Daughter of the Scepter (Children of Destiny #1)

Chapter 1

Ten Years Earlier

From Lenore Chapman’s Last Catalogued Memory

As I sewed the skin of my future grandson-in-law back together, I lamented that these would be the last minutes I’d have with my best friend—the only true friend I’d ever known.

Moderators would burst through the door of my home soon to arrest me for my association with terrorists and my role in my daughter’s conspiracy against the President.

My needle sliced through the boy’s skin, threading its way across his throat and repairing the damage he’d inflicted to ensure I lived long enough to see Eliana one last time before her father could sell her off to the highest bidder—and to find the necklace I’d kept hidden in the room only this broken boy and I knew existed.

“Promise me,” I whispered so the walls wouldn't alert the Administration any sooner of my whereabouts, “That no matter what, you will always choose her.”

He groaned, the sound I’d only heard a couple times from him in the fifty-odd years that we’d been inseparable coming out gargled as he drowned in his own blood.

“You must choose her,” I begged and snapped the thread. My weathered, wrinkled hands cupped his face. “Promise!”

“Always…”