Moth Dark

From the bestselling author of Sascia has always loved the Dark. Six years ago, when the world she knew collided with the Dark, she found it thrilling rather than terrifying. Now, she spends her days studying Darkcreatures or seeking them out in the shadows where they thrive. Then, one day, she--impossibly--pulls a person from the Dark. A person who shouldn’t exist. And they’re here to kill her: Nugau, the heir to the Darkworld, claims to be delivering a sentence for Sascia’s betrayal in a battle she’s never heard of, in a war that hasn’t happened. Sascia escapes with her life--barely. But tensions are brewing between her world and the Dark, and it’s not long before she discovers that she and Nugau are bound together by forces they don’t understand. As they grow closer, crossing worlds and timelines, they realize that they must choose between ensuring the safety of their own kinds and fighting for peace the hard way--and in doing so, fighting for each other.

Autorentext
Kika Hatzopoulou is the bestselling author of Threads That Bind and its sequel, Hearts That Cut. She is a native Greek and current Londoner and holds an MFA in writing for children from the New School. In her free time, she enjoys urban quests and gastronomical adventures while narrating entire book and movie plots with her partner. Find Kika on Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok @kikahatzopoulou and on her website kikahatzopoulou.com.

Klappentext

*From the bestselling author of Threads That Bind* comes a timeline-crossing romantic fantasy about a girl in love with a world of darkness—and with the mysterious heir to its throne—who must fight to prevent the destruction of all she loves.

“A lush, breathtaking, and wholly unique fantasy. I was entranced.” —Ava Reid, #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Study in Drowning
This gorgeous edition features charcoal gray hued edges for a shadowy, ominous look.**

Sascia has always loved the Dark. Six years ago, when the world she knew collided with the world of the Dark, she found it thrilling rather than terrifying. Now, she spends her days studying Darkcreatures or seeking them out in the shadows where they thrive.

Then, one day, she—impossibly—pulls a person from the Dark. A person who shouldn’t exist. And they’re here to kill her. Nugau, the heir to the Darkworld, claims to be delivering a sentence for Sascia’s betrayal in a battle she’s never heard of, in a war that hasn’t happened.

Sascia escapes with her life—barely. But tensions are brewing between her world and the Dark, and it’s not long before she discovers that she and Nugau are bound together by forces they don’t understand. As they grow closer, crossing worlds and timelines, they must find a way to fight for peace—and for each other.

Leseprobe
The Maw opens up between West 18th and 24th Streets, smack in the middle of Manhattan, a giant collapse sinkhole nearly half a mile across, its black so absolute it devours whatever preconceptions you might have had about darkness in one bone-­snapping gnash. Nova-­lights hang in a concentric ring on the concrete barrier, like a giant chalk line in an old-­timey crime movie.

The body: the Maw.

The crime: existing.

On the observation deck at 21st Street, Sascia leans on the rail and watches today’s visitors. There are the overeager tourists, pressing against the reinforced glass, smiling at their phone cameras. There are the kids, dashing about in Darkbeast masks. There are the tour guides and security guards droning precautions. If you pay close attention, you’ll notice the gazes of this last group, the professionals, are carefully avoidant of what lies inside the barrier.

Sascia first noticed the feeling on her third day giving tours ofthe Maw six months ago. A sensation along her spine, a muted hiss in her ears. The instinct to just bolt. It was one of the security guards who put a name to it, after he noticed Sascia’s hunched shoulders. *Feels like something’s breathing down there, don’t it?

• A monster in the darkness, lurking in anticipation.

  But to Sascia, the Maw is far more than a crime to be feared. Get your life together, her dad had said after their massive blowout when it became evident Sascia was squandering her once-­in-­a-lifetime opportunity at an Ivy League education. Except Sascia’s life was the Dark, and that wasn’t socially acceptable, so she settled for the next best thing: running exclusive tours of the New York Darkworld to pay for her ridiculous remedial courses and ridiculous SAT retakes. The Maw is, in a way, her second chance.

  “Its scientific name is NY18 Sinkhole,” she says now to her latest client, launching into her familiar monologue, “but people call it the Maw, after that viral footage, you know, of the delivery guy on his scooter, racing away from the emerging Dark.”

  “Yeah,” her client says, and dutifully quotes, “Everything’s disappearing into it—­like it’s a damn maw.”

  Yvonne Coleman-­Zhao is from Chicago, a first-­year student at Juilliard, a violinist or cellist or something, and she’s never seen the Maw before. Her eyes are big and unblinking, her body tense; she refuses to step any closer than necessary. (Chicago might have the occasional runaway Darkbeast, but it does not have a Maw.)

  “The Pit of Shanghai is bigger, of course,” Sascia recites, “and xenoscientists—­scientists who study the Dark—­believe there are cracks in the deep ocean that dwarf the ones on land, but, yeah, the Maw of Manhattan is catalogued as the second-­largest host of Dark in the world. It is home to a number of monstrosities, as you can see.” She gestures at the talon marks on the concretebarrier surrounding the Maw. “As you surely know, there are no humanoids in the world where the Dark comes from, but there’s plenty of Darkcreatures, something akin to our own animals, and a few Darkbeasts, ranging in size from an elephant to Godzilla-­level giants. Fortunately, no Darkbeasts have managed to burst out of the Maw in five years, since the Blackout. If something big is crawling through the Dark, movement sensors at the lowest ring of the barrier automatically turn on lights fortified withnova energy to the highest brightness and release light ­bombs to send the beast scuttling back.”

  Sascia pauses, because this is the point where most of her clients need to pose the question. Right on cue, Yvonne asks, “Does that happen often?”

  “In New York? It happens three, four times a year.” Her breezy answer is well rehearsed; after almost half a year on the job, she knows to offer the sense of safety her clients are craving. “Tradition says if the skyline blazes white and you’re still alive when the lights switch off, you have to go get blackout drunk.”

  “Well, let’s hope my parents never hear about that. It was hard enough to convince them to let me move to a city with an active Darkhole.” The girl glances at the black-­and-­orange water bottle peeking out of the side pocket of Sascia’s backpack—­a gift from her father when they visited Columbia University last summer. “So you’re at Columbia?”

  Uh-­oh rings like an alarm in Sascia’s head. She doesn’t want to have the college conversation, least of all with a bright-eyed first-year student. They’re so full of dreams, opportunity ripe for the taking; dreams that Sascia should share, opportunity she should be taking advantage of. *I was recruited by the elite…