Excerpt from Merrow by Ananda Braxton-Smith, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Of course, he did come back to us blinded; the great blaze of the Otherworld Halls being too much for his poor eyes. The Others never take some thing without leaving something else in its stead, though, and they gave him the Othersight to make up for it. He looks upon a different world from us, and sees us in ways we can never see ourselves." Ma stood, stretching her stiff back and placing her spotted hand on his head. She moved to the corner of the dark-ening cottage and lit a taper. By its light, among a heap of stones and shells, I saw the Christian's cross and a fresh green alder branch, a set of antlers, a stone spiral, and a bowl of milk, all set in the niche behind her bed. She gave each one a touch or a kiss, whispering and blowing and moving her hands in spirals. She drew a woman-sized circle in the air and stepped through it. "All that talking's thirsty work. Who's for a brew, then?" she asked briskly. Then she bent to me and whispered, "By the way, never trust a salamander. Nasty, feverish things!"

Scully turned his face to me, and his eyes looked straight into mine, milky in the candlelight and amused.

"My mother leaves nothing to chance," he said. "And that's a simple fact."

Excerpted from Merrow by Ananda Braxton-Smith. Copyright © 2016 by Ananda Braxton-Smith. Excerpted by permission of Candlewick Press. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.