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  Chapter 1: In Medias Res

  She stood framed in the doorway, hips cocked, arms loose at her sides like she didn’t fear a damn thing in the world. Light spilled over her shoulders and caught in her hair; green, not the dull green of moss or grass, but rich and alive, like fresh spring leaves. It was curly, wild and untamed, a cascade of twisting strands that tumbled around her face and down her back. Twigs, thorns, feathers, and tiny bone-and-bronze charms tangled naturally through the curls, as though the forest itself had woven them there.

  Her skin was the warm bronze of sun-slick bark, and her eyes…

  Ohh god, her eyes.

  Dark as obsidian, rimmed in forest green, they glimmered with something sharp. Calculating. Curious. She was beautiful in a way that didn’t feel safe. Not like someone who belonged to this place. More like someone who ruled it.

  He felt himself go still. Breathing ragged. Everything about her demanded attention. His body; traitorous, overwhelmed; responded before his brain could catch up. She hadn’t spoken yet, but he was already caught. Hooked.

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  Like a moth circling a bonfire.

  “You’re the root-born one,” she repeated, stepping inside. Her voice was warm honey over broken glass; syrup-smooth, but with something jagged underneath. A quiet threat. A promise of pain.

  He flinched as the root lattice behind her curled shut on its own. No one else had done that. Not the guards. Not even the Eryshae handlers.

  Just her. “Is that what they’re calling me?” Sam rasped, swallowing hard.

  “You emerged from the ground in a ring of living roots,” she said, circling him like a stalking cat. “The land spit you out like a Seed, and the saberclaws didn’t tear you to pieces.” Her eyes dropped briefly to his glowing hand, now dim and veined with something unnatural. “The forest likes you. That makes you interesting.”

  “I didn’t ask to come here.”

  “No,” she murmured. “You didn’t.”

  She came to a stop in front of him. Close. Too close. Sam could smell her; sandalwood and pine smoke, something wild beneath. His skin prickled. She wasn’t armed, not visibly, but power radiated off her in waves. Not magical; instinctual. Royal.

  “You’re not one of us,” she said softly. “And yet you walk unbitten through the heart of the Eryshae.”

  He didn’t know what to say. Her eyes bore into him, stripping him down to marrow. Her gaze paused at his chest; scratched, bleeding, half-bare. He wasn’t imagining the way she looked at him.

  There was hunger in it.