He never wanted a wife. But marrying her is the only way to keep his little sister alive.
Five years after the world ended, David has one job: keep Grace alive.
Food is rationed. The water is contaminated. Marauders roam beyond the fences. And the Drange is turning ordinary people into violent, purple-veined monsters.
When a deadly infection breaches their refugee camp, the rumored Sanctuary may be her only chance of survival.
There’s just one problem: Passage is reserved for families.
So David makes an impossible choice: he marries his nemesis.
She doesn’t trust him. He doesn’t trust her. Their marriage is supposed to be nothing more than a means of survival.
But once they leave the fences of Camp Orange, surviving each other becomes the least of their problems.
Because the wasteland is hungry.
Beneath the Burning Sky is a post-apocalyptic dystopian novel blending survival horror, a deadly outbreak, infected humans, forced marriage, reluctant allies, and a slow-burn enemies-to-lovers romance.
EXCERPT:
So this is what the end of the world looks like.
The thought ran through David’s mind as he trudged along next to his father and sister, bumping shoulders with hundreds of other desperate survivors who had escaped the wrath of Yellowstone.
Just fourteen days ago.
His dad had driven them hundreds of miles before the gas stations ran out of fuel.
It hadn’t been far enough.
They’d been walking ever since.
They’d crossed into Kentucky two days ago, but it didn’t look any different than Wyoming. Any different than Missouri four days before that.
The fingers of devastation reached here as well. The volcanic eruption had come out of nowhere, shattering the land and blanketing everything in gray.
Ash rained down from the sky, a silent, relentless shroud that smothered everything in its suffocating grip. The smell of sulfur and smoke lingered in the air, a constant reminder of the chaos and destruction that had been unleashed upon the world.
David opened his bag and pulled out a granola bar. Three days ago the group had run into a military unit handing out bags of food, urging them to keep going.
“We’re setting up camps in the south,” they’d said. “We’ll have shelter, food, everything you need until we can get back on our feet.”
David counted the bars he had left. Five. That was it.
He dropped the bar back into his bag.
His feet dragged through the ash like freshly fallen snow, leaving deep imprints behind. The horizon was filled with ruins of buildings and broken trees, the sky a gloomy mix of gray and red as the sun attempted to peek through.
East. Go east. And then south. Get to Georgia, Alabama, Florida.
That’s what everyone around him said. Like somewhere magical and untouched by the eruption existed if they just went far enough.
His home, his entire life, had been taken from him in an instant.
His mom.
Don’t think about what you’ve lost.
Fabric stained with soot and sweat covered his mouth. He trudged on, his mind numb and his body achingly tired.
Author Bio:
Ruby Valladares writes adult speculative fiction filled with catastrophic disasters, impossible choices, complicated relationships, and ordinary people discovering just how far they’ll go to survive.
Her worlds are dark. Her characters are messier. And hope—when it comes—has to be fought for.
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