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Authors: E.M Reders

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Sneak Peek at book 2 in The Elemental Born series

Coming late 2016

(Unedited and may be different from final published version)

“Thyra... Thyra...” a voice called through the darkness of my dreams.

They were always dark, shadows everywhere, but I wasn’t scared. I don’t know why I wasn’t, but I always felt like there was someone there with me in the darkness. Not on the ground where I stood peering into the blackness around me, but up in the air, hovering somewhere above me looking down.

“THYRA!” someone screamed in my ear, pulling me completely out of my dream and back to the land of the living. Jumping up in bed, pulling the covers up in front of me like some kind of security blanket, I realised that it was still dark. Why would anyone wake me up at this time of night?

Looking around I found Mona’s very worried face peering at me. Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong. She looked like death, all the blood having drained from her face, her eyes wide in fear and her hands visibly shaking at her sides.

“What is it, what's wrong?”

Mona wasn't just a maid, she was also a seer. A few times over the years she’d had a premonition regarding the coven’s safety and we’d had to move suddenly during the night. Was that what was happening now? Had something happened? Had one of the coven angered someone and now we needed to make a hasty retreat before they came to seek their revenge?

I know it sounds a little crazy, but that had happened a lot. Some members of the coven had a very different sense of right and wrong that most people. I wouldn't call any of the evil per say, but I would certainly not call them good.

“Quickly, get dressed as silently as you can,” she instructed, passing me a small bundle of items before she began grabbing the few clothes I had and rammed them into a duffle bag she had brought with her. “I overheard some of them talking about the other night, going on and on about a change in the rules. I was going to wait for them to tell you themselves but after the premonition I just had, we are running out of time. It has to be tonight and it has to be now.”

“What does? What change?” I asked as a mixture of both excitement and dread began to fill me. I wanted to know what had caused all the excitement the night before, but I was getting the feeling that it involved me. I quickly dressed in the ceremonial robe she had passed me while waiting for her to explain.

Wait… Ceremonial robe?

“The calling. The protector calling. The Crones have changed the rules for you; all Elemental witches are to perform the ritual at the age of twenty one, not twenty five.”

Oh my god. That meant that I could call my protector... now. My birthday had passed a little over a month ago. None of the coven had said anything, celebrated it in the slightest. Not that I had expected them to, they never had before, but Mona had. She had snuck a rather large piece of chocolate cake from home into the house to give me. It had been the best thing I had ever tasted.

I’d never thought I would get the chance to call my protector. The Elementals haven't survived to reach the age of maturity since the original four were killed.

“Really? I can really call him?” It had been something I had always dreamed of doing, though I hadn't held out any hope for it. I sometimes got the impression that Sandra and the others didn't approve of the idea of protectors. A witch’s protector was her soulmate, her perfect partner. At the age of twenty five a witch was granted the chance to call her protector, to join with him completely and gain access to her full powers. That was something I really needed if I was to ever stand a chance against the demon.

None of the coven had a protector. None! I had once asked Pamela why and she had just glared at me, insisting that no woman of power needs a man. “They are inferior,” she had stated, “beneath us, useless.”

Coming back to the present, I focused back on what Mona was saying. “Yes, but the problem is we need to get to sacred ground to perform it and the nearest place is Sabbath Hill.”

Sabbath Hill was where the coven met on mass for rituals and meetings. I had been once when I was very little but had then been banned as the Pamela and some of the others complained that I upset the balance.

Upset the balance indeed. More like the place responded more to me and my power than it did them. “Won't the coven be there now? It's the night of their meeting.” Once a month the whole coven would meet and perform a spell on mass. Sandra said that it helped bring harmony between them. “They won’t be happy if I show up there tonight and demand to perform the calling.”

“No, they won't, but we have no choice. He's coming, Thyra. The demon is coming tonight, and if you don't perform the ritual in time, then we are all dead. You ready?”

My breath caught in my throat at Mona’s words, true panic settling in my chest. This was it; this was the day I was going to die.

Well, maybe not. From what Mona was saying, if I performed the calling in time there was a chance I would survive, or at least some people would. I just hoped I would be one of them.

It took me a moment to get the words out, and when I did they were nothing more than a croak. “Yes, I’m ready.”

“Then come on, we need to move... fast.”

Other Books Available By E.M Reders

Fangless Series

Fangless

Bloodless

Fearless

Flesh & Blood Series

Amber & Lochlann

Beth & Al

Chaetdorian Mates

Corr’s Forgiveness