Teaser for Chapter 5 of Meena Mason's The Thief's Tale. Read by the author.

Kessa Decora is no stranger to letting her feelings show; unless those feelings happened to be her deepest and most secret feelings. Feelings so secret even she is unaware she has them. Feelings that could toss her into a moat of insecurity, swirl her in a whirlpool of doubt, and leave her for the pragmatism piranhas to devour. The stars have aligned subjugating Kessa to one of her toughest challenges yet – coming to terms with her feelings. And, great Athalos, founder of Acara, even sharing them!

Chapter 6 of the audiobook version of Meena Mason's, The Thief's Tale.

Chapter 6 Excerpt:

Dripping with sweat, face beet-red, breathing rapid, Kessa, hands on her hips, walked around the moat resisting the temptation to jump in. The lengthy run had helped calm her nerves, but physically, she felt hot, sticky, and she smelt like her sweat had been competing for a best stench award. Glancing at the moat again, she rationalized that a quick dip wouldn’t do her any harm. True, she didn’t know what, if anything, lurked beneath the surface, or how deep the water was, but if she was quick nothing would notice. Done with hesitation, she jumped in, clothes and all.

Who struck Kessa Decora over the head? When consciousness finally returns, what new predicament will the fugitive find herself in this time? And will it widen the rift forming between her and Aquestria?

Chapter 5 of the audiobook version of Meena Mason's, The Thief's Tale.

Chapter 5 Excerpt:

The merry chirping of birds, usually a cheerful sound to regain consciousness to, ravaged Kessa’s ears and split her aching head into fragments. Her eyes became painfully aware of sunlight beyond their lids. Vocally, Kessa wished for someone to hit her over the head again just to stop the pain.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I had a sneaking suspicion you might try to run off and asked Rake to prevent that from happening. I didn’t realize he’d take me so literally.”

Immediate recognition of the voice relaxed Kessa’s fears but did nothing to ease her discomfort (to the contrary, knowing who was in the room with her only increased it). If Kessa could’ve rolled her eyes she would’ve, but instead she had to content herself with merely squinting at her captor.

“Your Rake is aptly named,” she grated.

He smiled impishly. “Good to see your sense of humour hasn’t been affected by your headache.”

“I’m surprised it wasn’t knocked out of me.”