Emery Collins, half-Fae half-human, has left her home in search of the identity of her father. Her search leads her to Hawthorn, a city filled with walking nightmares and monsters.
She must find out her father's identity before those very nightmares and monsters eat her alive. But Hawthorn City holds its secrets close, and Emery will have to learn that nothing is as it seems in the jungle of stone, steel, and glass...
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Emery Collins had always enjoyed travelling. She got to do it often enough as an assistant to the editor of a small magazine, so, at the young age of twenty-one, she'd seen a good amount of the country. But she had never been to Hawthorn City.
It wasn't the oldest city on the continent, but it was the most powerful and influential. Millennia ago, two small Fae families had left behind the seats of power of old, and followed the pull of a ley line, setting aside the age-old rivalry between the Seelie and Unseelie. They divided the land between them and started their new dynasties, varying Fae – and even humans – following to join them in settling on the powerful, untapped land. And now it was the greatest city on the continent. At least, that's what the guidebook her mother had given her said.
The poor woman had tried not to cry as she waved Emery off at the train station, but her shoulders had been trembling as George, her current boyfriend wrapped her in his arms and glared at Emery. They'd never gotten along, maybe because he thought Emery was the cause of every problem that he and her mother faced. Every argument came back to Emery and the fact that she still lived at home. If George had two brain cells to rub together, he'd realise that Emery had never left until now because every time she brought it up, her mother got that panicked, watery look in her eyes, and Emery didn't have the heart to upset her mother.
But now...
Now she needed to do this. To look into her mother's past. To find... to find her father. She knew next to nothing about the Fae male her mother had slept with. It was the one and only one night stand her mother had had while at college, and after that night she'd sworn off drink and men because he broke her heart by disappearing before she'd even woken up. All she knew was the name of the nightclub they'd met in, the names of the friends who'd been with her, and a description of him.
He was High Fae, so he looked human except for the pointed ears and one other physical trait, like wings or horns or talons, all of which were retractable – but her mother hadn't seen anything like that. He had been utterly breath-taking, her mother insisted, with high cheekbones and an angular face. He had been tall, at least six foot, with an athletic build and silver tattoos covering his body. His hair had been a copper colour, shoulder length and sleek. His eyes were green, true green, with threads of gold running through them. Eyes Emery had inherited. Those eyes and the ever-so-slightly pointed ears she tucked her hair behind were all she had inherited from him.
She'd gotten her hair from her mother – golden-blonde and thin. And she was short, something her friends never let her forget. Despite her Fae heritage, she could never really shift the weight that clung to her, but she'd managed to learn to like the curves on her body. She could at least say she was pretty, but nowhere near as striking as the Fae.
