The Book of Dragons, sneak-peek

Read on to sample the first 3 chapters of "The Book of Dragons", a high-fantasy novel coming in March of 2026.

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Chapter I

Predators much larger than I used to hunt in these woods. 

Well, truthfully, that depended on who you asked. I believed it. I believed that they once dominated the skies, that they dwelled deep in the ocean depths, that they owned every inch of this forest. Others, not so much. 

It didn’t really matter at the end of the day. Because one thing was for sure – dragons didn’t exist anymore.

Now, the biggest predator in these woods was me and my bow. Not today though, because my focus was so drowned in thoughts of my father’s impending homecoming that I completely ruined my shot.

“Sif!” Finn roared as his fingers released from his own bowstring, the two of us watching as it soared, proud and true, in the direction that mine should have. Only once the sharpened tip of it tunneled deep into the chest of the deer in front of us, did Finn leap out from the bushes, an ear-to-ear grin on his face as he shook his head at me.

“Oh, shut up,” I grumbled as I pushed myself to my feet, slinging my bow over my shoulder and freeing a tendril of black hair from being caught. I was forced to watch Finn perform a strange little dance that cemented his victorious shot over mine, which pushed my eyes so far into the back of my head, I feared they wouldn’t roll back right away.

“It’s not like you to miss so terribly,” Finn cackled as he made a wild gesture in my direction then to the deer. Like every time we hunted together, the one that didn’t make the successful shot had to haul back the kill. It had been many, many months since that was me. 

Scowling at him, I trekked towards the lifeless mass in the center of the carved-out clearing of the North Woods, all while feeling his judgemental stare on the back of my head. The only reason I remained quiet about it was because, deep down, I knew that his taunting of me was born of the same thing that made me miss – concern for today's homecoming. 

“I could help you, if you’d like,” he beamed as he watched me awkwardly pull at two front legs, groaning as I tested the weight against my muscles. But I shot him a daring look, to which he threw his hands up and continued his mocking cackle.

That cackle didn’t die down until we were out of the North Woods and into the center of Epigan.

Like every day of the past week, the courtyard was eerily silent. In the center of it sat a fountain, the spurts and sprays of water atop it climbing into the clouds where they then soared down into the circular basin. Most days, every square inch of that fountain would be covered in bodies. Children; playing, screaming, and horsing around as they chased one another, daring a dive into the water, or simply standing on the ledges and howling. Elders gathered on their knees at the ledge, their brows pressed into their palms as they ushered quiet prayers to the Idrytis. And between them all, families with wide grins and flushed cheeks as they aimed to begin their day. 

Not today. Not any day this past week. Not with over half of our kingdom having been called away to fight.

Finn and I let the chilled silence wrap around us as we continued our trudge through our village. After the courtyard was soon the marketplace, which was one of three places that Finn and I could normally be found. If we weren’t in the woods hunting, back at my home with my father, then we were in the marketplace selling goods. My father and I sold anything that he could make with his hands – wood-work, weapons, armour, even toys and furniture. Finn, on the other hand, sold food. Whatever we had hunted that day, plus the foraging that we often did throughout the week. 

With a growing disdain for the weight of our find over my shoulder, I cast my gaze down the length of the marketplace. The booths, not yet occupied by other merchants, remained the same day-in and day-out, never shifting in design. Four lanes, each with ten booths, devoured the northern side of Epigan.

Like usual, Finn and I stopped in the first row, setting the deer down on the fifth booth. 

Being at the booth had never really been my calling. I didn’t mind helping with the hunting, the foraging, or the crafting, but it was the part with the people that I struggled with. 

So I watched Finn set up our booth from a comfy position behind it, leaning back on my elbows as I sat cross-legged within the warmth of the earth. 

The sun peered up from the horizon in front of me, golden rays spilling across Epigan and illuminating the otherwise dull state of the villages around us. Along with the light, though, was the heat that warmed every inch of my face, allowing me to tip my head back and bask in such a sensation.

“You’re useless,” Finn huffed with a smirk as he finished a masterful carving of our hunt.

“I know.” I smiled as he rolled his eyes at me. “It’s wonderful.”

Once the booth was scrubbed down with whatever water Finn had hauled from the fountain, he got to work unloading his pack and setting down the dregs of our last foraging session alongside the meat. Taking a step back, two hands on either hip, he grinned at his job well done.

But my peace was interrupted by footsteps and sheepish giggles from the south. Begrudgingly, I turned my head to face the noise, but there was no need. As they did every morning, a horde of young women were sauntering their way towards us.

“Here they come…” I groaned to Finn, earning me a second roll of his dark eyes and a warning glare all in one. 

“Ladies! Hello,” he began, immediately strapping his charming smile to his face and adding a glisten to his eyes. Their cheeks all flushed red as some began to twirl hair around their fingers, causing me to narrow my eyes and flash judgement in their direction.

A varying array of “Finn!” squealed out across the marketplace, a symphony of different tones and volumes that I had to fight from plugging my ears against.

“Sif?” a shrill voice called. “Is that you down there?”

I couldn’t stop the harsh, mumbled curse that fell from my lips as I removed my sun-blocking hand from my forehead and glared at the destroyer of my peace. 

“Katherine,” I managed behind a cheap smile, hoping to every Idrytis that she could detect my utmost desire to not speak to her.

It wasn’t like I hated talking to people. But some – like Katherine – tested that invisible line within me. It was only because I had known her all twenty-four years of my life that I knew exactly what to expect when she opened her mouth – half-insults, half-compliments, tied together with a sparkling smile and battering lashes.

“Ah, that is you! I didn’t recognize you in the sunlight.”

Strike one.

Biting down on the inside of my cheek, I put all of my resolve into keeping my face as neutral as possible as I nodded at her.

Her brows bunched as she peered up and down the marketplace laneway. “I see your Father is missing. He was summoned?”

Strike two.

She continued to look around as if her narrowed eyes would somehow generate the Archer Captain before us. 

What I wanted to say was, ‘obviously, you ignorant moron’. Instead, I forced more teeth to show between my lips and said, “Yes.”

I didn’t want to be thinking about my father. Not when the whole last week had plagued my mind with the horror that he might not return. 

He always did, though, which was what I should have been clinging to instead of the dread. But this time, when King Heuthen – possessed as always with the haunting of his fathers legacy – called my father forward to fight none other than the Outherian Army, I had doubts. 

Just as my smile climbed new heights in how false it was, so did hers. 

“Talkative as always, Sif,” she tutted before turning the full heat of herself towards Finn. It was a good thing, too, because that was strike three.

At least I wasn’t bored, yet. I had a steady source of entertainment in the form of a single-file line that had appeared, all of which were girls in their late-teens, early-twenties with overly combed hair and kohl lining their eyes. A little show for Finn, as always. 

“Morning, Sif,” another voice chirped, this one quieter and weaker. Only because I recognized her voice did I open my eyes once more, praying to the Idrytis that I wouldn’t be blinded by the sudden penetration of sun against them.

“Elani.” I smiled, this time genuinely. She mirrored it, the heavy collection of crimson-freckles stretching on her face as she tucked some matching hair behind her ear. 

“Are you excited for today?”

I tried with all of my might to rein in the desire to lash out or scoff at her. Instead, I nodded a few times. “I am. Your father was summoned by that moron too, wasn’t he?”

I forgot that I was talking to someone other than Finn. No matter what the citizens of Epigan thought of King Heuthen Gekas, no one was so bold as to announce it in the way I just had. 

Elani bristled as she pretended not to hear me. At least that way, if I was hanged for my treasonous words, she would be spared.

“I’ll look for your fathers safe return, Elani.”

Relief washed over her features as she released a breath. “Thanks, Sif. As will I, for yours.”

With that, she offered me one more meek smile before realising it was her turn in the line-for-Finn. I watched with bored curiosity as her cheeks flushed with the subtle movement of Finn running a hand through his mouse-brown hair. 

The women continued to arrive, flirt, then depart. Luckily for us, a few actually purchased goods.

“You are worth keeping around then,” I scoffed as Finn finally slumped his weight against the table.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” A suggestive brow flipped upwards as he glared at me.

“You’re kidding, right?” Rolling my eyes, I finally pushed up and out of the small crater that my bottom had formed against the grass. “I don’t know what they all see in you, if I’m being honest.”

Finn tipped his head back and let out a bitter laugh before nudging me with his elbow. Little flecks of gold danced in the inner-rings of his eyes as he watched me settle at his side, the sun casting a glow across the two of us.

He had a retort primed and prepared, but was cut off by the appearance of our first non-female visitor.

“Finn, Sif,” an older voice croaked, snatching both of our attention in an instant.

“Timon,” we both said. As he approached the booth, we both offered a satisfactory smile to him.

Timon was one of the elders of Epigan. All that meant was that he had walked this earth longer than our parents had.

There were many reasons not to like Timon and perhaps one or two to like him. Because he was older and his days of fighting, foraging, and crafting were long gone, he had little to do during his days but wander the kingdom and act as a constant nuisance. He always had an opinion about something and would offer it up freely, whether you asked for it or not. That was why I liked him, actually.

“What can we get for you today, Timon? The usual?” Finn already had a cotton sac in his hand, half-filled with the same six things Timon got every time he prowled by.

“I picked extra rhubarb, just for you, Timon,” I giggled as I shoved the handfuls of it into the already bursting sac.

A grin formed over his wrinkled skin as he touched my hand with his own. “This is why you are my favourite, girl.”

Finn’s eyes rolled so heavily in his head that I swore I heard them as he finished tying up the sac. With a curt nod of both of their heads, the sac was passed over just as a pouch of coin hit the table. 

“See you next time!” we both shouted as we watched his curled-over outline waddle away.

So began a long shift in the marketplace.

Chapter 2

My hands had been twiddling so intensely against my lap that the only way to sate the desire was to grab onto a handful of grapes and cheese.

Noticing Finn’s silence through a few loud crunches, I forced myself to turn and face him, only to see him staring at me. 

“What?” I grumbled, my mouth still full of mashed grapes and a few pieces of cheese.

“You are disgusting,” he laughed as he shoved a piece of cheese into his own mouth.

“This stuff is good.” 

Before I could block him, he swatted the next piece of cheese destined for my stomach out of my hand. My only option for retaliation was a swift punch to his bicep. 

“You can’t eat it all if we need to sell it,” he chuckled as he offered me another grape instead. Those were my favourite, anyway. 

A grape half-way onto my mouth, I nearly choked when the sudden blaring of horns shook Epigan.

Finn and I shared a quick look between one another before we were up on our feet, coins stashed into his pack. Wordlessly we began the sprint towards the courtyard, listening to the sudden uproar of Epigan as every soul remaining in the kingdom had the same idea as us.

“The horns are blaring!”

“The lads are home!”

“The men are home, oh the men are home!” 

The cheering and shouting and hollering only grew in volume as Finn and I slammed to an abrupt stop next to the fountain, joining up with hundreds of other bodies. Twisting awkwardly, I tried my best to free my leathered-jacket from the odd hold it had on my body. In all reality, it sat on me as it had always sat on me – just that my skin no longer felt like my own as the eerie breeze rushed over hundreds of waiting women and children and elders.

I only realised that when a calloused hand dragged along mine, my fingers soon laced with Finn’s as he offered me a sad smile at my side. I squeezed, desperate to siphon some strength from his towering mass as I awaited the arrival of the army.

Before we could see them, though, there was one last thing to do. 

Our oldest tradition.

Finn fell to his knees first, his elbows braced on the edge of the fountain, only after yanking me down besides him. My knees shattered against the cobblestone, my brows pressing against my palms as I tried to decide what I wanted to do. 

Will I pray?

Every homecoming, the same question lingered in my mind. 

From behind my hands the excited trickle of the fountain before me could be heard, the droplets spraying up against my flesh and sending a refreshed shudder down my spine. While I was ailed with indecision and rigidness, the water continued to ripple and dance across every surface as if in mockery.

Daring a glance at Finn, I saw he was already in prayer.

Closing my eyes, I tried to find the answer I so desperately wanted.

Would I close my eyes and beg the Idrytis for the safe return of my father? The deities had always delivered, I had no reason to doubt they would this time.

Would I beg Carbona – the mother – to bring my family back together?

Would I beg Siotre, the War Idrytis, to see to it that my father’s strength in battle had not faltered?

Would I beg Niyier, Healing Idrytis, to tend to his wounds and save his life from them?

Or how about Cleooai, the Idrytis of Darkness – would I beg her to spare my father from her cruel grasp?

The water within the fountain continued to swirl, impatient and taunting as I fought with the decision. 

Finally, I pressed my head harder against my cold palms, allowing the light to fade from my eyelids. The noise of the world slowly faded to a mere whisper in the background of my mind as I focused on the words and intent building within.

“To any, to all: I pray for your mercy, your gentleness, and your kindness.”

It was all I could muster.

And even then, I wasn’t sure I believed it.

Were the Idrytis capable of mercy? 

Were they kind?

One day, I’d be able to answer that as quickly as I could blink – No.

The second echo of the trumpet shook me to my core, forcing me back down into my body as it alerted us to the beginning of the arrival of the army. 

Ignoring a salty tear that dared at the corner of my eye, I sniffled and pushed myself to my feet only to see Finn already there. His eyes were pinned on the treeline, on the sudden appearance of a mass of darkness that swarmed the meadow between us.

The meadow preceding the North Woods was coated in soldiers. Some mounted on horses, some trailing along on foot, and some on wundanes.

The wundane – Epigan’s most ferocious weapon. Smarter, bolder, braver, faster, than normal wolves. Bred and tamed and perfected over several centuries, the wundanes were the very thing that brought Epigan from scattered villages of peasants to a kingdom capable of holding on to a reputation of strength and resilience.

Anxiety rippled through the gathered folk of Epigan like a foreboding mist. Even I wasn’t immune to it, my feet stamped impatiently at the ground as I tried my best to look up and over the shoulders in front of me. 

The third blare of the trumpet would always be worse than the rest. Why? Because it meant that every man was out of the treeline, that every body was back in Epigan. 

“Oh no,” I groaned as the realization set in, my heart a war-drum in my ears that threatened the integrity of my skull. 

That realization wafted over everyone, heads cocking and weight transferring to toes as they fought and shoved at one another to get a better look. 

The army was small. 

Too small.

Some women understood what had happened and sobs ailed the air around the courtyard, coating my nose with the scent of salty tears. 

My own body weakened and my knees – the cowards that they were – buckled. Finn grabbed me at the last moment, hugging me against him tighter to avoid another collapse. With lips quivering, my eyes filled with liquid sorrow. 

Not my father.

There was just no way. He would be there. He had to be. 

He would be there.

A deep howl shook the ground beneath us all.

Everyone jumped up, looking into the crowd of soldiers which were still a few hundred meters out. Out from the front-line, the raven-pelted wolf, easily the height of a tall man at the withers, calmly broke through. Her brown eyes glowing with adrenaline, her blood pumping so hot and so rapidly that her veins were visible through her coat, even from this distance. 

She let out another roaring howl that rumbled the loose pebbles scattered around our feet. 

King Heuthen sat upon the Chief of Wundanes – Jada, and grasped some of her long black coat desperately in his fingers. Nudging her on, the army speeding up a little, I struggled to pay attention to anything but Finn’s gaze bearing into the side of my face.

Jada screeched to a halt just before the gathered women, children, and elders, where King Heuthen attempted to straighten his spine for us all. 

He would never be King Philip Gekas – his father – though. No matter how hard he tried. 

“People of Epigan,” he began, his voice slurred and his eyes directed neither here nor there, “it is my honour to welcome home the heroes of today, tomorrow, and forever.”

He paused in anticipation of a roar of cheering, but was met with three awkward claps.

“We were met with great strength from the Outherian Army.”

Oh no.

“Tonight, we ask Carbona to accept into her care twelve-thousand and fifty-two soldiers.” Muttered outrage ricochetted through the courtyard, quite possibly the only reason he kept his usually-painfully-long speech short. “Men, you are released.”

Chaos endured, like it always did at homecoming. 

Horses stomped their way across the courtyard as they chewed nervously at their bits and blew unimpressed snorts in all directions. Infantry soldiers moved left and right, some taking the time to care for the wundanes in their midst, others fighting through the sea of bodies to find their families. Blood coated every inch of every body that returned to us, a casting of darkness across horses hooves, wundanes paws, and mens armour.

“Let’s wait for it to clear,” I whispered to Finn, who nodded.

Moments later, Finn was unable to remain still for a second longer. Using his elbows and a mighty crease between his brow, he worked at the crowd in an attempt to find us a path through the remaining people. 

I was following him, eagerly and determined, until I found myself looking at a group of women huddled around the fountain. Tears trickled down their cheeks as they clung to one another, the streams soon combining with the basin of the fountain where they would remain forever.

“Pitying them won’t do them, or you, any good,” Finn grumbled as he grabbed onto the bend of my elbow and returned me to our task. 

I was about to suggest that we stop again and wait for more bodies to clear, when I saw a familiar face hidden behind a dense, red beard and bushy brows.

“Grimmel!” 

Before Finn could stop me, I was charging towards the short, rotund man, who opened his arms immediately and met my greeting with a contagious grin. He wrapped himself around me, squeezing extra tight until I was sure that my lungs were going to perforate against my ribs.

As we parted, his mouth opened, but his eyes caught on something over my shoulder. All of the harsh lines of his face simply melted away, his eyes softening along with them. I didn’t need to turn around to understand his wife and two young girls were thundering towards us, the latter two slamming into his shins where their grubby hands were likely to never let him go again.

It was a mashing of smiles and tears and creases against eyes, whispered thanks and uttered prayers, as the four of them reunited. 

Finn nudged me, and when I finally peeled myself away from them and shoved away the jealousy, I began to follow after him.

“Sif, wait,” Grimmel cried out as he managed to free himself of his family. They took to standing behind him, hovering in his shadow in a desire to never be without him again.

I saw it in his eyes long before he could say it. Eyes always spoke the truth.

The knot that had been building, growing, devouring with every day of this past week suddenly went taut, then disappeared all together. Which should have been a good thing, but it left this cavernous hole in me. A space void of light and all-consuming that I knew, then and there, would never be filled again. 

The feeling moved through me, finding the point of contact between Finn and I – our hands – and transferred into him.

“Lass, your… Your… Well, your…” Whatever strength he thought he had must have been left behind, because his words tapered off and he offered me nothing but his eyes and the look behind them. 

I was a shell. There was nothing to me, nothing around me, nothing ever again as I looked at him. 

“He’s gone.”

Chapter 3

Grimmel nodded at my declaration, his face twisting as his tongue tried to form words once more.

Instead of letting him offer some sort of comfort, I looked at his two young girls. “Why don’t you get your papa home?”

With their family suddenly erupting into cheers, two small hands and one larger hand grabbing on to Grimmel, I let them drag him away all the while his eyes remained on me.

While everything in me was numb, everything to me was rattling. Like a never-ending storm that began at the top of my head and washed over my body, over and over and over until I was sure I was drowned in the depths of it. 

Only one voice drew me back to consciousness.

“Oh, by the Idrytis…” Finn groaned. I turned around just in time to see him fall forward, his knees smashing against the cobblestone. Then vomit, so much more vomit than a body could handle, flew from his mouth. He alternated painfully between breathing and puking and sobbing.

There was nothing to do but frown at my best-friend. While this feeling was suffocating everything that was inside of me, I knew how to shoulder it. How to strap it to me and let my body carry it until it demanded the last of my strength. But what was I supposed to do for Finn? How could I console Finn?

Stepping to his side and dropping down to a crouch, I ran absent circles over his back with my hand. “We’ll be okay.”

I didn’t believe it. He didn’t, either.

After watching him paint the cobblestone with more acidic bile, I helped him to his feet and offered my body as something to lean against.

The walk from the courtyard to my home was ten minutes at most. Today, it took us an hour.

Broken-down cobblestone – that was placed there long before Finn and I were born – crunched beneath our boots as we moved down the lanes behind our village. The long stretch of grey beneath us mirrored the agony that resonated in our bones, but I kept dragging Finn along. We moved past rows upon rows of identical, beige buildings that only furthered Epigan’s gloomy appearance, especially when placed against the vibrant sky that stretched above us. 

It was hard to look at such a beautiful colour overhead, furious that the world was unaware of what grief had splashed across our kingdom in such a short stretch of time.

Like most of the time we strolled through the laneways, Finn’s eyes caught on a string of houses farther down the stretch than mine. His stride faltered, his hands clenching at his sides as his eyes refused to blink away from the ghost of the life he used to live. Because there, several lots down from where I had spent my whole life, Finn lost his. His mother and father, devoured by flames as quickly as one might breathe. 

Shaking his head, he rid himself of the haunting of a lost family and found himself at my side once more, only for the two of us to groan against the knowledge of the shrinking of mine. For how long Finn had lived with my father and I, the loss was just as much his as it was mine.

By the time we reached the wooden door of my home, Finn had fallen to his knees once more where he threw up yet again, this time only generating a few mouthfuls of spit that coated the decaying grass around us. 

I left him to groan against the cold earth as I pushed at the front door, so deep within my own sorrow that I nearly missed the fact that we were no longer alone. 

Because there – right there – sat on one of my kitchen stools like he had lived there all his life, was a man.

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