#FirstPage with @JessCluess

  This week were sharing the first page of one book that I so SO can't wait for!!! 

This title will be released on September 19, 2017.
The magicians want her to lead.
The sorcerers want her to lie.
The demons want her blood.
Henrietta wants to save the one she loves.
But will his dark magic be her undoing?
 
In this seductive and explosive second book in the Kingdom on Fire series, Jessica Cluess delivers her signature mix of magic, passion, and teen warriors fighting for survival. Hand to fans of Victoria Aveyard, Sarah J. Maas, and Kiersten White.
 
Henrietta doesn’t need a prophecy to know that she’s in danger. She came to London to be named the chosen one, the first female sorcerer in centuries, the one who would defeat the Ancients. Instead, she discovered a city ruled by secrets. And the biggest secret of all: Henrietta is not the chosen one.
 
Still, she must play the role in order to keep herself and Rook, her best friend and childhood love, safe. But can she truly save him? The poison in Rook’s system is transforming him into something monstrous as he begins to master dark powers of his own. So when Henrietta finds a clue to the Ancients’ past that could turn the tide of the war, she persuades Blackwood, the mysterious Earl of Sorrow-Fell, to travel up the coast to seek out strange new weapons. And Magnus, the brave, reckless flirt who wants to win back her favor, is assigned to their mission. Together, they will face monsters, meet powerful new allies, and uncover the most devastating weapon of all: the truth.

JESSICA CLUESS is a writer, a graduate of Northwestern University, and an unapologetic nerd. After college, she moved to Los Angeles, where she served coffee to the rich and famous while working on her first novel, A Shadow Bright and Burning. When she’s not writing books, she’s an instructor at Writopia Lab, helping kids and teens tell their own stories. Visit her at jessicacluess.com and follow her on Twitter at @JessCluess.

London was waiting, and so was I.

Tonight was an official gathering of Her Majesty’s sorcerers--my first since being commended to the royal Order--and as the city’s church bells tolled seven o’clock, my stomach fluttered with nerves. We were a country still at war with monsters, but at that moment attacking hellbeasts were the furthest thing from my mind. The thought of going inside the palace made me wildly uneasy.

From out Blackwood’s carriage window, I watched the sorcerers as they rode up to Buckingham Palace on horseback or floated out of the evening sky to alight upon the ground with ease. They adjusted robes and ran hands through their hair as they hurried inside, trying to look presentable. I stayed hidden inside the carriage, my gloved hands folded tightly in my lap.

Two months before, when I’d arrived at the palace, it had been blazing with lights, ready for a grand ball. Now it was darker, more somber. It was a place of business. My business now.

“Your first Order meeting,” Blackwood said, sitting opposite me. “You must be excited, Howel.”

“Excited or numb with terror?” That was a joke. Mostly. “What should I expect?” I still felt awkward in my black silk sorcerer’s robe. It wasn’t designed for a woman. I was the first female to be inducted into the royal Order by a monarch, at least in recent memory. And so I fidgeted, pulling at the collar.

“I’ve never been inside.” He patted the handle of his stave. “Only commended sorcerers may enter. But I have heard,” he said, attempting to sound all business and knowledge, “that it’s quite impressive.”

“Something that might impress the great Earl of Sorrow-Fell?” I said. Flicking my gloved fingers, I shot a few embers at him. The cool night air quickly swallowed my fire. Blackwood laughed, bolstering my courage. He wasn’t much in the practice of laughter, though I liked to think he’d got more used to it after months of living with me.

“Do I have to worry about you bursting into flames every time you mock me?” he asked, wiping at his sleeve as the footman opened our carriage door. Blackwood stepped out and handed me down. I shivered. The evening was cool, a reminder that summer was nearly done.

“Don’t be absurd. I mock you far too often to set fire to myself every single time.” I took his arm, and we made our way to the palace’s entrance. Around us, sorcerers were greeting each other. I searched for my friends, Dee or Wolff or Lambe, but saw none of them.

Blackwood cut through the crowd gracefully, men twice his age stepping aside for him and nodding. I’d never have imagined this was his first Order meeting. He moved about in his robe with ease, as if he’d been wearing it all his life. Perhaps he’d practiced? Or it could be that he was simply good at everything to do with being a sorcerer.

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