Witch of the Lake

Beneath the murky waters of the lake, an ancient being slumbers, and Brygida is its servant. Kept sheltered in the woods by her mothers from the nearby village, Brygida has never had so much as a friend-until the day she meets a charming stranger painting by the lake. He invites her to the village's harvest feast, but her taste of the forbidden ends with a murder. Called into service for the first time, Brygida must take up her ancestral duty as Reaper of Death and solve the murder within three days. If she brings the murderer to the lake on the third day, the being she serves will be sated. If she fails, Brygida herself will be drawn beneath the murky waters, and the village massacred. There's only one problem: the main suspect is her charming painter, Kaspian. As Brygida investigates, the dangers are many and answers few. The village and her family stand against her, and with time running short, the lake demands a price. Brygida believes Kaspian is innocent, but can she stake her life on it, when failure means condemning the rest of the village, and being dragged into the deep . . . ?

Before the night of the winter solstice, Brygida has everything: her mothers, a full heart, and possibly a place in two worlds. But between those worlds is the darkness, and when it comes time to make the offering to the dark god, the lady of Rubin falls in... and so does Brygida. The land of Rubin is caught in a wolf's maw. As a smaller, weaker region, it relies on Lady Rubin's gift of diplomacy to stave off ruin. But as the heavy snows appear, she disappears without a trace. And Brygida, true to her ill-made offering, becomes the village's prime suspect-along with her mothers. When she's attacked by a demon and marked, she believes the same demon may have taken Lady Rubin. To defeat it before the mark reaches her heart and kills her, and to avoid a clash between her mothers and the village, she agrees to help Lady Rubin's son Kaspian find her. As the winter deepens and the search stretches, however, demons and spirits begin to emerge in great numbers... with great hunger... Plagued by strange creatures and malevolent foes, Brygida and Kaspian search for Lady Rubin, praying to find her alive. If they succeed, it could balm the divide between the witches and the village, as well as that between Rubin and the bloodthirsty land at its border.

After her life nearly fell apart, Brygida finally knows her place: away from the village, with her mothers, healing the slumbering wood to keep the nightmares at bay. Her family grimoire warns that the wood may never be allowed to wake, and she claims that duty for her own. Her mind does turn to the new lord of Rubin, but wishing for more almost lost her everything, and she's not about to lose her witchlands to its nightmares caused by the villagers. That is, until the dreaded cult arrives . . . Kaspian has never wanted the rulership, but when his father passes away, he has no choice but to ascend to lord. With tensions high between the village and the witches, trust lacking between him and his subjects, and a heavy heart turned toward the wood, Kaspian can't help but wish for someone to take it all away . . . And then a familiar face from his past comes to grant it. The cult arrives to cleanse the so-called stain of witchcraft upon Rubin, and it won't stop until Brygida and her mothers are dead. But with demons closing in and the wood ready to wake, the cult's violence could destroy not only the region of Rubin, but everything. Can Brygida and Kaspian stem the dark tide of the cult together, or will they and their people drown in the mortal inevitability of blood, demons, and a waking wood with an insatiable hunger?

In a struggle between gods, a young witch and the village she protects are caught in the crossfire. The dark god's cult aims to sweep up not just the village but the entire country. An unlikely force must stand against the onslaught. Brygida, who comes from a long line of water witches serving their goddess, now challenged with a gift of dark power. Kaspian, a second-born son who thought he'd spend his life painting instead of tending the rulership... until the murder of someone very dear to him. And the Madwood, a slumbering forest full of apparitions, whose strength or madness could change the world forever... Can Brygida and Kaspian stem the dark tide of the cult together? Or will they, their people, their lands, and everything drown in the mortal inevitability of blood, demons, and a waking wood with an insatiable hunger...?