had told her. “They must bloom fully… You’ll know when to pick them. Picked by the right person with the right intentions, at the right time, the flowers from these seeds can stop death himself.” They’d been some of the last words her mother had spoken to her, with a tight smile and a kiss on her cheek before she had barricaded herself in her room to protect her only child from death’s selfish