Read the First Chapter of Kamilah Cole’s Jamaican-Inspired Fantasy Debut So Let Them Burn

Chosen One stories tend to follow a very familiar formula. A protagonist is framed as the inevitable hero of a story due to their lineage, unique or often magical gifts, or the simple whims of destiny. Whether they’re meant to fight the forces of darkness, save their people from oppression, or pull a magical sword from a stone, their story most often ends with the conclusion of their quest. But stories set after a Chosen One has completed their destiny are few and far between—which is part of the reason that author Kamilah Cole’s debut So Let Them Burn is so intriguing. 

A story of a Chosen One whose adventures aren’t over when their initially prophesied duties conclude, So Let Them Burn follows the story of Faron, a young girl who can channel the power of the gods, and who used her magic to liberate her island from its enemies. So far, so familiar, right? But when Faron’s older sister bonds with an enemy, the very gods that singled her out five years earlier now insist that she must kill Elara in order to protect her people. Can a Chosen One ever choose a different path?

Here’s how the publisher describes the story. 

Faron Vincent can channel the power of the gods. Five years ago, she used her divine magic to liberate her island from its enemies, the dragon-riding Langley Empire. But now, at seventeen, Faron is all powered up with no wars to fight. She’s a legend to her people and a nuisance to her neighbors

When she’s forced to attend an international peace summit, Faron expects that she will perform tricks like a trained pet and then go home. She doesn’t expect her older sister, Elara, forming an unprecedented bond with an enemy dragon—or the gods claiming the only way to break that bond is to kill her sister.

As Faron’s desperation to find another solution takes her down a dark path, and Elara discovers the shocking secrets at the heart of the Langley Empire, both must make difficult choices that will shape each other’s lives, as well as the fate of their world.

So Let Them Burn just hit shelves this week, but if you’re looking for a reason to give this new fantasy debut a try, we’ve got the whole first chapter for you—as a little sneak peek at its story.

Chapter One

FARON

Faron Vincent had been a liar for longer than she’d been a saint. 

She’d learned from a young age that lies were a form of currency. They could buy freedom and earn forgiveness. They could alter reality faster than any kind of magic. A lie well told was itself magical, and Faron was nothing if not convincing.

She’d told three lies since this morning, and they’d each felt like a spell. She’d told her teacher that she’d try harder to bring up her grades before the end of the year. She’d promised her sister that she would go straight home after classes were over. And she’d sworn that she wouldn’t use summoning to beat Jordan Simmons in this race.

Was it her fault they always believed her?

To be fair, Faron didn’t always know she was lying in the moment. She’d intended to keep at least two of those promises— maybe all three, if she felt like acting particularly respectable. Then someone had spread around the schoolyard that she would be missing class to attend the Summit, and trouble had found her in the form of Jordan Simmons.

While the adults across the island of San Irie considered Faron a holy child, the same could not be said of her schoolmates. Jor- dan had approached her outside the gates, where she’d been stand- ing in line to buy bag juice. The weather was the kind of hot that made her sorry to even be alive, and rolling up the sleeves of her shirtwaist had offered no relief. Faron had been watching the frost clouds curling from the vendor’s open cart with such longing that she hadn’t noticed Jordan until he was inches away from her.

“Missing school again, Vincent?” he’d sneered, flanked by two other fifth-form boys. Their horselike snickers had been a discordant note in her otherwise harmonious day. To anyone else, this might have signaled danger ahead. Faron, on the other hand, had only been bored. “Being the Empyrean is quite the con, isn’t it?”

“If it were a good con,” Faron had said without turning around, “then I wouldn’t still be smelling the dung that comes out of your mouth.” 

She hadn’t bothered to mention the reality of war or the lingering nightmares or the heavy expectations that came with being the Childe Empyrean. Five years ago, when the gods had first given her that title and the unique ability to summon their infinite magic, she had only been thinking of protecting San Irie. She hadn’t realized what she was signing up for—or what she was signing away.

But even if she’d wanted to get into all of that with anyone, Jordan and his gang would have only used it against her. No one wanted to hear that being chosen by the gods to save the world was a curse rather than a blessing. She was a symbol, and symbols didn’t complain.

Instead, Faron had traded a handful of silver coins for a pieapple bag juice. While biting a hole in the corner of the bag to drink from, she’d eyed Jordan’s calculating expression. He was the kind of bully who was too strategic to lose his temper. He thought about the best way to hobble his victims and then he struck to kill. So it had come as no surprise when he’d tried to hit her where it hurt: her pride.

“If you’re so brilliant, then race me after school,” he’d said. “No gods and no magic. The war is over. It’s time to prove you’re no better than any of us.”

And Faron had never met trouble that she didn’t want to get into. She’d extended her free hand with a smirk. “Thirty rayes if I win?”

“It’s a deal.”

With a handshake, Jordan Simmons had sealed his fate. Or so she’d thought then.

Now they were halfway through the agreed-upon track, surrounded by a screaming crowd of neighborhood kids, and Faron was losing.

Loose braids slapped her back and neck where they’d escaped from her head wrap. Palm trees waved in the wind. Her skirts were tied around her waist, allowing her nimble feet to dance over tan dirt and smooth stones. But here she was losing the footrace that would end at the fossilized dragon egg in the town square.

On this stretch of road, there were no shortcuts to take or obstacles to throw in her opponent’s way. There was only a straight sprint to the egg and too much space between her and the boy in first place. Deal or no deal, that was unacceptable.

Faron held what little breath was still in her lungs and called on the gods.

Time slowed to a crawl, a second stretching into an eternity. The world took on a liquid haze, as if she’d plunged into the crystal-clear Ember Sea that surrounded the island. Her soul swelled into a beacon that screamed come to me, come to me, come to me. . . .

And, like always, it was the gods who answered her call.

Irie appeared in a flash of light, her golden crown piercing the sky like a blade. She wore a hoodless robe, wide-sleeved and embroidered with gold thread, over a white high-necked dress that fell to her calves. Her full gold-painted lips twisted into a frown. Even with her pupilless eyes shining amber, the sun goddess Irie, ruler of the daytime and patron goddess of the island, looked as if she should be going to see a play in Port Sol, not making house calls to a seventeen-year-old in the landlocked Iryan town of Deadegg.

But that was her problem. Faron had called. Irie had answered.

Five years, and that hadn’t changed.

Lend me your strength.

Faron gasped as she felt Irie’s power flood her body. At first, it was almost too much. Summoners trained for years to hold the magic of just one of their ancestral spirits, known as astrals, without dying. Even the most advanced santi—summoners who had dedicated their lives to the temples—didn’t dare channel more than five astrals at a time. But there wasn’t a single summoner on the island of San Irie who could call upon a god.

Except for her.

Faron felt as if she were on fire for a second, a minute, an hour, a lifetime. Her nerves crawled as if she were being shaken from the inside out, as if Irie were shoving against Faron’s ill-fitting skin in an attempt to make room for more magic than her body could hold. Her vision whited out. Her ears rang. Her heart pounded so fast that she thought it would stop.

Then it was over. Irie was within her, but Faron was in control. And she had a race to win.

A bead of sweat rolled down Faron’s cheek as she blinked into the present. The riotous jeers of the crowd flowed back in. The dragon egg peeked out from over the top of the corner store in the distance. Jordan was still in front of her.

But not for long.

Faron called on the divine magic now at her fingertips and willed it to push her body beyond its limits. In the five years she’d spent with the gods, she’d found more creative uses for Irie’s powers than roasting breadfruit. The sun was fire, energy, power. She directed that power into her lagging muscles and wheezing lungs, feeling Irie’s magic leak past the goddess’s obvious disapproval.

One minute, Faron was trying not to faint before she crossed the finish line. The next, she was eating up the distance between her and Jordan until she was close enough to count his locs.

He frowned at her. “Hey, Vincent! That’s not fair!”

“Take it up with my patron,” she sang back. “You can find a statue of her in any temple!”

Jordan cursed so colorfully that Faron laughed as she skipped past, leaving him to choke on the cloud of dust her feet kicked up. The town square yawned open before her, surrounded by squat wooden storefronts too low to block out the sun. Her hand slapped the short brick wall that surrounded the egg a moment later. Technically, this was where the race ended, but adrenaline pulsed through her, twining with her borrowed magic. She jumped the wall and kept running until she hit the egg, then reached up to grab one of the massive scales that made up its sickly gray shell. The wall had been built to keep people from doing exactly what Faron was doing right now, but she wasn’t the first Deadegg teenager to make this climb and she wouldn’t be the last. The egg predated the town, probably predated the island based on the petrified stone that coated the scales, and Faron had come to find it comforting.

Sure, dragons hatched from living eggs this size—eggs of gorgeous color hiding terrifying young monsters within—but this one was a monument. It was part of her home. More than that, it was proof that dragons couldn’t just be born and cruel and dangerous; they could be killed and defeated and forgotten.

Faron had survived the decades-long war against the Langlish Empire, a world power to the east of San Irie that used dragons as fire-breathing weapons to conquer land that was never theirs to own. By now, she knew the monsters’ weaknesses better than almost anyone. But it was nice to have more than memories. More than nightmares.

She perched on top of the egg, her skirts spilling back down to her ankles, and grinned as she waited for Jordan to catch up. The constant scent of brimstone wafted from the base, but Faron ignored it. Magic still hummed under her skin, waiting for further direction, and she didn’t want to let it go yet. She wasn’t ready for the crushing emptiness and dizzying exhaustion that would follow.

This is a poor use of my abilities, Empyrean, a smoky voice grumbled at the back of her mind. Must you always be so childish?

Of the three gods, Irie was always the one most devoted to making Faron feel like a toddler. Obie, the god of the moon and the lord of the night, spoke so rarely that Faron could ignore his disapproval most of the time. Mala, the goddess of the stars and the keeper of the astrals, was the most likely to encourage Faron’s stupidity. But Irie took her role as the supreme goddess very seriously—so seriously that Faron often wondered if she regretted giving their power to Faron in the first place.

Even though it had been five years since Faron had completed her calling as the Childe Empyrean and freed the island from Langlish occupation.

Even though the gods were the ones who had decided, for some reason, to stick around after the empire’s retreat.

Even though she deserved to live her own life now. A peaceful life. With or without Irie’s approval.

Empyrean, Irie snapped when she didn’t answer. Ignoring me does not undo your immaturity.

I’m seventeen, she reminded the goddess. And my name is Faron.

You are the Childe Empyrean. These insipid stunts cannot change the truth.

Faron forced herself not to respond. There was nothing she could say that wouldn’t sound ridiculous anyway. The war was over, Langley’s colonial hold on San Irie shattered and their remaining dragons subdued, but the iconography of the Childe Empyrean was still spread across the island. Santi commanded respect and reverence for devoting their lives to gods that may or may not answer their prayers, but Faron was a thing of legend. A living saint. Tangible proof that the Iryan gods not only existed . . . but they were listening.

If she entered the corner store that Jordan was currently jogging past, she would see her own face, five years younger, smiling in miniature from hand-carved statues. Every year, people across the island made pilgrimages to her house, hoping to catch a glimpse of her, begging her to intercede between them and the gods. Blaming her if their wishes didn’t come true.

Even still, she didn’t hold that against them. The war with the Langlish had taken something from everyone, including those who hadn’t fought. Faron understood better than anyone how bleak helplessness could lead people to ask someone more powerful for help. She just wished she could tell those hopeful crowds that they wouldn’t necessarily like the answer they’d be given.

“Cheater,” Jordan complained as he approached, pulling her from her dark thoughts. “I didn’t use any summoning to win the race.”

“That’s hardly my concern.” Faron lifted her eyebrows in a picture of innocence. “And you didn’t win the race.”

“We said no powers.”

“You said no powers. I don’t remember agreeing with you.” Jordan scowled. “You always do this.”

“And yet you always make bets with me.”

“I can start ignoring you outright if you prefer. It would certainly make my life easier.

Faron waved away the comment with a lazy hand. It didn’t matter how many times she lied or cheated. The people’s memories for her heroic actions during the war were long, but those same memories were short when it came to any of her less-than-heroic actions since. Even Jordan was repeating the same things he’d said during their last footrace, and it hadn’t stopped him from challenging her to this one. At this point, there didn’t seem to be anything that Faron could do that would have real consequences.

Or maybe the problem was that she already lived those consequences. Enemies and admirers were the closest that Faron had gotten to having friends since she’d come home alive but haunted, reeking of smoke and ash. She spoke to the gods more than she spoke to people her own age. She had her sister, Elara, but Elara also had Reeve and her sixth-form friends. Faron hated school enough that she already knew she would fail the exam for sixth form, if she didn’t fail this year entirely, and school was the only chance she had to mix with her peers.

Maybe that was the real price she paid for being the patron saint of lies. There was no Faron Vincent. Only the Childe Empyrean.

“Give me my rayes and take the lesson,” said Faron, forcing those thoughts away, too. “If you keep trying to use your track talent against me, expect me to use my powers against you.”

Jordan’s scowl deepened, but he dug through the pockets of his khaki trousers for the money. Faron shifted on the uncomfortable rounded tip of the egg as she waited, surveying the sprawling view she had of the town. Behind the businesses were rows of houses with thatched roofs, yards separated from one another by fences or cacti. Chicken coops pockmarked the grounds, and goats grazed in the open fields. She couldn’t see her own house from here, but she knew which direction it was in; if she squinted, she might be able to spot the splashes of forest greens and cypress browns that made up her father’s garden.

There was none of that right now, though. In fact, the farther she looked, the more the edges of Deadegg seemed to be smudged by fog.

Fog that seemed to be moving.

Within the cloudy puffs, she could see a shape—no, shapes. Shapes that were dark and large and worryingly familiar. Horses.

And not just horses, but an entire horse-drawn coach. It was an unusual sight, both because mules and donkeys were more common in rural Deadegg and because she didn’t know anyone in town who could afford a coach of any kind. The longer she stared, the more she was able to make out the ocean blue of the carriage, the grass green of the drawn curtains, the golden detailing catching the sunlight. Her heart stopped, and in that long, silent space between beats, she noticed a flag in all three colors waving from the rooftop. The Iryan flag was the last confirmation she needed.

For the first time all day, Faron felt true fear. 

The queen was here.

 So Let Them Burn is available now wherever books are sold. 

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Lacy Baugher Milas is the Books Editor at Paste Magazine, but loves nerding out about all sorts of pop culture. You can find her on Twitter @LacyMB