Pitch Wars ALT: LL-14 A BREATH OF SILVER

MENTOR: Tina Moss
ALTERNATE: Cheyenne Campbell
TITLE: A Breath of Silver
CATEGORY/GENRE: YA/NA Fantasy (time-travel)
WORD COUNT: 100,000


PITCH:

In 2165, when historian Bryn MacBride uncovers a conspiracy regarding her idyllic town’s dark past, she seeks help through the forgotten London Underground. Outside Cimmeria for the first time, she emerges in 1692. In the Scottish Highlands, her ancestors wield ley lines, and a link between the Glencoe Massacre and Cimmeria’s origins. To return with help, Bryn must untangle her history — and relinquish her newfound freedom.       

EXCERPT:

I never entered the Ruins for anything other than research, but that day, I made an exception. As Sod’s law would have it, this turned into a complete cockup. My boots pounded the gravel as I darted through the fence separating town’s cottage rows and sculpture-dotted promenades from the acrid haze. Weekly research expeditions built my tolerance to the Ruins’ psychological residue and resultant disorientation, but Tessah and Hyde had no such tolerance. Racing across the melted landscape, I swore for the fifth time in as many minutes. If anything happened to them, I’d never forgive myself.

Tessah was practically my kid sister, and I’d planned on distracting her with our recent discovery – the second-largest pre-Meltdown structure on record. Hyde brought packed lunches, and if Tessah’s father hadn’t been cremated hours earlier, it might’ve been a rip-roaring afternoon. But the damn kids snuck ahead, and now I envisioned them swallowed by treacherous mists like other Cimmerians down the years. Like my own father.

I negotiated Sector Four, where last week I’d unearthed a rare specimen: a 20^th-century jar, intact. Thrilled at the time, now I could only consider its uncanny resemblance to the vase holding Tessah’s father in particle form atop his wife’s mantelpiece. Pressing onward, I swore again, vehemently deciding on two fundamental absolutes in life. One: I would never voluntarily fit into a vase; and two: marriage was complete and utter bollocks.