Fantasy Book Club discussion

Can somebody who owns a copy of The Elvenbane show me an excerpt from the first chapter, please? Say, two or three pages?

It's really important so it'd mean a lot and I'd appreciate it if somebody could do this.

I hope this is enough - I don't have page numbers set up, and copy/pasting is messing up the formatting a bit.


Chapter 1
SERINA DAETH. I am—Serina Daeth. Serina clung to her name as the only thing she was still certain of, the only thing the sun could not burn away from her. The sun—it was high overhead now, beating down upon her, trying to evaporate her.
Hot—she'd never been so hot. It was hard to think, hard to remember that she must keep moving. She couldn't see her feet under the swollen ball of her belly—she felt them, though, every step an agony. But it would be worse if she stopped.
Her throat and mouth were so dry; there was nothing left from the dew she'd drunk this morning, lapping it off the rocks like an animal.
I am Serina Daeth. I am—
Ah, gods, that it should come to this.
A few months ago she had been Lord Dyran's favorite. A few days ago she had hopes of hiding her pregnancy until the damned brat was delivered. She had planned to get rid of it, then return to the harem to give that bitch Leyda Shaybrel exactly what she deserved. She couldn't have told Lord Dyran what Leyda had done to her, but she could have found some way to bring her down. Leyda had enemies; all the women of the harem had enemies. It was just a matter of making common cause until Leyda was ousted…
But Dyran returned from Council unexpectedly, and Leyda was waiting…
I will live, I will return, and I will find a way to make her suffer—
Lord Dyran had found their rivalry amusing, and encouraged it, by promising Leyda any number of things, but keeping Serina in the number-one position. When Leyda failed to oust Serina as favorite, and realized that Lord Dyran had no intention of replacing Serina, she had not given" up. Undoubtedly she had turned to sabotage.
She must have. How else could I have conceived?
She must have substituted all of Serina's food for a month with that intended for the elves. That had been several months ago, just before Lord Dyran went off to Council—
The Council lasted eight months. Would that it had lasted longer! I would have been free of this burden, and none the wiser!
Lord Dyran had left before Serina realized she was pregnant.
As soon as she knew, she had been in a panic.
To be pregnant with an elf-lord's child, a halfblood, was a death sentence unless the lord was very lenient. And even if Dyran didn't kill her, he'd have cast her off.
That would be as bad as death. To be given to some underling, or to the fighters as a breeder—or worst of all, given to Leyda as a servant—
No, never, not after what she had been, all she had fought to achieve—
All she had fought to achieve… for so long, and so hard…
Serina pinned an errant strand of russet hair back in place, and surveyed her image in her silver-rimmed mirror critically. She nodded a little, and turned her attention to her makeup. She was in competition with the best, and that left no room for anything other than perfection.

Oh my god, thank you SO MUCH! :D You made my week!!

You can read more here - just click on "Look Inside" above the picture

http://www.amazon.com/Elvenbane-Halfb...

Wolfrott wrote: "Oh my god, thank you SO MUCH! :D You made my week!!"

:) You're welcome - I'm curious why you needed that...

Oh, I should have realised that... Sorry for any inconvenience! :(

Thanks for the link!