Read Lady of the Lake Online

Authors: Elizabeth Mayne

Lady of the Lake (3 page)

BOOK: Lady of the Lake
10.15Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Warwick offered little respite from the scorching sun. The barest hint of a breeze wafted against the stone walls of the fortress and promptly died. A tremendous heat had built up, inside the great stone keep, and which remained steamier than the catacombs beneath Rome. Not one open shutter allowed air to move from chamber to chamber or floor to floor.

Oh, there were windows and openings, shutters and doors aplenty as per Edon’s construction plans. But Embla had thought it best to bolt the shutters and keep the entrances securely barred. She claimed there was no other way to protect from thieving Mercian thralls the treasures he’d had shipped to Warwick in the intervening years.

Edon didn’t care much for Embla’s disdainful dismal of his plans and orders. Nor had the woman the vision to see that Edon’s well-planned, thick stone walls should have made the vast keep cool in spite of such intense heat— provided the windows and doors were open. Instead, the handsome structure had the appeal of a brick kiln sealed to fire pottery.

Edon was aware of his attendants’ reactions to Warwick.
Eli rolled his eyes each time he looked at the steamy green forest, nor could Rashid hide his own awe of the great woods blanketing acres and acres of land. Eloya and Rebecca were near to fainting from the unaccountable heat. They had, in desperation, taken over the bathhouse.

“Tell me,” Edon said easily, putting aside the goblet of watered wine his niece had provided him from her own stores. “When was the last you saw your husband? He has been missing seven moons now, Guthrum said.”

“Eleven moons,” Embla corrected. Her thick fingers tightened on the handle of her short sword. Were she a man that gesture would have made Edon wary. Were he less of a Viking, he might have taken insult. “Too long, my lord Edon. I have given up hope of ever seeing Harald Jorgensson alive again.”

“Surely not.” Edon lifted a hand, inviting her to sit and rest, but Embla ignored it. “You are a Dane’s wife,” he continued. “Your man could be on the high seas. He could this moment be turning his long ship into the north wind or trading for jewels and furs that will please you. Eleven months is nothing. I myself have been on voyages exceeding three years duration.”

“Forgive me for reminding you, Jarl Edon, but the Avon has no outlet to the sea,” Embla replied.

“Ah, but long ships do traverse the other rivers. The Severn and the Trent both have access to salt water.”

“Not good access from deep inland, Jarl Edon. Weirs prevent even the most stalwart of long ships safe passage. No, my Harald has not gone exploring. I know what has happened to him—he was murdered by the druids. Else he remains a captive in the dungeon of the keep on Black Lake.”

“If you think him a captive, why have you not assaulted this keep?”

“No one can reach the lake in the heart of Arden Wood,” Embla told him. “The druids have strewn charms
all through the forest, disguising the trails. The witch has cast terrible spells that turn even my bravest warriors into terrified madmen. No, my Harald has been murdered, Jarl Edon. I know it, and none can convince me otherwise.”

Edon made a rumbling noise in his throat as he considered her words. “So my brother Guthrum has informed me, but he said there was no proof to that charge. Harald’s body has not been found. Is that true?”

“Aye.” Embla’s jaw tightened. “Harald disappeared the night of the great druid sacrifice to their god Lugh, August 1.”

“I had not realized there were druids still practicing in these isles,” Edon mused absently. “How curious…and here I thought the Romans put them all to the sword.”

“The savages exist,” Embla said intractably.

She turned her back to Edon, and for an unguarded moment she glared at his entourage. His wagons, sleds and carts filled the entire ward of her utterly inadequate wooden palisade. In Constantinople, where Edon had spent seven years as Guthrum’s hostage-emissary, such a structure intended for defense would have been torched the moment it was erected, just to prove how useless it was.

“Are you absolutely certain of the date of Harald’s disappearance?” Edon asked. “It was at Lammas?”

Embla grasped the wood stakes and tilted her chin, exposing a long throat and wondrous white teeth as she laughed scornfully. “Why wouldn’t I be certain? You haven’t lived here for years as I have done. It was August 1, the feast of Lughnasa. The night the druids sacrifice a living man to their gods of the lakes and rivers.”

“Granted, it has been years since I last lived in Warwick, Lady Embla,” Edon said smoothly, “but I remember the people well. They are for the most part a breed of peaceful, simple farmers.”

Embla snorted. “They are cannibals. Men are put to death over their Beltane fires. Infants are slaughtered and
their bones thrown beneath the foundations of their houses.”

“That uncivilized, are they?” Edon remarked with a raised brow. “How amazingly similar we are then. Vikings leave their newborns outside to weather the elements the first night of their lives. By Byzantine and Roman standards we are both barbarians, are we not?”

Embla checked herself. Her blue eyes hardened in judgment of the Viking jarl before her. She thought him a lazy wretch, a weakling softened by the pampered life of a courtier. He was of no use to a woman determined to amass her own inviolate wealth.

Thank Odin, Guthrum had provided her adequate warning of the jarl’s arrival. She’d wished Edon Halfdansson dead many times over the years of her tenancy in Warwick.

Now that she saw him in the flesh for the first time, Embla gave the pampered Wolf of Warwick one sennight in his home shire, certain he wouldn’t last that long before he hightailed it to a retreat in Anglia.

She raised a brow, inquiring archly, “Does our home wine not suit your palate?”

Edon wasn’t so easily baited. “I saw no grapevines thriving in your arid fields.”

“How observant you are, Lord Edon.” Embla’s tone changed smoothly, and she smiled as she pointed south over the spikes of the wood palisade. “Crowland Abbey was fortuitously placed, as was another monastery in Evesham. Both were pitiful places where monks wore out their knees endlessly in prayer. Their vines were well established. Their cellars were also quite full. It was nothing to dispatch the monks to their Christian hell and relieve them of their surplus.”

Edon sampled another taste of the unpalatable wine and deliberately changed the subject. “So who is it that you believe murdered my nephew?”

Embla turned to face him. Her fingers clasped the hilt
of her sword again. “The druid, Tegwin.” She straightened, as if refusing to grant Edon dominance over her, despite his height.

He set the cup aside. “What happened to the wine cellar I ordered my nephew to construct? Every casket I’ve brought with me will sour in this heat if it is not properly sheltered from the heat and the sun.”

Embla held a firm check on her simmering temper. She looked toward the fields, which she believed showed her best efforts very clearly. This hideous stone castle of Edon’s had no value or importance. The fertile land wrested from the hands of the lazy Leamurian farmers held the true worth of Warwick.

“I have altered some of your plans, Lord Edon. Owing to the bedrock here at the summit of the hill, it was necessary to place one or two of your requested conveniences elsewhere. Now that you have quenched your thirst, shall I give you a tour?”

“By all means,” Edon agreed, eager to inspect every inch of his property.

The stone keep was primitive and crude to Edon’s eye. But then he was accustomed to the splendors of Constantinople, that gem of cities bustling with artisans, philosophers and scholars.

In time, Edon knew, his own hand would change and alter what was begun here in Warwick. For this was now his home. He was finished with roaming the world, doing his brother’s—King Guthrum’s—bidding. Now, at the age of one score and nine, Edon intended to establish his own court and turn Warwick into a seat of learning to rival Byzantium.

The two-storied square keep was only the beginning of what he planned to build.

Embla proudly took him to her longhouse first. The building was completely roofed with luxuriant thatch. Its pitch was so high that no smoke from the cooking fires
stung Edon’s eyes. A raised vent in the center let the smoke rise and allowed a beam of bright daylight inside.

The largest part was used as a hall for feasts and the daily meals. “My chamber is here to the east of the hall, my lord, but if you prefer my services in your keep, I shall move at your convenience.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Edon replied.

Looking around him he saw many thralls at their labors. Women made bread and tended the meat roasting on spits over the open fires. Edon had grown up in surroundings similar to this, as most Vikings did. Farmsteads were the backbone of Viking economy and culture. Embla’s longhouse was no different than any of a thousand like it Edon had inspected in his travels.

He thought fondly of the palaces at Rome and Alexandria. With their courtyards and splendid gardens, there was beauty everywhere a man looked. Given time, Warwick would become such a place.

He returned his attention to the woman, whose walk so reminded him of a proud man’s strut. Edon put out his hand to touch the carved bone handle of her dagger, which her fingers had flown to so often during their conversation. “This is a curious piece. Who made it?”

At the interest in her prized weapons, Embla offered a genuine smile, the first Edon noted. She proudly unsheathed the dagger and laid it in his hand, expecting his admiration. “Falkirk is my carver. He is good with bone and ivory. This is the goddess Freya hunting a boar.”

“An ambitious work.” Edon tested the weight and balance of the blade, but was truly enamored of the skill of the bone carving, the attention to detail and the beauty of the craftsmanship. This carver knew what he was about. “It is a worthy weapon. I trust you have little need to use it for defense.”

“Humph,” Embla scoffed. “Few are foolish enough to challenge me.”

“So I have heard.” Edon smiled and handed her back her knife, offering his own blade for her inspection. “Mine is more modest, but possibly more deadly in the tempering of the Damascus steel. That is what counts where weapons are concerned, is it not?” His smile faded from his lips. “It is far better to never need to have to unsheath one’s weapon in the first place.”

The jarl left Embla with those cryptic words. He walked to the well and took a dipper in his hand to quench his thirst.

Asgart, Embla’s best man, threw the bucket in the well and drew up a fresh supply after Edon had drunk his fill. Suddenly, the soldier gave with a shout and leaned over the rim. Before his eyes, the water level dropped ten feet.

Asgart’s cry of alarm brought everyone in the ward running to the well. The gathering crowd watched the water inch slowly back up the stones that lined the well. It foamed and swirled, a brackish, foul brine. The stench that arose was foul enough to make a strong man stagger.

“The well has been poisoned!” Asgard shouted. He threw the dipper and the bucket to the ground. Edon took a step back because of the stink. Sulfur wasn’t a pleasant smell, though the water he’d just drunk had been sweet and pure.

Embla ran to his side and waved her hand across the rising water, smelling the sulfur-tainted air. Fear and alarm darkened her fair cheeks.

“The well has been cursed!” she announced. “The witch has cast another spell upon us!”

Furious, she turned on Asgart, her hand clenching the hilt of her sword. “Damn you, Asgart, bring me that woman! Double your patrols. Find the witch before she causes any more harm. Bring her to me! She will pay for poisoning my well!”

“As you command.” Her captain saluted by striking his fist to his chest. Before Asgart could call his soldiers to
him and comply with Embla’s orders, Edon stepped forward and laid his hand on the captain’s arm.

“There is no need to send out a search party.”

“But…” Asgart sputtered.

“Keep your men here and go about your usual business,” Edon commanded, taking charge of his land and defense of his property. “That was rather presumptuous of my niece to make such a command. I am here now. My men will see to the shire’s defense when necessary, Embla Silver Throat.”

Both the captain and the woman were stunned by Edon’s contradictory order. Only Embla spoke out against it.

“What? You don’t know what goes on here,” she sputtered.

“I know enough to realize that wells fail during droughts, and it doesn’t take witchcraft to accomplish that,” Edon replied sternly. “Send your people back to their work.”

“Get back to work!” she shouted at the thralls who had come to see what was happening. Edon found it hard to decide which frightened the people more, their mistress or their superstitions. In either case, the poor slaves backed away in alarm.

He didn’t believe in such nonsense as wells being cursed by witches. He was astute enough to see that Embla and her people did.

Edon sent one of his captains into the keep to see if the well inside had also been affected. He was met by a servant Lady Eloya had sent running from the bathhouse, to ask what had happened to the water. The sluices in the bathhouse had suddenly gone dry. Rig returned, reporting that the same rotten-egg smell affected the water well in the keep.

Edon gave his head a firm shake, regretting the bad luck
of that. “Then we will have to cart water from the river below the palisade. This is quite unacceptable.”

Rig stood beside him as the others moved away. “These people are very superstitious, Lord Edon,” he said quietly.

With a meaningful glance at the retreating form of his niece by marriage, Edon said, “That they are, Rig. Let us hope that we can educate them somewhat over time. Shall we adjourn to the keep?”

Chapter Three

T
he day’s heat refused to dissipate until the sun sank within a handspan of the horizon. A soft breeze off the river gently cooled Tala ap Griffin on her walk to the top of Warwick Hill. The fine red glow of the setting sun made it easy for her to slip unnoticed through Warwick’s open gates and approach the stalwart keep. Her hair and her mother’s scarlet cloak simply melted into the vibrant colors of the dwindling light, making any spell for invisibility redundant. She had no need to cloak herself magically when the dwindling light accomplished all. Inside the wood palisade, a commotion drew the curious to the fortress’s communal well.

Curiously, most of the Vikings had gone inside their huts and houses. It was the time of day when their noses led them to steaming pots and fragrant haunches of sizzling venison and pork. Those that lingered in the ward paid no attention to her as she quietly approached the keep and slipped inside.

No dogs barked a warning, no shouts broke the stillness that had come over the land when the cooling breeze lifted off the river. Nothing living took any notice of Tala ap Griffin until she reached the topmost step inside the fortress and came face-to-face with a wolf.

Distracted by the beauty of the setting sun, Edon turned his attention from his crowded table to the wide window aperture gracing his hall. Sundown had come.

He noted the time somberly as he sighed deeply. Come the rising, he would have to go looking for the spies in the oak. He could not allow his authority to be challenged, not even by Warwick’s curious children, else he would not be respected in his own shire.

Sarina’s throaty growl brought Edon’s attention back to the present. At the top of the stairs stood a woman in an exquisite white gown, sheltered by the increasing shadows and a long, flowing scarlet cape. She held herself so completely still in the increasing darkness that Edon almost believed the beautiful woman was an apparition—a vision solely in his mind. He caught his breath, thinking that she could have stood there forever unnoticed by everyone in his hall.

Only Sarina inched toward her, her hackles lifting, her growl a soft warning to Edon’s sharp ears. The woman had eyes for only one thing—the wolfhound coming to the end of her leash.

Edon inhaled deeply of the charged air in his hall and discerned that curiosity was the overriding emotion exchanged between the woman and the wolfhound.

Smiling a welcome for the beautiful woman, Edon came to his feet, lifting one hand to Sarina in a command to halt. Edon’s motion alerted Embla. She started and looked around, then lunged to her feet, upsetting the balance of intrigue between the woman, the wolfhound and Edon.

“Seize her!” Embla shouted.

The newcomer was obviously not a welcome sight to any of Embla’s guards. All six of her Vikings lurched to their feet, bumping their neighbors’ elbows as they drew swords from their scabbards. Embla moved hastily, tipping her goblet and spilling wine across the table.

“Seize her, I said!” the Viking woman screamed.

Edon’s hand clamped onto his niece’s wrist, slamming her sword back home where it belonged. “You overstep yourself, wife of Harald Jorgensson. We are in my hall, at my board. Here the rules of hospitality are more sacred than all the gods in Asgard.”

Tala tore her gaze from the wolf to the black-haired Viking jarl. He spoke without raising his voice, but the authority in his command fixed Embla to marble. Tala had never seen or heard the woman crossed before. Her eyes glowed with venom; her body tightened like a snake poised to strike.

Embla found her voice, recovering as she spun around and confronted the jarl in a shrill voice. “You would allow a Mercian witch to enter your hall? A witch who has tainted Warwick’s wells? She’s come to gloat! She will curse you and steal your soul, suck the breath from your mouth and blood from your heart. Banish her, Lord Edon. You know not what evil you allow.”

“My word, all of that?” Edon undercut Embla’s venom, halving it with an amused chuckle as his gaze returned to the beautiful lady. He envisioned that lovely mouth sucking the breath from his mouth and found the idea appealing.

Sarina crept closer, sniffing at the woman’s trailing scarlet mantle, lifting her nose as Edon did, searching the wind for the newcomer’s scent. Edon considered the lady’s face and white throat and the firm press of her lush bosom against an elegantly crafted tunic.

Two gilded brooches held the separate cloths fastened at her shoulders. A fine gold girdle rested at the peaks of her hipbones, bringing the sheer white linen to a narrow tuck that widened across her hips and fell in graceful folds to her ankles. A jeweled diadem circled her brow and held a wealth of flaming curls away from her face.

Thus far, Embla’s vitriolic attack had only made the stranger smile. And a beautiful smile that was, Edon
thought, full of promise and mystery. He allowed his gaze to linger a moment longer on the lovely oval of her face before turning to Embla’s restive guards and commanding them to put down their arms.

“The lady bears no weapons on her person. Sit down and be civil, else you will be evicted from my hall. Rig, bring my visitor to the table and make her welcome. Eloya was wise enough to order a setting prepared for her.”

“I will not eat of the same food that is served to a Mercian,” Embla hissed bitterly.

“Then you will likely starve before our eyes in this hall tonight, Lady Embla. If it so pains you, you may leave and sup in your own hall.” Edon dismissed her, satisfied that Rig had moved to the newcomer’s side and no harm would befall the beautiful lady should Embla choose to leave in anger.

“I see that blood means nothing to you,” the Viking woman sneered.

“On the contrary, wife of my nephew,” Edon said with telling candor. “Blood means everything to me.”

Embla blanched. Her pale lips tightened and her chin jutted out in fury. Edon saw no gain in allowing Embla to think she retained any power now that he’d returned to his shire.

He was not ready to condemn her for the murder of his nephew, but he had his suspicions. So did his brother, Guthrum. Nor would Edon tolerate any direct challenge from her. Best she learn that now.

“Will we be killed in our beds?” Rebecca murmured fearfully from the near side of the table.

“No, we will not,” Edon said resolutely.

Theo turned to distract Rebecca from the commotion of Embla’s exit with her six foul-tempered guards. The newborn’s mewling became a soft undercurrent punctuating Sarina’s throaty growl.

The growling continued until Embla was gone from sight.

Edon realized that it was Harald’s wife the wolfhound took such great exception to, not the Mercian newcomer. He started to settle back into his chair, then realized that the newcomer had yet to take a seat. She had paused to greet Sarina and to speak to the two thralls manning the wine casket. Granted, they were only children that Eloya had selected from the compound, but Edon took umbrage that the woman chose to acknowledge anyone before she had made proper abeyance to him.

Blind Theo turned from soothing his wife and small son, chuckling, “So it begins, Lord Wolf.”

Ever quick to sense any change in Edon’s mercurial temper, Lady Eloya cast a knowing smile his direction. Then she did the unthinkable, speaking out in her clear contralto, in well-practiced Saxon. “Princess, Lord Edon feels ignored.”

Tala turned about so quickly she startled the thralls. Another blotch of wine splattered on the unvarnished floor. Sarina rose to her feet and ambled to the stain, sniffing it noisily.

As she gave ground to the wolfhound, Tala found herself the censure of all eyes. She didn’t know which was worse—standing still for a wolf to come close enough to devour her or confronting the dark Viking’s unfathomable eyes. Frissons of heat skittered over her neck, pebbling the skin on her arms as she turned around to face him. It was the same feeling that had overcome her that afternoon when he’d spied her in King Offa’s oak.

“Why did you call me ‘princess’?” She addressed the women at the table, not knowing which of the ladies present had spoken to her.

A very beautiful lady at the far end of the boards deigned to reply. “Because Lord Edon’s oracle, my husband, Theo the Greek, told us we would have a true princess
dine at our table our first night in Warwick. We are in Warwick and you are the only visitor that has come to the hall.”

“Ergo, you are the princess.” Edon finished the theorem with simple logic. He saw no reason to add the dictum that the gold torque encircling her neck also proved the theorem valid. He came to Rig’s side and took hold of the woman’s hand. Her fingers were warm and moist, pale against his sun-browned skin.

“I am honored to be given such rank,” Tala replied. She dipped in a proper bow of respect to the lord and all of his guests at the table. “Forgive my interruption of your meal, but I was ordered to present myself at sunset.”

Edon blinked in surprise. This beauty standing before him was the bare-limbed nymph in the oak? He shook his head in denial. “You are not the girl I saw hiding in the oak.”

“And you said you never forgot a face.” She delighted him with a playful smile. “‘Haps I should have disobeyed your command and tested your memory, as well as your eyes.”

Edon looked closer, admiring the neatly tamed curls held by a net to her diadem. Her fair skin was kissed by the sun, warm and glowing. Wispy red curls escaped at her temple and brow.

“I did not command that you come alone,” Edon responded tersely. He felt slightly chilled at the idea of her facing Embla’s animosity unprotected.

“I did not say I came alone.” Tala chose her words carefully. “It is no matter at the present. You have ample swordsmen and warriors at your table to protect many ladies, be they princesses or not.”

Edon deliberately let his gaze move to the empty stairs. “Then summon the boy. He will sup with us as well.”

“What boy? I know no boys, lord.”

So she would spar words with him, would she? Did she
think his eyes were as sightless as Theo’s? Edon motioned to Rig. “Have you discovered the princess’s name?”

A handsome smile lightened the planes of Rig’s lean cheeks. “Indeed I have, Edon. May I present Tala ap Griffin? Princess, this wolf in fine clothing is Edon Halfdansson, Jarl of Warwick.”

The dancing amber lights in the princess’s eyes dimmed slightly, as if she’d suddenly recalled a sobering thought. She removed her hand from Edon’s. “You are brother to Guthrum and son of Halfdan, late king of the Danelaw?”

“Guilty as charged,” Edon answered. He drew back the seat beside his own and placing his hand firmly at the small of her back, guided her to it. She stiffened at his touch, declining to take the seat immediately. By doing so, she wrested control of his hall from his hand. If she would not sit, he could not. If he did not sit, the food would grow cold and no one could eat.

“What ill do you bear my late father?” Edon asked, playing her game momentarily. The top of her head barely reached his shoulder. His hand warmed to the sweet curve at the small of her back. “Halfdan has been gone to Asgard a score and five years. You are not old enough to have been ravished by him, and I know for a fact he did not venture this far south of the security of York.”

“Perhaps I am not from the south,” Tala countered.

“Ah, but you are, Princess. You are a royal Leamurian. The torque at your throat proclaims you that. Embla bears you great ill and openly calls you a witch. Has she reasons for her animosity, valid ones?” Edon asked silkily.

He allowed his hand to move slowly up the delightful curve of her spine, enjoying the way she pressed back into his hand, seeking a distance he wouldn’t allow. He smiled deliberately, as if to ask
who is in control now?

“Embla Silver Throat is well-known for her malice.” Tala couldn’t take her eyes from his. “She spreads it about her indifferently, sparing no one.”

“She empowers you with the cunning of a witch.”

Tala’s laugh at that bald charge echoed into the high ceiling of Edon’s hall. “Aye, so she does.”

“You do not deny the charge?”

“To what purpose? Vikings are known for their stupidity and superstitious ways. Both run hand in hand with brute force. Embla has mastered all there is to learn of that.”

“Now you try to provoke me. Sit down, Tala ap Griffin. The food grows cold and others in this chamber want to have their bellies filled before the moon rises. Mind the insults you levy, lest you find there are no stupid Vikings at my table.”

That the warning bore a truth was as evident as the deep cleft in the jarl of Warwick’s handsome chin. Tala gave in to his command and took the seat beside him. Sitting allowed her some measure of relief, as he removed his possessive hand. But the imprint remained like a brand from a hot iron, tormenting her.

A servant hastily cleared away Embla’s spilled goblet, whisking clean linen and gold plate in its place before Tala. She squirmed on the hard chair, tearing her gaze from Eden’s face to look at the people at his table. Her palms grazed the lovely carved wood at her hips as she adjusted the chair closer to the table.

Edon watched her fingers unconsciously caress the carved wolf heads and wondered what the stroke of those same fingers would do to his own flesh. He watched as she gave in to a moment of curiosity, studying the various personages at his table. That allowed Edon more time to enjoy the pure curve of her cheek and the symmetry of a perfect nose above lips so sweetly red and full he imagined she’d consumed a handful of berries prior to coming to his hall.

Her gown was in no way unattractive, with its classic lines, but it was not something constructed just for her.
The bright kirtles and fitted silk gowns his ladies favored would better suit her strong coloring and lush figure.

She wore not a trace of perfume, neither oil of attar nor the modest scents of herbal soaps. That appealed to him deeply, for he loved the scent of a woman. That was the richest perfume of all.

The food was served and the meal commenced, during which Edon introduced her to his guests and friends. As ladies were wont to do, she and Eloya struck up a fast friendship, asking about the gowns each was wearing, the source of the rich cloths. The princess seemed very pleased to learn that Eloya and two of her ladies were skilled with needle and thread. Warwickshire needed more such talents.

BOOK: Lady of the Lake
10.15Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Denali Dreams by Ronie Kendig, Kimberley Woodhouse
The Yellow Room Conspiracy by Peter Dickinson
The Earl and His Virgin Countess by Dominique Eastwick
Slave to the Rhythm by Jane Harvey-Berrick
Quantum Night by Robert J. Sawyer
Finding Margo by Susanne O'Leary
The Birds and the Bees by Milly Johnson
The Orchid Tree by Siobhan Daiko
Island Promises by Connell, Joy