Buried Magic

Orphaned as a baby and adopted by a couple desperate for a child, LeAnne believes she has finally found a family-until the Williamses have a biological daughter of their own. Suddenly, LeAnne is no longer their daughter. She's the unwanted adopted child, dressed in church hand-me-downs, denied the right to call her sister sister, and constantly reminded that she should be grateful simply to have a home.

Then, at five years old, LeAnne does something impossible.
And her family becomes afraid of her.

For thirteen years, they try to force the strange power out of her. LeAnne learns to bury every flicker of magic alongside her anger, fear, and pain, convinced that if she can only make herself normal enough, perhaps someone will finally love her.

By eighteen, the magic refuses to stay buried.

With stolen money, a few belongings, and no real destination, LeAnne boards a train and travels as far as she can-until she finds herself alone in Somerset, England.

But Somerset is different.

Magic lives in the land itself, and after a lifetime of suppression, LeAnne's unfamiliar American magic reacts violently to it. Exhausted, injured, and desperately trying to force her power back down, she finally collapses in an alley.

For the first time, LeAnne meets someone who doesn't recoil when impossible things happen around her. Someone who insists the power she's spent her entire life fearing isn't an illness, a curse, or something that needs to be beaten out of her.

It's magic. And it belongs to her. But escaping the people who hurt her was only the beginning. Now LeAnne must learn how to live without hiding, how to trust when kindness has always come with conditions, and how to control a power she was never allowed to understand.

Because some things can only stay buried for so long.

Buried Magic is the first book in The Starling Chronicles, a generational fantasy saga about magic, family, survival, and the choices that echo through generations.