Like Fire

Chapter 7: Birds Take Flight

Keile looked down at Silvia and Shelia huddled against the cold stone wall, Dreka making her hesitant way…

Chapter 6: The Tower and the Kerk

The Salamander slept on the open pages of the book of old magic atop a rough stone table high in the tower. Its tiny feet curled inward, and normally fire-bright eyes were shut tight. Stepping further into the tower room, Astá thought, but only briefly, of Beroos. He…

Chapter 5: The Sparrow in the Cage

For days, the girls from Kestrel Point had been crying. Kamron Ancaster was dead.

Chapter 4: Before the Fire

Beroos emerged from the fireplace brushing ashes from his hair and trousers. He accepted a cup of spiced brandy and sipped from it without saying a word.

Astá did not want to be the first to speak, but as often was the case, the dark man’s silence was as…

Chapter 3: The Salamander

Finlay Mack was about to say more to say more about Kamron’s death when the heavy oak door to Astá’s chamber flew open so fast the wood slammed against the stone wall with a crash.

Chapter 2: Kestrel Point

Astá d’Avia watched her black-clad Counselor mark the sheepskin map with a piece of sharpened charcoal. The dark powder was easy to brush away when needed.

No one would have called Beroos Zuri handsome, but there was something precise and attractive in his…

About Like Fire

A few years ago, I participated actively in the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. I decided that, as a teacher and mother, I might be best-suited to writing books that younger readers would enjoy. Although I had always written science fiction and/or “literary fiction,” the stories…