It’s #bookqw and our hero can see their ‘whole’ future in a pest invasion.
More from Chapter 3:
Daeryn stepped between them. “Let her talk. This team isn’t pack. With Owen gone, we’re equal members and have to hear each other out.”
Between his mustache and beard, Zar’s lips twisted like he’d scented carrion.
But Jac dipped her chin to him in a rare show of appreciation. “You didn’t see what I saw, so you can’t fault me for running down the one I finally found. It’s bad. Tonight those pests didn’t just bite up some vegetables. They’ve gnawed the stalks at the base and destroyed an entire row of acorn squash.” Jac waved her arm this way and that, her excitement from the chase still evident. “The teeth on those things must be as sharp as axes.”
The four of them remained silent. This was bad. A few of these beasts, over a few nights of cutting through plant stalks, and Wellspring Collective wouldn’t have a viable crop left. Or sales…or cash…or workers.
“This proves it can’t be sentient,” Jac said. “Nor an animacambire. Only a ’cambire gone bad pulls that kind of crap, ruining a crop so the plants die and the vegetables can’t ripen.”
Daeryn swallowed. “Can’t be a bad ’cambire, or even a small pack of ’em,” he said. “Not when every farm north and east of here reports them. The entire north half of the Farmlands shire.” This was what ruined farms, like Owen had said the hare invasion of ‘39 did when the whole valley almost starved. Drove farmers and their hands to town jobs, and Outside. Many of them didn’t return. After nearly three years, Daeryn wasn’t just a hand, but a vested collective member. This farm was also his, just as it belonged in part to Jac, Maraquin, Zar…all of the longtimers.
If Wellspring went under, he wouldn’t just be seeking a new position, but a new home.
~~~
Hunt with these animal shifters to protect their farm in a spellbinding cottagecore fantasy!
The Unraveling, Volume One of The Luminated Threads is a free first novel of a serialized cozy fantasy — download it from my Payhip Store and major retailers.
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