For Home and Hearth

Ella Holland wanted a simple life, but she would have settled for survival.

Life in the ravaged wilds of Appalachia is dangerous, and most folks don't live past fifty. Even if sickness or starvation doesn't get you, the rival clans, or shifty nomads, or the unbred monsters that roam the hills will. This is why a clan must stick together at all costs, nestled in whatever patch of peaceful land it has scratched out for itself. This is why strangers are not to be trusted. But when a wandering ...