Excerpts gothic fantasy Read an Excerpt From A Dark and Wild Wood by Sarah Nicole Lemon A lush and atmospheric story of a maiden with dark magic who becomes the apprentice to Lord Death—for a price. By Sarah Nicole Lemon | Published on April 21, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from A Dark and Wild Wood by Sarah Nicole Lemon, a debut dark fantasy publishing with Harper Voyager on May 26th. Ever since she was a child, Salomé has been plagued by visions of spirits and dangerous powers she can’t control. After watching her foster mother burn as a witch, she and her beloved sister Rochelle are raised together in a convent, a grim and dreary existence. Until one day, Rochelle vanishes.Determined to find a way to save her, Salomé runs: first to a brothel, and then, after a terrible accident, away from the village and into the woods. Deep amongst the trees of the wild Black Forest, she comes face-to-face with Lord Death.Rather than taking her life, he brings her to his home at the heart of the woods, a strange manor full of locked rooms and mysterious corridors, crumbling one moment, magnificent the next. He promises to make her his apprentice and teach her how to harness her mind and magic. His words are as seductive as his presence—but should one trust Death? Drawn to the Edge Another girl is gone,” Dacia said. “I heard from one of the washing women.” “Another?” I asked, then yawned. I stood bleary-eyed and clutching my too-thin wrap against the icy wind, on the premise of scrounging up some eggs for Cook. The rest of the girls were inside, clinging to the last few moments of sleep before Josef would order them up. Privacy was hard to come by in a brothel, but in these late morning hours when all the previous night’s patrons had left and that night’s patrons had yet to arrive, there were a few precious moments when I could pretend we were just two village wives, our cheeks and noses reddened from the wind and our eyes weary from babies or husbands keeping us up at night. I drifted off, staring at Dacia’s golden curls as she ducked to look behind a barrel for some hidden nest. She straightened and caught me staring. But I did not blush. I never blushed. “You’re supposed to be looking for eggs,” Dacia scolded. “I’m too cold,” I said. But I turned my attention to the nooks and crannies of the yard where the chickens liked to lay. It had been an early and long winter, following a meager harvest. The first girl went missing in the October freeze, before Allhallowtide. At first, there were the usual tales of wolves and running off, but then another disappeared, and then another and another and another. A few had been daughters or wives of good standing in the village, good girls, and so the tales had shifted. The current favorite was that of Death, a tall lord, all in black, who rode a black stallion with smoke at its hooves, and lured girls from their beds to carry off to his château deep in the forest. Sometimes as slaves. Sometimes as queens. The village opinion of the girl in question determined the difference in her fate. I picked a corner of the yard where Dacia could not see, and thinking only of having an egg deposited into my hand, reached. My fingers slid across the warm shell of the egg, buried in the straw. “Here,” I said, offering her the pretty blue pullet. “Who was it?” Her smile was generous and just a little sly, there at the corner, which always made my heart race. She took the egg and tucked it away under her wrap. “I don’t know how you find them so easily.” “A gift,” I said with a bitter little laugh and quickly changed the subject. “She probably ran away. Hoping to find patrons other than the Baron’s men,” I said to reassure her. It had only been last summer when our long absent Baron arrived from King Frederick II’s court in Palermo to take up residence in his valley maison. At first, we were excited for the flush of new men and good business. But soon after his arrival it became clear that the Baron was present only to send out a large retinue of guards to gather tributes, taking back in taxes nearly everything we earned from his soldiers. I’d heard—not from his soldiers, but from other women at the well—that he’d been exiled from the Holy Roman Court on account of some financial misdeeds. Buy the Book A Dark and Wild Wood Sarah Nicole Lemon Buy Book A Dark and Wild Wood Sarah Nicole Lemon Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget “You don’t think it’s Lord Death?” Dacia’s question was said in jest, but it did not distract me from hearing the undercurrent of fear that swirled in her voice. We all asked the reasonable questions: If they had run away, why had none ever sent word? If they had died, why had no one found their bodies? I remembered the black-eyed gaze of the burning man, looking at me from inside the forest, and a chill crept down my spine. That was the kind of creature in the forest—not some romantic hero that whisked beautiful girls away to make them queens. And too, I remembered the thin figure that had come for Valerie as she burned. That was no Lord or even man. But saying any of this would make Dacia think I’d lost my mind. “Or they ran away to the Bandits of Molsheim,” I offered instead, with a waggle of my eyebrows. The bandits, supposedly led by a pair of much-sighed-about green eyes, had started tormenting the new Baron. Dacia laughed and shook her head at me. “Be sensible,” I said. “If you were Lord Death, you would not keep a home in the middle of a nowhere such as this.” “If it was Lord Death, I might rather he take me,” she said, and I could tell I’d set her at ease. But then she looked toward the forest and called. “Lord Death!” A raw bite of wind snuck along my neck, and the moment she called out, it gusted and sent chills up my arms. It seemed the whole world fell silent, as if a speaker had overheard his name and abruptly stopped so he might eavesdrop. “Stop,” I hissed, panicked. Her face fell. Eyes wide. “Salomé, I was only joking.” “I know, but…” I half turned, glancing behind me at the mountain ridge looming just past the village. The dark gray trees clattered like bones in the wind. A terrible burning leapt into my throat, as if I were still out there, in the field, screaming for my sister to be returned to me. “You don’t know what you might call. I can’t…” But my words stayed clumped together in my throat. I was now twenty-four, and five years had passed since I’d lost Rochelle, but my childlike terror and the memory of the monster who took her remained clear and vivid in my mind. I had never heard a story since that described such a creature or explained what it might have been. My stomach trembled and I grabbed Dacia’s hand in the middle of crossing herself. “Let’s go. It’s cold.” We rushed inside and I slid the bolt tight behind us. Leaning against the door, I waited for my heart to slow. Dacia didn’t notice, carefully carrying the eggs to Cook. I had nothing to fear, I reassured myself, for there was nothing left to take and nowhere lower for me to go. Excerpted from A Dark and Wild Wood, copyright © 2026 by Sarah Nicole Lemon. 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