“Who cares—we just gotta find her,” says a third voice, a younger boy.
I listen as they move through the trees, headed the other way. This is it then. Time to choose. I have no idea who they are or why I’m here. I could take Luke and head back toward civilization. It seems more sensible. My instincts are telling me to run, to hide, never to trust anyone again, but my eyes glance down at Luke and the choice is easy, really.
“I’m here,” I call out, moving from behind the tree.
There are three of them. They turn as one to face me. There’s golden light saturating the world. Within it they approach.
The girl is the oldest—she looks about eighteen. She has a shaved head and huge blue eyes. Through her nose is a silver bolt. To her right is a large boy with blond hair cut into a mohawk. He is covered in tattoos. Last is a smaller boy, wiry and no older than fifteen. He shares the look of his companions though—all three are grizzly and scarred and staring at me with a mixture of distaste and curiosity. They are also heavily armed with machine guns and dressed in camouflage clothing.
“Who the fuck are you?” the girl barks.
It takes me by surprise, and my lip curls without my permission. I am a flame of fury—I always have been. “Watch your mouth,” I tell her softly. “I’m not in the mood for lip from a group of kids.”
There is silence.
“Holy shit,” the youngest boy breathes. “She’s not a drone!”
“And I think I love her,” the blond boy announces.
The girl strides forward. “Do you even know why you’re here?”
I close my eyes, swaying on my feet. I’m too tired for this. I can’t work any of it out. “Who are you?” I demand.
The blond boy catches me under the arm. I’m so weak that I let him leave his hand there—without it I’ll probably eat the dirt.
The girl moves right up close to my face, and I realize her eyes are an amazing shade of bluish purple. “You’re uncured,” she tells me. “You knew the code. So we’re here to welcome you to the resistance. Forget everything you thought you knew about fury. In the West we’ll show you what it really means.”
About Charlotte McConaghy
Charlotte grew up with her nose in a book and her head in the clouds. At fourteen, her English teacher told her that the short story she’d submitted was wildly romantic, so she decided to write a novel. Thus began her foray into epic fantasy and dystopian sci-fi, with sweeping romances, heroic adventures, and as much juicy drama as she could possibly squeeze in.
Her first novel, Arrival, was published at age seventeen, and was followed by Descent, which launched The Strangers of Paragor series, an adventure fantasy for teenagers.
She then wrote her first adult fantasy novel, Avery, the prologue of which came to her in a very vivid dream. Her second adult novel, Fury, is the first in a romantic science-fiction series called The Cure, set in a dystopian future.
Charlotte currently lives in Sydney, having just finished a Masters in Screenwriting from the Australian Film, Television & Radio School. With her television pilot script, she won the Australian Writer’s Guild Award for Best Unproduced Screenplay of 2013. She will, however, always be a novelist at heart, still unable to get her nose out of the books.
First published by Momentum in 2014
This edition published in 2014 by Momentum
Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd
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Copyright © Charlotte McConaghy 2014
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.
A CIP record for this book is available at the National Library of Australia
Fury: Book One of The Cure (Omnibus Edition)
EPUB format: 9781760080822
Mobi format: 9781760080839
Print on Demand format: 9781760080921
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Edited by Deonie Fiford
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