Blood Roses
Chapter One
Blood Roses
Every day, Lucy and Rosie searched for the blood roses in their canyon. They found eucalyptus and poison oak, evening primrose and oleander but never the glow-in-the-dark red, smoke-scented flowers with sharp thorns that traced poetry onto your flesh.
"You only see them if you die," Lucy said, but Rosie just smiled so that the small row of pearls in her mouth showed.
Still, the hairs stood up on both their forearms and napes that evening, turning them to furry faunesses for a moment as they sat watching the sunset from their secret grotto in the heart of the canyon. The air smelled of exhaust fumes and decaying leaves. The sky was streaked with smog and you could hear the sound of cars and one siren but that world felt very far away.
Here, the girls turned doll-size, wove nests out of twigs to sleep in the eucalyptus branches, collected morning dew in leaves and dined on dark purple berries that stained their mouths and hands.
"We'd better get home," Lucy said, brushing the dirt off her jeans.
They would have stayed her ... read full excerpt from Blood Roses ebook
