Darkburn Book 1: Fall
by Tayin Machrie
Free ebook download: Darkburn Book 1: Fall by Tayin Machrie, legally licensed and available in PDF, Kindle, ePub, and Word formats.
Deep in the Darkburn Forest, something is stirring. Creatures that bring fire and devastation are stalking the land. They hunt - and are hunted by - the Riders of the Vonn
Deep in the Darkburn Forest, something is stirring. Creatures that bring fire and devastation are stalking the land. They hunt - and are hunted by - the Riders of the Vonn, a people in exile. But when the pedlar Yaret stumbles upon an injured Rider, she too is drawn into the struggle against the mysterious beings that are known as darkburns.
Excerpt:
There ought to have been nobody else here.
So what had caused that sudden rhythmic thudding, as if a frantic heart had started to beat in the grey depths of the forest?
Yaret felt the hoofbeats drumming through the ground before they became audible. It sounded like a solitary horse, but still… In fourteen years of travel through this slice of wilderness, where tangled forest met the lonely grasslands, there had never been a horse – or another human – to be seen.
The hoofbeats were coming closer rapidly, crashing through the undergrowth in reckless haste. Swiftly Yaret picked up the waterskin and stepped away from the bank of the Darkburn.
Here, the Darkburn was no more than a lively brook, not yet a river. After gathering itself upon the moors, it dived into this gnarled forest of ancient oak and hutila and greythorn. Apart from the constant chanting of the Darkburn’s waters, this had always been a quiet place.
Until now. The hooves grew louder, faster, their vibration making the faded foliage quiver: the urgent thuddings of a heart that was about to break.
The horse burst through the bushes in a fountain of dead leaves and splintered twigs. It was riderless. And it was terrified.
