Submission Heather

Name: Heather McCorkle
Email: hmccorkle(at)wildblue(dot)net
Title & Genre: TO RIDE A PUCA Young Adult Historical Fantasy

Pitch: During the 12th century invasion of Ireland, one of the last of the druids, must master her power to keep her kind from being annihilated.

1st 250 (240 actually):

Just like they had done time and again, invaders were coming to take what wasn’t theirs. Emily adjusted the druid’s spyglass with a shaking hand to get a better look at the ship that marred the perfect blue horizon of the ocean. It was still too far away to tell much about it save that it was large and imposing. Then she saw that the prow was carved to resemble the head of a dragon. Fear rose up to clamp its icy grip on her throat. Norsemen invaders had never come this far down the coast.

“This can’t be good,” she murmured.

Emily had never seen a Norseman and she didn’t want to. The horrible tales of what they did to entire villages was the stuff of legend. Her heart started to thud with the intensity of a blacksmith’s hammer. Nervous energy hummed through her body.

A hot summer wind blew a strand of her long brown hair across the druid spyglass, obscuring her view. Her horse shifted beneath her and stomped his foot. She didn’t need any more urging, it was time to go. The ship was at least half a day out to sea which would give them just enough time to disappear.

The click the glass made as she compacted it made both her and her horse jump. It was silly to think they could hear but knowing that didn’t make the irrational fear go away.