Cover Reveal and Excerpt of Cherie Reich's Reborn

This week is full of excitement since I'm revealing the cover art of my debut YA Epic Fantasy novel Reborn. I had the idea for Reborn in 2006. On January 15, 2009, I started writing the first draft. Since then, it's been through a complete rewrite and multiple edits and will be released on May 23, 2014 ... just five months away!

From 2006, I had an idea of what I wanted the cover art to look like for Reborn, and I found the perfect cover artist, the brilliant Laura Sava, to take my vision and make it into a reality. Without further ado, here is the cover art for Reborn.

To save a kingdom, a prophetess must challenge Fate.

On the day of Yssa’s death and rebirth, the god Apenth chose her as the Phoenix Prophetess.

Sea serpents and gods endanger the young prophetess’s journey and sour the omens. Yssa is cursed instead of blessed, and her duties at the Temple of Apenth prove it. She spends her days reading dusty scrolls, which does nothing to help her forget Tym, the boy back home. But the annoying yet gorgeous ferryman’s son Liam proves to be a distraction she can’t predict, even though he rarely leaves her alone for two sand grains.

Her boring temple life screeches to a halt when visions of her parents’ murders consume her. Yssa races across an ocean to stop the future. If she can’t change Fate, she’ll refuse to be the Phoenix Prophetess any longer. Fate, however, has other plans for her and the kingdom.

Yssa must either accept her destiny or fight to change Fate.

Unfinished Print Cover Art

And here is the prologue of Reborn:

The Island of Mournia
23 Day of Inasham
Year 2500 AUC

The infant lay limp upon the table, a thin cloth separating her from the wood. Her dark hair was matted down, and a smudge of birthing fluids tainted her pale flesh. The midwife had rushed to wipe off the baby after birth and deposited her in the nursery away from the child’s parents. Apenth, the God of Prophecy, Wisdom, and whatever else mortals had labeled him with this day and age, believed the little girl was perfect, except for one tiny thing.

She was dead.

Apenth had waited five hundred years for this child’s birth. Breath flowed from his nostrils and rustled her hair. Wails from the other room clamored for her death not to be so. He straightened at their pain. The small crib sat discarded in a corner. A doll, sewn by an expecting mother’s steady hand, peered at Apenth with its coal-black eyes. Her parents didn’t know a god was here, watching, waiting for an opportunity to save their child. His hand hovered over the baby’s heart.

One touch would change everything.

“Stop, my son.” A wrinkled and liver-spotted hand seized his wrist.

He cursed his lack of a premonition. Shouldn’t he have known Postera, the Goddess of Future and Foresight, would try to stop him? He was the God of Prophecy, after all! Her bony fingers gripped tighter with a strength he didn’t know she possessed. With a sigh, he focused upon her clear blue eyes, so like his own.

“Mother, she’s the one. I have to continue Amora’s prophecy.” He gently pried her aged fingers from his wrist.

“You cannot go against Fate again. The gods are displeased.” Clothed in the threads of life, she ran her fingers along the thrumming red yarn—each strand symbolized one life and weaved together to create her dress. All threads emerged from a ruby gemstone belted over her navel. The closer to death a person was, the more the yarn would change color from bright to dark red. She reached into that dress and thrust the severed darkening strand of this baby’s lifeline toward him. “Fate has forfeited her life, and her soul shall reside in Hupogaia’s realm.”

His heart sank. The detached thread swayed back and forth from her fingers. Was it too late to revive the child? His body curled closer to the infant. Her life was slipping through his fingers with each passing grain of sand in an hourglass.

This girl had to be the sixth prophetess.

He jerked away from his mother. His eyes flicked between the blackened thread and the baby. If he didn’t save the child, who would stop Fate? His Phoenix Prophetesses were more than normal seers. They had the power to take his prophecies and change what was to come by foreseeing the future, peering into the past, and dreaming of the present. Her future was fading into the dark depths of the Underworld. She couldn’t be one of Hupogaia’s eternal children. He owed it to his deceased love, Amora, and the kingdom she had created and ruled. “You know what will happen if I don’t save her.”

“I know what may come. Who taught you the art of prophecy? I did.” Postera exhaled through her nose and pulled at her hair. “You cannot keep meddling. Do you not see my wrinkles, my white hair? Kisa will curse you like she has me. Have you forgotten how Hupogaia protested against you last time in front of the High Council? They blinded your prophetess and said grave consequences will come if you save another one.”

He couldn’t forget the council’s words or how they’d cursed his fifth Phoenix Prophetess. But visions of the Kingdom of Amora in flames flashed through his mind. He could taste the ashes, like burnt bread, and hear her people’s screams. The prophecy of the kingdom’s destruction leaked sour bile into his mouth. The other gods, including Kisa, the Queen of the Gods, might be willing to turn their backs on their loyal people for Fate, but he wasn’t.

There was also the infant in front of him. She reminded him of his daughter. His mortal family resided in the Underworld, but he wouldn’t let this child.

“I have to save her.”

“Think of the consequences, my son.” She seized his robes.

He had. They both knew the gods would find a way to curse him and this innocent child, but the price was worth saving the kingdom.

Ignoring his mother’s protests, Apenth leaned over the lifeless baby again. His lips pressed against her ashen forehead, so cold to the touch. Postera clawed at his arms, but he shoved away her hands. Nothing would stop him from completing Amora’s prophecy, protecting the kingdom named after his love.

“You are mine, little one.” His palm pressed over the infant’s heart. Electric heat flowed from his glowing fingertips and nearly burned his flesh, but he kept his hand steady. The white light expanded and exploded within the room.

“Live.” He commanded, pleaded.

“No!” Postera screamed. The child’s life-thread ripped from his mother’s hand and joined the pulsing jewel on her belt. The piece sizzled, reattaching to the gemstone, and transformed to blood red.

The life-giving luminosity collapsed into the child, her flesh glowing for a moment. A tiny strawberry-colored birthmark in the shape of a phoenix blossomed upon the flesh over her heart. The baby’s lungs filled with air, and a cry broke from her lips.

The Phoenix Prophetess was reborn.

Click here to read Chapter One.