Branna's Song: The Coldwood Saga, #1

By Katherine Bryant

Young Branna Winhold was born into the luxury of noble life, but her soul was built for adventure. So when her elder brother Oren is about to be sent off to war, she chafes at the idea of being left behind with an uneventful life and a destiny in which she has no say.

Naturally, the spirited Branna takes matters into her own hands. Defying convention, she disguises herself as a soldier to join her brother on the warpath. Yet what she hopes will be a journey full of adventure and glory quickly turns into a trial that puts to the test everything she ever believed about herself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Little Monster Press
• Release date: Nov 11, 2016
• ISBN: 9780998185019

Katherine Bryant

Katherine Bryant is an author and artist hailing from Minnesota. When she is not busy writing tales of mayhem and adventure or creating miniature monstrosities from wool, she spends her time tending her menagerie and playing too many video games for her own good.

Book preview

To my Toad.

I love your stupid face.

1

It’s a pity the gods didn’t think to bless you with any grace.

All the grace they have to offer wouldn’t do me any good when I’m stuffed into this dress like a sausage. The words tore through Branna’s mind, but she knew better than to speak them aloud. Instead, she closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath through her nose.

And don’t flare your nose like that, her mother said, her words striking as quick and sharp as a lash. It makes you look like a horse.

It took every ounce of self-control Branna had at this point to keep from huffing, or scoffing, or rolling her eyes. She released her breath, careful not to let her nostrils flare in the process.

She teetered back to the seamstress, taking small steps to keep from treading on the dress’s hem. Though she tried to move as smoothly as possible, the disappointment that seeped through the passive mask on her mother’s face told her the effort was wasted. Branna may have spent much of her life in elaborate gowns, but wearing them still made her feel like a foreigner in her own body. The constricting fit and long, heavy skirts never seemed to settle the right way on her body. Something about wearing so many layers transformed her otherwise competent limbs into the ungainly legs of a foal.

At least it was a beautiful dress. It was a rich blue color that brought out the azure tones in her pale, grayish eyes and complemented her soft fawn complexion. As the dressmaker resumed her work, Branna brushed long black tresses behind her shoulder to better admire the gown’s elaborate silver stitching. She didn’t need to keep stealing glances into the mirror to know how stunning she looked. Hopefully it would make up for her lack of poise. As dissatisfied as she was at the prospect of getting married, she didn’t want her betrothed to think poorly of her if they were resigned to spend their lives together.

Branna did her best to ignore her mother’s fussing while the seamstress finished with the dress. Once the matron seemed satisfied with the work, she swept out of the room, leaving Branna to breathe a sigh of relief.

Get me out of this thing, Branna said once she was sure her mother was well out of earshot.

With the seamstress’ help, she all but jumped out of the gown. The woman brought another dress to change into, this one far less lavish and confining than the last. Branna waved it away.

No, get my breeches.

As happy as she usually was to get into a more comfortable dress, it was hardly appropriate attire for fighting. After that fitting, Branna wanted nothing more than to release her pent-up frustration by whacking imaginary foes a sword.

It was frowned upon for a young woman of her station to dress like a man, much less to indulge in the art of swordplay, but by this point in her life, Branna had had many years to perfect the equally daring art of rejecting the judgment of others. Every noble family had a member or two about whom curious rumors were whispered. Her family was lucky that Branna’s were so tame.

Once dressed, she hurried outside and made her way to the smithy. It was nothing more than a large, thatch-roofed lean-to that housed the forge. It was lined with racks filled with freshly forged swords, axes, and shields. After looking them over, Branna selected one of the blades from a display and carried it to the open patch of dirt behind the modest building. This was where her family’s soldiers practiced their swordplay.

When they weren’t around, this was where she practiced with her brother.

She spun the blade in her hand, swung it downwards in an elegant arc, and back up again before lunging forward in a thrust. A smile curled the edges of her lips as she repeated her favorite maneuvers, stepping, lunging, and drawing the sword through the air as smoothly as a brush over canvas. Her mother accused her of having no grace, but that was in the confinement of her quarters, under the stifling grip of generations of expectation. Out here, under the sun and in the open air, sword in hand, her soul soared and her body danced. Out here, she felt like herself.

When she was a child, Branna indulged in fantasies in which she was Helewise the Heartstrong, heroine of the Unification War of Lothia over a century ago. Helewise was a commoner who fought her way from obscurity to greatness in the service of Lothia’s first king. She was the only warrior woman the stories ever spoke of. War was considered a man’s pastime, but she lived a life as bold as any of her contemporaries and died in glorious battle. Such a fate was lucky for the king, as her death saved him from having to make the awkward decision of whether or not to allow women to possess lands and titles in their own right.

Needless to say, Helewise was Branna’s hero. Though she wouldn’t admit it even to her dear brother, she still liked to imagine she was that great icon whenever she held a sword in hand.

Branna stopped her drills when she spied her brother out of the corner of her eye. She turned to face him, sword pointed at his chest.

I challenge you to a duel, sir! she said, the smile still stuck on her face.

Oren stood at the edge of the ring, arms crossed, with a frown peeking out at her from beneath a mass of dark hair. We don’t have time for this, Branna, he said.

Of all the things he could have said, she did not expect those words to come from her brother’s mouth. Neither one of them had ever turned down the opportunity to spar with the other. The expression on her face fell in time with