Veiled Innocence (Book One, The Soul Cycle) by Krystle Jones Page B

no idea they were supposed to be white. They were positioned as markers along the walls of flowers and bushes to guide patrons as they navigated the refurbished labyrinth. 
    She had not made it so far as the Grand Ball Room, where the gala was to be held, but she could imagine from the considerable improvements on the rest of the fortress what extravagance she would find there. 
    Few people came to visit her, and finding hersel f to be a nuisance in her state , she kept to her chambers and watched the transformation of the courtyard below, looking on while servants worked themselves into nervous bundles of knots. She had not seen U rsa since the countess appeared. H er father and sister had not stopped by either, but the latter did not surprise her as much as the former . Gabriel dropped in a handful of times to inquire about her health, but within minutes he would become tongue-tied, clam up, and abandon the room as quickly as he had entered. 
    Lian sighed from her perch on the window seat and gazed over the garden into the black expanse of Dreaka’s Forest, beyond the dreary, graying hills. If she squinted, she could barely see the faint glimmer of the leaves, their veins lined with metallic hues of red and gold.
    According to legen d, there was a war between the g ods, said to have occurred at the dawn of the Age of Stars, the darke st era in Eresean history. The g ods spilled their blood on the forest, cursing its leaves and slowly draining the forest of its life essence. Dreaka, not wanting to see any living creature suffer, lent some of Her own essence, the power of life and light, to the forest. She healed it, though the mark of the battle had already s tained the leaves; red for the g ods’ blood, gold for Dreaka’s benevolence. At night, the veins glowed, not as bright as the moon but enough to give it a ghostly aura. Priests said it was Dreaka’s light, Her mark that the wood s were Hers, while scientists claimed the plants somehow trapped the light of day within their veins, appearing to glow at night.
    There were different stories surrounding the wood s . The one thread they had in common was that the forest was sacred, said to be a favored haunt of Dreaka, Queen of the g ods. Travelers often claim ed to have glimpsed Her betwe en the trees or by the river, shining with all the light of the world. These tales were usually accompanied by rumors of strange, otherworldly creatures that inhabited the wood s , made from the very essence of the forest itself. Maidens with bark for skin , men who could turn into water; there was something new every week, it seemed.
    No doubt exaggerated by an overzealous merchant looking to drive home a sale.
    She never placed much stock in the stories. Though she had never set foot in the forest, she had never seen anything to suggest something extraordinary was happening there. Though it might spor t some unusual vegetation, she had always assumed it to be a qu irk of the land, perhaps a side effect from the lack of sunshine. After all, the plants had to survive somehow. Why not trap sunlight? It seemed like a perfectly logical explanation for their appearance at night.
    Her thoughts drifted back to the present. She watched gardeners fuss over flower beds, making the garden look less regal and more cluttered, while attendants swept the walkways. After a moment, they began to blur out as her mind once again wandered.
    There was hardly a moment spent where she didn’t brood over something. So many things had happened recently , and she had lost count of the hours she spent trying to decipher what it all meant, if it meant anything at all. Sometimes, she wasn’t entirely convinced it all had not been a dream. She was healing to o fast, f irst from Orris’ bruises, and now a miraculous recovery from what had appeared to be a near fatal illness. Though she was relieved, it bothered her at the same time. The mask she carefully hid her emotions behind felt cracked, leaving her