hello, reader
 

Hi, everyone. I hope you and your loved ones are well and safe.

In this newsletter, you'll find #Furybite number 6, as well as another giveaway! This week, it's a Lightbringer ARC, as well as a young adult novel that I'm just about to start reading and am really excited about.

You can find the first five #Furybites at my newsletter archive, and if you want to go straight to this week's #Furybite, click here.

What's a #Furybite? These are bite-size pieces of Empirium Trilogy lore that only take a few minutes to read. They might be deleted scenes, or they could be scenes I wrote for fun while practicing my craft but never intended to include in an actual draft. They'll be coming at you every Monday and Thursday morning through October 8 as we count down to the release of Lightbringer. 

With these #Furybites, I'll also be giving away Lightbringer ARCs and wonderful books by other authors! If you want to go straight to this week's giveaway, click here.

And just to remind you: My publisher is holding a fantastic pre-order campaign for Lightbringer. Everyone who pre-orders gets great prizes, plus a chance to win a grand prize pack crammed full of good stuff.

Read on to learn more.
 

LIGHTBRINGER pre-order
campaign info

Simply fill out this Google form with all your Lightbringer pre-order receipt info, and you'll receive a set of these gorgeous 5" x 7" prints on heavy cardstock. Each print features a quote from the Empirium Trilogy. One is from Furyborn, one is from Kingsbane, and the final quote is from Lightbringer.





If you pre-order, you'll also get exclusive first access to Queen of the Blazing Throne, an Empirium Trilogy novella. This is a story from the POV of Obritsa, the child-queen of Kirvaya, and takes place during the events of Kingsbane. 





You'll also be entered into a drawing for a grand prize pack of goodies, including the basic pre-order prizes, signed hardcover copies of the trilogy, Sun Queen and Blood Queen candles from Flick the Wick, a 24-oz white Hydroflask, and an ox red Kånken backpack.





All the rules for entering can be found at the Google form, where you can enter your proof-of-purchase info. If you have any questions, please feel free to visit my Sourcebooks FIRE publishing team at their Instagram!

#Furybite No. 6

Now sitting rigid against the headboard, Hallvard stared silently at his son. There was a sudden stillness to him, as if some phantom power had scraped away all his excess.
     “And what did you do there, in the Sunderlands?” came the king’s voice, thin and sharp, like the drag of a polished nail.
     Ilmaire frowned. There was a saying in Borsvall, for the moment when your skin prickled for no discernible reason—no breeze, no sudden change in temperature:
     One of your deaths has been born.
     Ingrid would tell him to grow up, that the children’s stories he so favored had rotted his brain.
     So Ilmaire pushed past the feeling—and the subsequent thought that, given how many times he had experienced such a shudder over the course of his life, hundreds of deaths must be wandering the world, each whispering his name.
     “The Gate is falling, Father,” Ilmaire said. “You remember this. I told you as much, before we disembarked.”
     He waited for a response. None came.
     “Lady Rielle and Prince Audric requested that we visit the Sunderlands,” Ilmaire continued, uneasily, “to assess the state of the Gate for themselves. I could see no harm in it, and after all, Lady Rielle saved our capital from a tidal wave caused by the weakening Gate. It seemed only proper, to grant them this request.”
     For a moment, silence. Then the king drew his knees to his chest, beneath the blankets, and wrapped his arms about his legs, like a child eager to hear the rest of a story.
     “And then what?” the king asked.
     This time, Ilmaire could not will away the echo of his death. It crept down his spine on narrow feet. “Are you all right, Father? You’re acting strangely.”
     “I’m merely waiting for the end of your story, ævelska. Go on. What did Lady Rielle do? She saw the Gate, did she? Was she able to repair it?”
     Ilmaire’s thoughts scrambled. The endearment was one his father had bestowed upon him often in the early years of his life. Memories of a kinder time flooded his heart; for a moment, he could not speak. “No. In fact, her attempts to do so seemed to have further weakened the Gate’s structural integrity. So said Jodoc Indarien, the speaker of the Obex.”
     His father leaned closer, his eyes brighter than they had been in months. “By how much did she weaken it?”
     “I’m not sure…”
     “Pah. Yes, you are. You can do very few things well, boy, but you do at least listen. Be precise: By how much did she weaken the Gate?”
     Heat gathered behind Ilmaire’s eyes. He did not dare blink. “Jodoc counted an additional thirty-three fractures—”
     “Only thirty-three?” Hallvard made a disgusted sound. “The bitch is a fool.”
     The words had hardly left his mouth when, with a sharp cry of pain, he was jerked across the bed. His body snapped to the left, then to the right; his head smacked against one of the bedposts.
     Ilmaire rushed to him, reaching frantically for his father’s flailing limbs. “Father, stop! What are you doing? What’s wrong?”
     But Hallvard jerked away from Ilmaire’s touch. His wild movements carried him off the bed and onto the floor. He twisted violently on the rug, his back arching until it seemed he might snap in half.
     Behind Ilmaire, the door opened; Arvo and Joonas rushed in, their swords drawn.
     “Your Highness?” Joonas barked.
     “Fetch the healers,” Ilmaire cried, finally managing to subdue his father’s arms and barely avoiding a swift jab to his jaw in the process.
     Joonas ran out at once, leaving Arvo behind.
     Then Hallvard wrenched himself away from Ilmaire’s grasp, and prostrated himself on the floor, reaching feebly for something Ilmaire could not see.
     “I am sorry,” the king moaned, his voice thick with pain. “My apologies, my lord. I do not think Lady Rielle a fool. Forgive me. I have rotted for too long in this corpse, and it is has weakened my mind. Please, my lord, let me come home. I ache for the north, for your presence and wisdom. I ache for the great work.”
     Slowly, Ilmaire rose to his feet and backed away from the bed, death-echoes sweeping down his arms and legs. A terrible thought formed in his mind, so inconceivable that it tilted the world under his feet.
     “What are you?” he asked.
     Hallvard lifted his head. His smile cracked his dry lips, deepened the creases lining his face. In a low, thin voice, he spoke in words that at first Ilmaire did not understand. They were not in any of the Borsvall dialects, nor the common tongue.
     Ice gathered at the base of his spine. This was an angelic language—Lissar, specifically.
     His brain raced to interpret:
     “I am infinite. I am invincible.”

Felix Love has never been in love—and, yes, he’s painfully aware of the irony. He desperately wants to know what it’s like and why it seems so easy for everyone but him to find someone. What’s worse is that, even though he is proud of his identity, Felix also secretly fears that he’s one marginalization too many—Black, queer, and transgender—to ever get his own happily-ever-after.

When an anonymous student begins sending him transphobic messages—after publicly posting Felix’s deadname alongside images of him before he transitioned—Felix comes up with a plan for revenge. What he didn’t count on: his catfish scenario landing him in a quasi–love triangle...

But as he navigates his complicated feelings, Felix begins a journey of questioning and self-discovery that helps redefine his most important relationship: how he feels about himself.

Felix Ever After is an honest and layered story about identity, falling in love, and recognizing the love you deserve.​