Total pages in book: 204
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
In the dead of night, passions rise and empires fall.
Welcome to Kingdoms of the Compass.
The Fulcrum is failing, and demons are slipping into the mortal world, stalking the night.
No one is safe.
Especially not Sorrel. An orphan and an outcast, she’s spent her whole life within the walls of her small village, ostracized for her mystical abilities. She wants to survive…and maybe find somewhere she can call her true home. But Fate has other plans.
Sorrel has been chosen. Cursed.
She must cross the Badlands to return the Queen's crown and convince the fearsome female to save their world from destruction.
Well aware she’s no brave hero, Sorrel makes a dangerous deal with Merc, a brooding, commanding mercenary known only by his unscrupulous profession.
The deal? A night in his bed that she will never forget, in exchange for her safe passage.
But Merc has secrets of his own, and even though passion runs hot between them, enemies are around every corner, and danger and betrayal threaten at every turn
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
One
Demons and Departures.
“Where do you think you’re going, Sorrel.”
As Mr. Lewis heaps his rotund frame into my path, I shrink beneath my Pox cloak. The owner of the Gauntlet Public House is a mountain with a bald summit, and there is no going around, over, or through him, especially not for a barmaid like me. Keeping my eyes on his scuffed boots, I tuck the satchel of medicine I prepared under the folds of what covers me from aching head to tattered slipper shoe.
“I am to send word to the grain miller—”
A cresting of bawdy laughter and thumping fists cuts off the lie. In the glow of the lanterns, the pub’s main door is just twenty lengths away, but the maze of rough-hewn tables is a congested landscape of sweaty, drunken clientele and faded-rose working women. With my employer blocking my escape, I can’t even get to those obstacles.
“I have cleaned the hourly rooms,” I offer by way of a toll to pass. “And I washed the pints for the tender, and the flour sacks have been brought in—”
“What about the stairs?” He pulls up the waistband of his sackcloth pants with the effort worthy of a stump removal. “And the sheets.”
“I have brought the sheets in from the clotheslines and they are folded.”
“The stairs, then.” As another round of laughter explodes, Mr. Lewis points a pudgy finger over my shoulder. “You have to earn your room and board. I don’t run a charity.”
He reminds me of this at every turn, and if I am cast out from this place, I have no family, no money, and no prospects.
“You are very generous, Mr. Lewis—”
“I am too generous.” He sniffs an inhale, as if he disapproves of himself. “Get your broom then. You don’t need to be out and about when things are busy here.”
“But the miller needs to know the order for tomorrow’s flour. It won’t take long—”
“He always comes here after his wife serves him that bad food of hers. Without my ale, his gout would cripple him. You will tell him then.”
“I can be right back—”
“Why are you still talking. And you’ll sweep behind the bar, too.”
I glance across at the tender, a perpetually cross man who is not going to want me back there.
Beneath the folds of my cloak, I fist the satchel in my hand. “Yes, Mr. Lewis.”
Turning away, I reenter the back of house through the archway, and tell myself there’s still time to get to Mare, if I make quick work of the duties. The elderly woman suffers without what I give her, especially in the cold and the damp of this interminable autumn, and I wasn’t able to get free this morning. As I picture her in the nest of blankets I’ve made for her, fragile as a baby bird, I pray she’s warm enough.
Bypassing where I sleep under the stairs, I go to the next closet. After I stuff the satchel into a pocket, I grab whatever handle comes to my palm, and mount the worn steps to start at the top—
A young man who’s been lodging with us throws himself into a thundering descent as he pulls on his gray waistcoat. The tails of his untucked shirt bounce, and he’s whistling under his breath, having clearly enjoyed his lusty pursuits.
“You missed a spot,” he mocks as he pushes me aside.
He’s been with us a week, having come down from Prosperitus, the royal seat of the East. His city ways have been the subject of provincial awe, and it’s clear he enjoys the deference. The ladies have certainly enjoyed his coins.
I wonder when he’s leaving so I don’t have to do his sheets.
Arriving up top, I swear that Mr. Lewis lies in wait for me to have an unoccupied moment, and as I draw the broom from balustrade to bare wall, there’s no loose dirt to sweep onto the next lower step. What there is plenty of is the muffled sounds of coupling. The grunts and theatrical moans ripple out from the closed doors of the ladies’ rooms, and it’s a relief to make progress so that I can’t hear them anymore.
Sallae Mae, the women’s unofficial madam, appears at the bottom with a charge. She’s got blond hair that tumbles down her back, but with thirty years and four of hard living, there are lines on her face and a cynical twist to her smile and voice. The man leads the way, and as he ascends, I stop what I’m doing and try to make space for him to pass. Though I lower my eyes, I recognize his riding boots. They’re very fine, with polished spur nubs that shine silver. It’s one of the mayor’s sons—
“Will you get out of the way,” he mutters at me.
I try to become flatter against the wall as I remember attending his wife on the birthing bed last month. The son he’s so proud to have is only alive because of me, and that means he and I have a dangerous, unlawful secret.