Blog Tour: Desecration: The Wizard Queen at 16 by Hadley Holt

DESECRATION – Excerpt, Fear of Lightning

Finally, a half hour later, and well on my way to a state of zombieness, I practically fell onto my bed. I tucked my teddy bear, Cuddles, into the crook of my arm and rolled onto my side. I didn’t even blink an eye when Cheeva hopped onto the bed and lay down beside me, with his head on the other pillow. I held up my teddy bear to the arctic wolf. “Cheeva, this is Cuddles and he’s not a chew toy. Cuddles, this is Cheeva and I guess he’ll be sleeping with us every night.” I didn’t even comment on the perplexed tilt of Cheeva’s head. I just closed my eyes and fell to sleep, feeling safe for the first time that day because Cheeva was with me.

*****

BOOM!

I sprang up to a sitting position on my bed, my heart racing frantically inside my chest. Cheeva leapt out of the bed, growling as he searched for the threat in my room.

Through my window, I watched as lightning branched out, illuminating the sky.

I counted silently: one-thousand, two-thousand, three-thousand—

BOOM!

I flinched. Perspiration beaded on my upper lip.

Cheeva stepped over and peered at me, his head tilting to the side.

Embarrassed, I sighed. “I’m afraid of thunderstorms,” I admitted to my familiar. Electricity exploded wildly across the sky once more. “One-thousand, two-thousand—”

BOOM!

I started breathing in and out too fast. I began to see stars hovering in front of my eyes. I was hyperventilating. I tried to breathe slowly in and slowly out, covering my head with a pillow. Although I tried to ignore the storm and think of something else, my mind went to the memory of where my fear of storms began. I’d been five years old, and in my bedroom, this very room, huddled in bed, staring out the same window during a thunderstorm. The lightning had come too close to the keep and finally, a flash of lightning was so bright that it blinded me, and the boom of thunder shook my room like an earthquake. A groaning crack split through the night

and glass shattered as a huge tree branch crashed through my window and

landed on top of me, pressing me down. Rain blew in through the window

and soaked me. I tried to cry out for help, but I couldn’t breathe. The weight

of the branch was suffocating me and the pain—I remembered the painlaced

panic.

Even at five years of age, I knew the keep was a massive structure

and I was terrified that no one would get to me in time to save me. I

struggled to suck in air, but my world began to fade to black. In the haziest

part of the memory, I saw my father burst through the door and use his

magic to pull the branch off of my body.

About the Book:

In a hidden world of wizards where only men hold the power of magic, one girl arises with the power to change everything, if she isn’t killed first…

Adriana Victoriana Evangelista (Addie), daughter to the High Chancellor of the Wizard’s Council, has always been the perfect wizard girl. She never questions why men possess magical powers and women have no power at all, magical or otherwise. Male wizards blend into the modern human world, leading huge corporations while wizard women are sequestered away.

On her sixteenth birthday, Addie discovers she possesses magic. Under wizard law, she is a desecration. An ancient prophecy surrounds the emergence of a girl magic-wielder, the wizard queen, who is destined to bring about the downfall of the wizard-kin.

Addie has long had a forbidden crush on a human boy who lives in the wizard stronghold, Rory Devlin. As she delves deeper into the dangerous mysteries surrounding her own destiny, she suspects Rory might be more than just human.

Addie’s fate sends her straight into the path of a powerful and evil sorcerer, but the worst danger of all may come from right inside her own home.

But Desecration on Amazon

About the Author:

Hadley Holt, author of paranormal, and fantasy YA (Young Adult) has always loved to write. She also nurtures an incurable fascination with all things supernatural and fantastical. From a young age, she imagined stories about dragons, wizards, witches, ghosts, shape-shifters, vampires, and other magical creatures. As life often does, it blessed Hadley with family – a hunky husband and amazing children, and with family came a rewarding career. Hadley spent many years in the not-so-magical world of finance and mortgage banking, but the stories were always there in the back of her mind, demanding to be set free.

Thanks to the housing market crash, Hadley finally realized her dreams. She now breathes life into her magical tales of reluctant young heroes finding their inner power to stand up against terrible creatures and even more terrible odds.

Please visit me at HadleyHolt.com!

Blog | Twitter | Facebook | Author Goodreads

Here is the link to the the blog tour in general