Title : Hidden (Dragonlands #1)
Author : Megg Jensen
Genres : Fantasy
Publication date : January
Synopsis:
The mystery enshrouding Hutton’s Bridge is as impenetrable as the fog that descended at its borders eighty years ago. Each year, three villagers enter the mist searching for answers. No one ever returns.
Then a dragon falls from the sky to the town square, dead—the first glimpse of an outside world that has become nothing more than a fairy tale to Hutton’s Bridge. Except to Tressa.
Tressa grew up with Granna’s stories of the days before the fog fell. When Granna dies, leaving Tressa without any family, Tressa ventures into the fog herself, vowing to unravel the foul magic holding Hutton’s Bridge captive.
What she discovers beyond the fog endangers the lives of everyone she loves.
Tressa grew up with Granna’s stories of the days before the fog fell. When Granna dies, leaving Tressa without any family, Tressa ventures into the fog herself, vowing to unravel the foul magic holding Hutton’s Bridge captive.
What she discovers beyond the fog endangers the lives of everyone she loves.
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AUTHOR BIO:
I've been a freelance parenting journalist since 2003 and began writing YA novels in 2009. I live in the Chicago suburbs with my husband, two kids, and our miniature schnauzers, Ace & Tanu.
For more information on me please visit my website at http://www.meggjensen.com
Author links:
Excerpt :
Death
lurked in the air that afternoon. Tressa sat by Granna’s bedside, clasping hands
with the woman who at ninety-three had outlived her entire generation.
“You
are leaving tomorrow, yes?” Granna’s liver-spotted hands shook. The
rough-hewn walls seemed to close in. Tressa knew Granna didn’t have much time left. She
wanted to squeeze out every second she could with her.
The
smell of tonic and medicine hung in the dark room. When the curtains were
drawn, Granna’s eyes watered. Adam, the village healer, said sunlight would
help Granna, but Tressa knew the truth. Granna would leave her soon, leave the
village, taking the only first-hand knowledge of the outside world with her.
The tales of the outside world – a place no one in Hutton’s Bridge had seen since
Granna was just a child. Not since the fog had descended on the borders of
their village.
“Yes,
Granna. You chose me, remember?” Tressa stroked Granna’s hair with her free hand.
The silver strands were still soft. “Me, Sean, and Connor.”
Granna
nodded. “Yes, yes, I remember now.” A gasp preceded each breath, struggling
against the inevitable finality of life. “You’re the only girl eligible
this year.”
Tressa’s eyes dropped to the
floor strewn with straw, the hem of her long, cotton dress sweeping it every
time she moved. She was eligible only because she’d never conceived. After
three years of coupling, not one baby to show for it. Not even a failed
pregnancy. The girls who did achieve pregnancy were never forced to leave. They
were safe, protected. Tressa had felt the cold breath of death breathing down
her back every time she didn’t conceive.
“But,
Tressa, it is your destiny to leave the village.”
Tressa
held back a sigh. Granna was about to die herself. Why would she want her only
great grandchild to follow her in death? No one who ever entered the fog
returned to the village. It was as much of a death sentence as Granna’s failing health.
Tressa’s palms began sweating. A
tremble skipped up her arms to her chest where her heart pounded out an irregular,
nervous beat.
Granna
took another deep breath. Without looking at Tressa, she said, “The fog. You
must leave. It is your destiny.”
Tressa
managed to force out a small laugh. Granna’s grave expression didn’t fool. “Granna, don’t you want me to live a
long life, like you have?”
Granna
shook her head. “Beyond the fog there is a life for you. I have seen it.”
No
one had the gift of sight in her village. Granna claimed once there was magic.
It was one element of her stories that made the outside world seem so
desirable. Tressa would give anything for a magical potion to save her great
grandmother. Instead, they could only rely on Adam’s knowledge of healing.
“But
I was supposed to live to watch you leave. I saw it. I believed it would
happen.” She took another breath, shallower this time. “I don’t know if I can hold on
until tomorrow.” Granna’s eyes flashed with anger. She held out one frail hand. An
owl flew through the window, landing on Granna’s fingers. The fog’s undulating fingers
caressed the tree’s limbs.
“That’s my Nerak.”
The
little owl hooted in response.
“You
take care of Tressa, Nerak. Help her to see the truth.”
The
owl’s head
bobbed, then it flew out the window and sat in the tree.
Tressa
leaned down, kissing Granna on the forehead. Granna always said the downy owl
had magic. Tressa had never seen it do anything other than the other trained
birds in the village. Tressa sat up again. Granna was cold, too cold. Her skin
paled into a gray pallor. Her blue eyes lost focus, gazing somewhere over Tressa’s shoulder.
“I
love you, Granna,” she said.
“I
love you too, my sweet Tressa.” Her voice rattled. Granna’s eyelids fluttered, then
closed with a finality only accompanied by death. One last breath expelled, but
her lungs didn’t take in another whiff of air.
Tressa
laid Granna’s hand on her stomach. Taking a step back, she took one last
look at the woman who had loved her every moment of her life. Tressa’s mother died in
childbirth and her father had left through the fog. Like all of the others,
three a year for the last sixty-seven years, none of them returned. Two hundred
and one souls lost to the fog.
Tressa
was next.
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