**BOOK 1 IN THE TALES FROM DROMISSE SERIES**
Silvia considers herself the luckiest woman in all Dromisse. Her soon-to-be fiancé, Duncan Ora, is a candidate for Light Within, the greatest gift that the Almighty Gale can bestow upon someone. Then a ra...
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Boom! Light. Color. And then, everything went black.
When you opened your eyes, you were no longer in The Isle of the Silver Trees.
You were in a hospital bed, with your grandmother and her monster nearby. But no ... it wasn't a monster. It was your grandfather. And the longer you stared at those four white walls, the more the memory of The Isle became distant, hazy. Soon it was gone, vanishing like nothing more than a dream.
There were many people who went in and out of your room. They poked you and prodded you and touched you all over. You were uncomfortable, but your grandmother kept assuring you that you would be okay. Eventually your mother visited—a monster, no, family—but she didn't stay for long. She still had to deal with the court and your father.
You were achy, and your legs kept burning. People repeatedly asked how you felt. You had a sensation in your chest that could only be described as something fanged gnawing on your heart. Each chew sent a pulse of electricity through your veins. Chew, zap, chew, zap, chew, zap! You complained to your grandmother, but she said the doctors said you were fine.
You are fine.
When you left the hospital several days later, your grandmother took you to her home. You didn't like living with her. Though it was better than with your mother—your father, the monster—your grandfather yelled constantly. One day he lost his mind when you'd taken a few petals from his tulip garden and put them in your pocket. He swung his hand at you, but you dodged the blow and ran. Grandmother tried to explain it away—adults always tried to justify—it was the war that made him that way. Their son, the uncle you never knew, had died defending your country. Your grandfather was never the same after that.
It was war, it was grief, it was always something other than themselves that turned humans into monsters.
At times, you remembered strange things. You remembered trees being silver, a sky full of stars, and grey grasses whispering in a cool breeze. But your grandmother laughed and said you had nothing more than a vivid imagination. Those weren't real memories.
Yet sometimes they felt too real. You were distressed; you would have rather been in that silvery forest than here.
Grandmother taught you to pray for solace, and she took you to church, where you met other children and sang songs. With time, you forgot the land where the trees grew grey and sparkling, and where monsters weren't humans, but creatures with hooked fangs and claws.
Nooyark ... Nooyark ... New York. That's where you lived with your grandmother. You grew up and met a girl named Taliyah. She always seemed to know just what you were thinking or feeling, and she always knew what to say. She was your best friend. When you were both old enough, you moved out together, into the tumultuous city. It was the era of the new woman, after all, and the shadow of the 1800s was well gone.
