Beginnings and Endings, book 1: Of Secrets and Beginnings
Ashlynn B. Rudd

In the outskirt villages of Irropia, twenty-one-year-old Atallia has only ever glimpsed bits of magic on her slowly dying world. Outcasted and shunned, she longs to be left alone and live her life in peace, but as fate would have it a mysterious disease has begun to spread across the land, cursing those who fell ill to a slow, cruel death.

In but a single night her world is shattered and reshaped, lies and truths blending together as her destiny is laid out before her in a blaze of light and destruction. Attacked and nearly killed, power that had simmered beneath her skin her entire life tears free and shakes the world.

Saved by a magical people long thought lost, Atallia’s life would never be the same. Especially after meeting Kanan, the military might and revered champion of his kind. Everything about him may have drawn her in, made her heart beat faster, but the darkness in his eyes—the secrets—had her wondering whether he could be trusted, or if he was just another name to add to the long list of those who sought to pacify her. To control her.

With visions of war chasing her in her dreams, and more questions than answers, Atallia would soon find out if secrets really did run as thick as blood; and if so would anyone make it out unscathed?

Or would she have to burn the world down to find out the truth...?