The Broken Branch: A Girl Between Worlds (Prologue/Preview)
What does it mean to grow up in a world that already thinks it owns you?
They called her a miracle. A monster. A marvel.
Eliana was born different from any child before her-a hybrid child, neither fully human nor fully beast. She lived her life behind glass until the day she could no longer be contained. Overnight she became a headline, a spectacle, a mystery that the world wanted to protect... or control. But everyone wanted to explore.
As Eliana struggles to claim her place in a society that both idolizes and abhors her, she finds solace in the one bond no one can take away: her telepathic connection to Luna, her mirror-self and sister suffering in another world.
Eliana and Luna are identical in body, yet worlds apart in every way that matters. One was raised with the freedom to explore a world that feared her; the other was raised in captivity by the very people who created her. One learned to survive through defiance, aggression, and an unwillingness to let anyone hurt her without consequence. The other learned to survive through submission, empathy, and an almost impossible faith in the goodness of others.
But neither of them are complete without each other.
Through their impossible connection, they can share one another's senses, escape into a dreamworld where they can finally embrace, and offer each other something neither world can provide: a place where they are understood. When reality becomes unbearable, they turn inward. When one begins to break, the other reaches across the impossible distance between them. And as their bond deepens, so too does their
These are the first 10 chapters for a novel I've been writing for the better part of a year. These chapters serve as sort of an intro/prologue for the rest of the story. They recount the portion of the story that happened during the protagonist Eliana's life up until age five. The rest of the story will go over the following years of her life, all the way up until young adulthood. I hope you enjoy. :)