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Fairytales Slashed Fairytales never grow old, because there is never an end of new ways to tell them, new ways to see them. In this collection, see what happens when a wolf and a hunter try to stop an evil witch who’s stealing children, when a prince conspires with bandits, and a former thief seeks shelter in a lone tower. See a goblin try to save his brother, and a tutor watch over his perfect princess, while a shy prince braves a mountain in the name of love. See what happens when a runaway prince must be tracked down, when dark rumors surface a gloomy castle, and when a young man saves a little girl, and a lonely soldier hunts down a band of robbers. See a stable boy save his best friend, and a prince save his mother, while a humble gardener faces down a terrible beast and a poor young man befriends a troll. Watch what unfolds when a sad young man is bound to a toad, and a prince confronts an evil witch, and a quiet mage seeks to break a terrible curse. Author’s Note: This version has changed slightly from previous editions. Main Gauche has been removed (to be put somewhere else with its companion stories) and Wolf-given has been put in its place. All else remains the same. |
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Main Gauche and Other Tales Tales of brothers, swords, and the men they most desire… Main Gauche — Though he was born to nobility, the loss of first his father, and then his mother, has left Dagger a peasant. His stepfather is cruel and greedy, and refuses to claim Dagger as his own. Instead of living the life for which he was meant, Dagger spends his days as the apprentice to a blacksmith, and pining for the handsome lord who frequents the smithy. Then the king calls for a royal tournament for his son the crown prince The chance to be a duelist again, to see the lord he so admires but can never have, is more than Dagger can resist… 1000 Victories — Epee loathes the noble life; his heartless father, his overbearing brother, the hypocrites he must call peers. He wants the simpler, ordinary life of a peasant. It is a life he is slowly working toward, and soon to hold in his grasp, no matter the consequences. All that holds him back is Lord Sharp, the man he has long loved but never been able to win. But, he is very close to winning his thousandth victory over Lord Sharp in the dueling ring. With that 1000th victory, Epee hopes to win at last the man he loves more than even freedom… The Perfect Son — Sabre has always lived according to the wishes and desires of his father, to the exclusion of everyone and everything else. His father’s eldest son, he strives to be what his father wants. He is affluent, educated, a talented duelist, respected, and feared. He is everything he is supposed to be. Except happy. |
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Ink & Paper Enitan is a simple clerk in the stationary shop owned by his stepfather. He spends his days as an underpaid stock boy, forbidden to do anything else in the shop that he and his mother built. Then the beautiful Rem walks into the shop in search of ink, and flirts shamelessly with Enitan, inviting him to spend the Royal Carnivale with him, an elite event that someone like Enitan could only dream of attending. As the Carnivale carries on, and Enitan grows closer and closer to Rem, he finds himself wishing for things even more impossible than owning his own shop. |
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A Trilogy of Knights THE KNIGHT AND THE DRAGON Bran is tired of living a life of blood and violence. After decades of serving his king on the battlefield, he wants the peaceful, violence-free life he has earned. When the king refuses to grant him freedom, Bran volunteers to go slay a deadly dragon—with every intention of dying alongside it. THE KNIGHT AND THE STATUE Grey has always kept to himself, so solitary and strange he is named after the mist-filled valley where he was found as a child. But he longs for things he cannot have – like Dunstan, a beautiful, young mage far out of reach. Then he learns Dunstan’s family is being tormented by mercenaries, and Dunstan himself turned to stone—and Grey and his strange past are their only hope for rescue. THE KNIGHT AND THE PRINCE All Victor wants is to be taken seriously by his so-called peers, who constantly bully him for his fussy ways and his close relationship to the throne. Then he rescues a foreign prince being chased by assassins, and finds himself swept into a strange world that feels more like home than anywhere he’s ever been… |
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Always There Tales of knights bound by duty, honor, and each other… Always There—When the princess they are sworn to protect is kidnapped, two knights are separated in their efforts to save her, and in being part realize what they always had together… Tournament—a young man attends accepts an offer to attend Tournament in the hopes that by winning it, he will finally gain the affections of the man he has loved his entire life. Vow Unto Me—two men, divided by tragedy and grief, are ordered to a remote monastery to unravel a mystery, and finally overcome the problems keeping them apart. |
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Demonica Life as a mercenary isn’t kind or easy, and Shale has lost much: one family, then another, one leg, one arm, one eye, and the love of his life when pain and medication left him disinterested in sex. The last thing he wants is to accept a job from his ex-lover’s mother, but the pay is too good to refuse, especially as it should be a relatively simple job. But crucial information was withheld, and the man they’ve been sent to escort home is like no one Shale has ever met—despite the dangerous reason he’s spent so much of his life sequestered, and the fact he’s part of the family that hurt Shale once before. |
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Lukos Heat Najlah is on the hunt for the traitorous coward who attempted to assassinate the king and nearly killed Najlah’s brother in the process. But the hunt has taken his team deep into the Shide, the treacherous, freezing mountains controlled by the mysterious Lukos, feral wolf shifters who do not tolerate trespassers. When the Lukos come upon them, Najlah is reluctantly intrigued. The Lukos, especially the one called Barkus, are nothing like the soft humans he spends most of his time around. They thrive in the brutal cold the way he thrives in volcanic fire. For the first time, it feels like Najlah may have found someone who can equal the fierceness of dragons, and see them as more than demons. But if he hopes to explore the bond forming with the Lukos, he must first survive the enemy—and the Shide. |
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Magic & Mischief Stories involving griffons, demons, dragons, wizards, and thieves. In The Dragon’s Treasure, a dragon obsessed with cleanliness quietly pines over a regular customer to his shop. In The Selkie No One Wanted, a selkie who is nothing like his beautiful siblings winds up helping the fisherman he has long admired. A demon finds himself dealing with two troublesome humans in The Spawn, and in Mad Finnegan, a mad wizard reunites with the person who first drove him into the ‘madness’ that has made him infamous. A young chef winds up with an unusual assistant in Dragon Stew and a man finds that life has not quite yet passed him by in The Innkeeper’s Story. The Quest sends a loud-mouthed demon to earn the affections of a mate who does not want him, and in Spellbound a talented thief longs to find a way to steal the heart of his latest client. |
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Runescribe Near-blind without his glasses, regarded as a burden to his family, Tyri left his clan to attempt a career as a runescribe in the city, taking his mute sister Vess with him so she doesn’t grow up tormented as he was. But finding a job proves more difficult than he anticipated, and his last hope to avoid being thrown out on the streets depends on the interview he has that morning. A morning that comes crashing down on him by way of a thunderstorm and the stranger who runs into him and destroys his glasses… |
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Silverhands Annia was happy being a humble miller alongside her stepbrother—but her stepbrother prefers that Annia agree to be his wife. When she refuses, he brutally cuts off her hands, and Annia flees when he falls asleep. With no one to turn to, and nowhere to go, she leaves the only home she’s ever known in hopes a new one might be out there somewhere. |
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Spell Weaver Myka’s dream was to someday own his shop, making and spelling suits that were prized throughout the world. Instead, he rejected an apprenticeship with a master who proved to be reprehensible—and untouchable—and lost everything. Now, he works in a derelict shop in the wrong part of town, and it’s only a matter of time before he’s caught spelling without a license or thrown out by his odious landlord. The only bright part of his days are the occasional visits from his best client, Johan, a man who works in the palace and always brings the finest suits to have spelled. When he accidentally leaves behind an invitation to the royal ball, Myka takes it, determined to have one evening where he can enjoy himself—and perhaps even spend time with Johan as something other than a spell weaver. |
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The Broken Forest When women and children begin to vanish, the people of Edge village summon a Huntress. Though she is long due for a break and exhausted from her previous assignment, Adamina accepts the assignment and heads for Edge. But when she arrives, the simple assignment she anticipated proves instead to be complicated—complicated enough she must consult with a witch. A beautiful, compelling witch that makes Adamina sharply aware of her own lonely life, and tempts her to make it less lonely. Assuming the forest doesn’t kill them first. |
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The Dragon’s Tamer Summoned to the royal palace by the King, Alaith spends his days either handling the dragons that plague the kingdom, or holed up in his lonely tower. Unusual in appearance, manner, and his method of taming dragons rather than slaying them, his only distractions from his painfully outcast state are caring for the tamed dragon who resides with him, and admiring the handsome Lord Trey—and arguing with the infuriating Prince Rythe. |
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The Only Option A desperate dragon. A lonely necromancer. A marriage neither wants. When he is summoned to the royal castle, Rochus anticipates nothing more than a particularly difficult assignment. The bothersome journey is almost made worthwhile when he is propositioned by a young, beautiful dragon, Tilo, who seems untroubled by the fact that Rochus is a necromancer. When Rochus arrives at the castle he is ordered to marry the very same dragon he spent the night with. Though Rochus would rather sign papers and return home, he is helpless against Tilo’s pleas for help, even if it means spending more time around a man he is desperately drawn to but who doesn’t seem to want him. |
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The Prince of the Moon All Solae wants is to be accepted and loved by the family that has always rejected him. But given it was his late mother who cursed the kingdom to eternal winter, the chances of that happening are minimal. If he can find a way to break the curse, however, surely that would be enough to change their minds regarding him. But Solae is forbidden to practice magic because of his mother, which limits his ability to pursue solutions. Desperate for advice and new ideas, he contacts a famous curse breaker—and has no idea what to do when the man unexpectedly shows up, handsome and friendly and dangerously intriguing. |
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The Royal Inquisitor Three years ago Esmour fell in love. Three years ago he was betrayed, arrested, and put in penance bracelets, ordered to serve the king as a royal inquisitor. Now he is one of the best inquisitors in the kingdom, known as they King’s Lymer… and still hopelessly in love with the man who once betrayed him. The man he must now work with to root out and stop slave traders, and Esmour fears this time it won’t be the criminals who are the greatest threat, but the man he can’t seem to despise and his own stupid, stubborn heart. |
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The Secret of Mermaid Cove After she is caught behaving obscenely with another woman, Sophia is left abandoned. Her friends pretend not to know her, her family is trying to decide the best place to banish her, and Sophia wishes that running away was as easy in fact as it was in theory. She is saved from scandal, if not her suffocating life, by way of an unexpected marriage proposal from Lord Everett Dobson, the most coveted bachelor in the city. Not in a position to refuse, Sophia accepts his offer and agrees to visit his home at Mermaid Cove for three weeks. Mermaid Cove proves to be as beautiful as promised, complete with endless beaches, glittering waters, a castle that looks like it was made of sand… family curses and local legends… and two beautiful, mysterious women who cannot talk, but seem to have secrets they want to share… |
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Two Parts Mistletoe Kingston has worked hard to get where he is: owner of his own shop, master potion maker, well-respected…and lonely, too busy with life to enjoy more than his regular visits to Acacia House. If he wishes his loneliness might be eased by Hux, the man he meets at Acacia twice a month, well, someday he’ll work up the nerve to ask. Maybe. Then Hux unexpectedly visits his shop, distressed and in desperate need of help to save his employer from a love potion… |