Rose of the Deadlands: An epic fantasy romance series (Forgotten Path of the Elors Book 1)

Rose of the DeadlandsJesse Sprague Copyright © 2023 Jesse SpragueAll rights reservedThe characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.Cover design by: Warren DesignEditing by: Amy McNultyPrinted in the United States of America Contents Title PageCopyrightPart I: The RoseChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Chapter 10Chapter 11Chapter 12Part II- The PantherChapter 13Chapter 14Chapter 15Chapter 16Chapter 17Chapter 18Chapter 19Chapter 20Chapter 21Chapter 22Chapter 23Part III- The DeadlandsChapter 24Chapter 25Chapter 26Chapter 27Chapter 28Chapter 29Chapter 30Chapter 31Chapter 32Chapter 33Chapter 34Chapter 35Part IV: BloodlinesChapter 36Chapter 37Chapter 38Chapter 39Chapter 40Chapter 41Chapter 42Chapter 43Chapter 44Chapter 45Join Jesse's Mailing ListThe Best Gift... Books By this author Part I: The Rose Chapter 1Saiette was trapped. Trapped by the rose arbor over the stone path from her cottage to the garden. Trapped by the square of earth under her feet. Trapped between one patch of horizon and the small town on the downhill slope.Her fingers curled atop the drystack wall that made a low border around her parents’ garden. She leaned out to look at the two paths stretching away from the rose-decked cottage. Every morning her father traveled the one to the left, toward the village at the base of the hill. This path was made from fieldstones, and Saiette had trod the path so many times she had the stones and their individual songs memorized. The path to the right was a dirt trail that led toward the forested horizon. In the distance, a bridge arced over a twinkling stream—that was the farthest Saiette had ever ventured in her nineteen years. It was the edge of her cage.Her mother’s humming filled the garden.Saiette knew her cage was lovely. Still, it was a prison, its extent drawn by the Deadlands cracks surrounding the village and the hill. The bone-white crevices in the soil cut off the land from the energies running through the world’s nations. Neither gods nor landbound nobles could feel what transpired within the boundaries.A sigh escaped her as her eyes foraged in the distant forest. Only out-of-towners traveled that path. They arrived smelling of the world, of scents and sights outside of Saiette’s realm of experience. How she longed to acquaint herself with those things, to smell and touch the earthworm-turned soil beside Birdwyn’s lakes, or to breathe Felinia’s crisp mountain air. Instead she had only the constant floral perfume of roses and a yeasty overlay from baking bread in the cottage—neither scent offered inspiration.Behind Saiette, her mother’s skirts rustled.“Someone is coming,” her mother said. Soft fingers folded around Saiette’s shoulders. Anna’s hands were petite as the rest of her, yet their touch surged with power.“For you?” Saiette asked.“No. Use your eyes, my rose.” A smile touched Anna’s velvet voice.Saiette turned to the village path. A gangly peasant loped up the hill. Philip. A man who wished to add bars to her cage.Children, a home, and a husband were worthy commitments—eventually. But she’d never sample the delights of the world with them chaining her. And, someday, she intended to be free, to see a high noble soar overhead on a gryphon and to thrill with fear as Bouraster’s wolves howled in the night.“Don’t forget the bread,” Anna said.“Why don’t you pull it from the oven yourself, Mother?” Saiette’s annoyance spilled into her words. She couldn’t leave this town and the shelter of the Deadland’s cracks. She needed the protection and her mother’s lessons. Yet as the years went on, Saiette resented more and more that Anna did nothing outside of gardening and selling the green blooms that covered the property with a seer’s reading etched into them.Anna’s skirts rasped along the garden path, and then the cottage’s wood door opened and clunked shut.Philip was close enough for the glint of his golden hair, bouncing with his stride, to catch Saiette’s gaze. The smile he flashed opened a deep yearning in her. There were aspects of life she might still sample from her cage if she wished—sweaty lessons to learn under the all-knowing eyes of the stars.But even this brief musing lifted the image of her dark rider into her mind. Of that hand of which she had each crease, each freckle memorized. The problem with having true-sight was that it wasn’t ever wrong.The man who would free her from this place, offer her protection outside of this little strip of land where the borders of Birdwyn and Felinia overlapped—the man she was destined for—had that hand.It was not Philip’s hand.Therefore, opening her heart to Philip or asking anything of his heart in return could only bring pain. She’d leave this place as soon as her rider came and broke these bars of roses and thorns.Saiette trooped over to the gate and let herself out. Time to get rid of Philip and return to her musings. Her foot touched the grass, and power seared through her. In the back of her mind, she heard a crash—an image superimposed over her eyes of pottery shards flying out across her kitchen floor. An overwhelming feeling of hopeless darkness swept out. Shriveled, decomposing fingers gripped her shoulder. Something hovered in the future—something far worse than a village boy—that filled her gullet with the pungent taste of rotten flesh.This was a future-vision, not the past-visions that her true-sight usually offered. She’d had fewer than a dozen peeks into the gods’ view of the future in her life, and this one left her with a sharp gnawing sensation, though she couldn’t define what it meant.Saiette gripped the drystack behind her, letting the sharp rock bite her palm. The nasty note of decay remained in her mouth. She wanted to flee inside to her mother.Anna would know what the vision meant. But first, Saiette had to deal with