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Chapters (64)
  1. Front Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Contents
  6. Pronunciation Guide
  7. Prologue
  8. Part One
  9. One
  10. Two
  11. Three
  12. Four
  13. Five
  14. Six
  15. Seven
  16. Eight
  17. Nine
  18. Ten
  19. Eleven
  20. Twelve
  21. Thirteen
  22. Part Two
  23. Fourteen
  24. Fifteen
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Eighteen
  28. Nineteen
  29. Twenty
  30. Twenty-One
  31. Twenty-Two
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Part Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Twenty-Six
  37. Twenty-Seven
  38. Twenty-Eight
  39. Twenty-Nine
  40. Thirty
  41. Thirty-One
  42. Thirty-Two
  43. Thirty-Three
  44. Thirty-Four
  45. Thirty-Five
  46. Part Four
  47. Thirty-Six
  48. Thirty-Seven
  49. Thirty-Eight
  50. Thirty-Nine
  51. Forty
  52. Forty-One
  53. Forty-Two
  54. Forty-Three
  55. Forty-Four
  56. Forty-Five
  57. Forty-Six
  58. Forty-Seven
  59. Epilogue
  60. Excerpt from The Sun and Its Shade
  61. The Night and Its Moon Playlist
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. Back Cover

The little girl smiled, delighted to have shared her confidential information. She whispered, “Mama says we’re not supposed to tell people about it. It’s a special secret.”

“That does sound special indeed,” she said quietly. Nox stared at the child for a long moment, soaking in her wide-eyed innocence, heart pinching at the utter lack of goodness in her own life. She longed to snatch the child into her lap and squeeze her until she disappeared. “Tess, would it be all right if I gave you a hug?”

It was the best hug she’d had in years.

Tess waved happily at Nox as she trotted off to meet her parents. Nox wiggled her fingers in return, knowing that as soon as they turned their backs, she’d be following them home.

* * *

It hadn’t taken long for the family to repack their cart and leave the city for the evening. Nox trailed at a reasonable distance, urging her horse toward the trees once they neared a small farmyard. Her beast protested slightly with a whinny, acting the part of a temperamental prima donna. It jerked to show its disapproval as it was forced from its comfortable path to the brambles of the underbrush.

“Oh, hush. As if your life is hard.” She rolled her eyes at the horse.

The night-dark horse objected rather adamantly, nickering as she dismounted. She leashed its reins to a tree and began to slowly pick her way through the forest toward the farmhouse.

Nox was at home in the lateness of the hour. She had been a lady of the night for years now, and sleep was the furthest thing from her mind. If Millicent and her damned tome of monsters were to be believed, Nox might very well be a creature of the night by blood. Should they truly be meeting in the barn, perhaps they’d welcome their long-lost succubus kin with welcome talons. She nearly snorted at the mental image it conjured.

Nox had never struggled with the way her vision had adjusted to the dark. Perhaps it was the goddess’s humorous gift to her namesake, or maybe it was a blessed curse from whoever—or whatever—had sired her. Her eyes didn’t strain as she watched the candlelight in Tess’s house blink out for the night. The absence of their orange glow made it easier for her to monitor the silhouettes of the home, the henhouse, the hills in the distance, and of course, the silvered outline of the barn as the light of the half-moon lit its frame.