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Free for the first 100 readers

The Veyl Between

Every human has a Veyl.
Almost nobody can see them.

Mara Vale can see everyone’s — except her own.

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Book One of the Blackthorn Trilogy · Free copy for the first 100 readers

Monday Morning

The creature on the pantry shelf

Thirteen-year-old Mara Vale has always noticed what people hide.

Then one Monday morning she sees a grey, gold-eyed creature sitting on the pantry shelf behind her mother — and watches her mother’s sleeve pass straight through its wing.

By lunchtime she has counted a dozen more. An exhausted fox trailing a kind stranger. A hulking shape ashamed of the man it follows. A frightened deer pressed behind the school bully.

Then a black envelope appears in her locker.

Not On Any Map

Blackthorn Academy

A coach with no driver carries her there, past signposts that change their minds.

Corridors that grow longer when you count them

The school doesn't stay the same shape twice. Nobody has explained why. Nobody seems worried about it either.

Lessons in Applied Consequence

And Introductory Hesitation. Subjects the rest of the world stopped teaching centuries ago.

Students who each walk beside a Veyl

A second soul that has witnessed every choice they have ever made. Every one. Without exception.

Every student — except Mara

The whole school stares at the empty air beside her. The headmistress has no procedure for her.

“And deep beneath the oldest stones, something called the Hollow is stirring.”

The Antagonist

It doesn’t hunt people.

It hunts the bond.

The Hollow hunts the bond between a person and their Veyl — and its weapon isn’t fear.

Its weapon is an offer

“Put it all down.”

Every mistake.

Every regret.

Every grief.

Never carry any of it again.

Because what sounds like mercy is the most dangerous thing in Blackthorn.

Who She Meets There

The Blackthorn Six

Mara doesn’t face the Hollow alone. She faces it with the strangest group of friends a school has ever accidentally assembled.

Elias

A laminated plan for every disaster

Including the disasters that haven't happened yet. Especially those.

Dorian

The boy everyone fears

Whose Veyl apologises to furniture. It has a lot to be sorry about. Or so it thinks.

Celia

Always knows more than she says

Which is saying something, because she says quite a lot already.

Thomas Bell

The boy who lost his shadow

Not misplaced. Not stolen. Lost — and he would very much like to know where it went.

Mara Vale

The girl with no Veyl

Sees everyone else's. Cannot find her own. The whole school is watching the empty air beside her.

The Hollow

Not a friend. Not exactly an enemy

It just wants to take the weight off your shoulders. All of it. Forever.

Together they must uncover what Blackthorn has spent four hundred years hiding — about the Veyls, about the Hollow, and about her.

If You Loved These

You’ll want to read this

A funny, eerie, big-hearted fantasy for readers aged 10 to 14 — and the adults who borrow their books.

Magical boarding schoolsHidden roomsBuried secretsFound familyBritish humourUnforgettable twists

Magical boarding schools full of hidden rooms and buried secrets
Creature companions with real personalities (and strong opinions)
Found-family friendships and warm, witty British humour
Spooky mysteries that build to an unforgettable twist
Stories about choices, kindness and owning your mistakes

Months In The Making

This one took a while. On purpose.

Thirteen months of drafting, redrafting, cutting whole chapters, putting them back, cutting them again. Of working out exactly what a Veyl is, why the Hollow wants it, and what Mara has to lose.

A world like Blackthorn doesn’t get built in a weekend. The corridors that grow longer when you count them had to be counted. The rules of the Veyls had to hold up across four hundred years of school history. And the twist had to land on the first read and the second.

It’s finished. And the first readers are getting it free.

Book in the trilogy

10–14

Reader age range

400

Years of Blackthorn secrets

Limited — Free Copy For The First 100 Readers

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