Morning, y’all.
Some time ago, DB Jackson created the THIEFTAKER world, with book one THIEFTAKER, natch.
Now, after 4 full length novels, he’s done 3 novellas and they are fabulous! Two are out already, and if you haven’t dipped a toe into the world, now is the time with his first novella, The Witch’s Storm. Cover, excerpts, and a couple of buy links below. Go! Find! Buy! READ!
#5
Greenleaf chuffed a frustrated breath and glared out the chaise’s window. “Just once I’d like an honest answer from you.”
“And just once I’d like to feel that you weren’t looking for an excuse to have me hanged.”
The sheriff faced him again, glanced at his flintlock, and slipped it into his pocket. “That’s fair, I suppose.”
The admission shocked Ethan, and yet Greenleaf wasn’t finished.
“The thing is, Kaille, I feel about this business much as the lieutenant governor does. I’ve lived here most of my life, and as much as I dislike Adams and his rabble, I wouldn’t want to see another shooting like the one in March. Anything this witch does to roil the waters makes my life more difficult.”
“So, for the time being, you have no interest in putting a rope around my neck.”
The sheriff laughed. “For the time being.”
#6
Ethan waited, wary and uncomfortable. If Sephira wanted to do him harm, she would have given the task to Nap and the others. The truth was, though, he feared her intimacy as much as he did her fury. They had been mortal enemies for too long.
She regarded him and rolled her eyes. “Oh, good Lord, don’t look so frightened. I’m not about to bare my soul to you.” She waved a hand in the direction her toughs had gone. “There are just certain things I prefer they not hear.”
“So I don’t need my confessional stole?”
The corners of her mouth quirked. “Hardly.” She plucked a bottle of dark spirit from the end table, filled a glass, and held it out to Ethan.
“No, thank you.”
“You’ve asked me questions. You’re going to drink with me.”
#7
Sephira smirked again, perhaps sensing that he was not his usual, sober self. “Ethan, I could almost take advantage of you.”
“No,” he said, “you couldn’t. And if you tried, you’d have Kannice to deal with, which you don’t want.”
She laughed, tipping her head back. She had a marvelous laugh—throaty, unbridled. He’d long thought it her most attractive attribute, which was saying something.
“I believe you,” she said. “She’s fiery, and clever. I can tell. She and I could be friends if not for you poisoning her mind against me.”
“I think the beatings did that.”
She twitched a shoulder. “Also simply business.”
#8
Lightning carved across the gray sky and thunder boomed an immediate response. Rain fell in a sudden torrent, sheets of it blowing across the waterfront and then the city.
Foam whitened the tips of the harbor swells, as if they were in the middle of the ocean. Farther out, beyond the North End and past Castle William, the sky had turned as dark as a bruise. Cloud built upon cloud, like boulders piled in the aftermath of a landslide. That far from shore, the water’s surface churned, waves and troughs dancing like demons.
“What have you done?” Ethan called to Whitcomb over the roar of the storm.
“What I should have long ago. This trial will not happen. You’ve lost, Kaille. You may live, but you’ve failed, and your city will burn.”
She thrust her crystal toward the sky again, and lightning cleaved the clouds. Thunder shook the pier like the strongest spell. A wave like none Ethan had ever seen on the harbor crashed onto the wharf, its spray dousing him.
Faith