Showing results by publisher "-emdashery books-" in Science Fiction & Fantasy

Sometimes it's just about being in the right place at the right time...with the right person. Sarge is the short story of a burgeoning D/s relationship between two space marines stationed on an alien planet where an endless war drags on.

In an eternal paradise, the most beautiful angel, Lucifer, struggles with shame, identity, and timidity, with little more than the desire to worship his creator. It isn't until the strongest angel, Michael, comes into his life that Lucifer learns to love himself. Along the way, their friendship begins to bloom into something else. Maybe the first romance in the history of everything. But this God is a jealous one, and maybe paradise is not paradise.

As the second son, Prince Larkin doesn't have much of a role at court. When his brother sends him on a quest to slay a wyvern, he pounces on the opportunity. Only problem? It's not a wyvern. It's a dragon. A naked dragon in human form, who possesses two very large...anyway. Larkin is definitely, absolutely, very not interested in trying them out, but Jade is very, very persuasive. It helps that Jade's fluids make Larkin tingle all over in the best of ways.

Ayden's life has long been guided by two emotions: love for his sister, and hatred of all things human. When he's captured in battle, he is enslaved in the service of a human prince, Freyrik Farr. Freyrik's always known elves to be beautiful and dangerous, but never has one affected him as deeply as Ayden. Teetering on a dagger's edge between duty and high treason, Freyrik discovers that some choices can change a life, and some an entire world.

The two parts of being a paranormal private investigator I could really do without are being forced to eat bananas by an animated statue with a potassium fixation, and being put on trial for murder by a self-appointed council of vampire oligarchs. To be fair, I did kind of do it (the murder, not the bananas). But I was kind of saving my girlfriend, who is kind of one of them. On top of this, I've also wound up with a primordial queen of the damned trying to strangle me in my dreams.

Jonathan Evergreen is a talented sophomore at a prestigious, isolated college in Vermont, who dreams of a career in book conservation. But Jonathan’s life isn’t as rosy as it may appear. Disowned by his family after they caught him with another boy, he struggles to overcome heartbreak and support himself through his studies. To make matters worse, his advisor and the only ally in the institution run by old money and family connections mysteriously vanishes, and a new enigmatic professor, Dacian Bathory, takes his place.

Vampire hunter Remy Pendergast and his unexpected vampiric royal companions, Lord Zidan Malekh and Lady Xiaodan Song, are on the road through the kingdom of Aluria again after a hard-won battle against the formidable Night Empress. Xiaodan, severely injured and powerless, causes the trio to seek refuge at the mysterious Court of Wanderers. Meanwhile, Remy must confront his strange dreams of the Night Empress, a woman he has long suspected to be his own mother. As family secrets unravel, Remy must face a heart-wrenching choice between his parents' legacies and his own destiny.

New York Times best-selling author TJ Klune invites you back to the land of Verania in a new collection of short stories starring the beloved characters from the Tales of Verania series.

Staff Sergeant Alexei Dvorkin has a history with spies that typically ends with most of them dead. But Agent Sean Delaney is proving to be the frustrating exception to every one of Alexei’s rules of engagement. As part of Alpha Team’s long-running mission to stop an enemy metahuman, the two are constantly forced to work together, resulting in a simmering attraction neither can ignore. When the MDF tasks them with finding evidence of criminal wrongdoing against the owner of a private military company, Sean knows exactly how to play the game to win.

Oxfordshire 1362. When Lily Barden discovers her best friend Johanna’s hand in marriage is being awarded as the main prize at a tournament, she is determined to stop it. Disguised as a knight, she infiltrates the contest, preparing to fight for Jo’s hand. But her conduct ruffles feathers, and when a dangerous incident escalates out of Lily’s control, Jo must help her escape. Finding safety with a local brewster, Lily and Jo soon settle into their new freedom, and amongst blackberry bushes and lakeside walks an unexpected relationship blossoms

Mara’s island is one of stories and magic, but every story ends in the same way. She will finish her days on the cliff, turned to stone and gazing out at the horizon like all the islanders before her. Mara’s parents - a boxer and a ballerina - chose this enchanted place as a refuge from the turbulence of their previous lives: they wanted to bring up their children somewhere special and safe. But the island and the sea don’t care what people want, and when they claim a price from her family, Mara’s world unravels.

Young, headstrong Psyche has captured the eye of every suitor with her beauty – but also, unfortunately, the jealous gaze of the goddess Aphrodite. As punishment, Psyche is tied to a rock to be sacrificed to a ‘monstrous husband’. And yet, no monster arrives: instead, she is spirited away by Aphrodite’s daughter Eros. Eros, goddess of desire, can change gender at will. And in her hidden palace, she visits her bride under the cloak of darkness: Psyche is forbidden to gaze upon the face of her lover.

Quiet, thoughtful princess Thanh was sent away as a hostage to the powerful faraway country of Ephteria as a child. Now she's returned to her mother's imperial court, haunted not only by memories of her first romance, but by worrying magical echoes of a fire that devastated Ephteria's royal palace. Thanh's new role as a diplomat places her once again in the path of her first love, the powerful and magnetic Eldris of Ephteria, who knows exactly what she wants: romance from Thanh and much more from Thanh's home.

With power comes a price, and the Devil has come to collect on an ancestral deal. David's days are numbered, and death looms at his door. Reluctantly, he reaches out to the only person he's ever trusted, his ex-boyfriend and secret society rival Rhys, for help. However, the only way to get to Rhys is through his wife, Moira. Thrust into each other's care, emotions once buried deep resurface, and the trio race to figure out their feelings for one another before the Devil steals David away for good . . .

1881 - Special Agent Gillian Hamilton is a magic caster with the Federal Bureau of Magic and Steam. He’s sent to Shallow Grave, Arizona, to arrest a madman engineer known as Tinkerer, who’s responsible for blowing up half of Baltimore. Gillian has handled some of the worst criminals in the Bureau’s history, so this assignment shouldn’t be a problem. But even he’s taken aback by a run-in with the country’s most infamous outlaw, Gunner the Deadly.

"Next of Kin" by Astrid Amara: Jay Yervant is a Hell Cop so powerful that his bare skin incinerates anyone he contacts. Isolated, he is tortured by desire, until he meets Brian, a sensual young man who touches him with impunity. But Jay's burgeoning hope is threatened when a malevolent sorcerer unleashes a host of demonic assassins against Brian. Keeping his lover may cost Jay his life.

When Phoebe, goddess of the moon, is killed by the knights of the sun god, Hyperion, all who follow her are branded heretics. With Phoebe gone, the souls of the dead are no longer ferried to the underworld, and instead linger on as shades who feast on the blood of the living. Raef is a child of the night. He lives in the shadows, on scraps, eking out a meager existence as a thief. But when an ornate box is sequestered in the Temple of Hyperion, the chance of a big score proves too great to resist. What he finds within propels him on an odyssey across the sea and back again.

Heather Morell is haunted. Otherworldly nightmares and monstrous hallucinations lurk around every corner, relics of childhood bereavement and schizophrenia. Until she meets Evelyn and Raine—a bad-tempered mage and her self-proclaimed bodyguard—and learns that she’s not insane after all. The monsters she sees are all too real, the god-thing in her nightmares is teaching her the secrets of creation, and her twin sister—the lost girl who supposedly never existed—might still be clinging on, a dwindling soul somewhere beyond the walls of reality, Outside.

Dimitri Alexeyev used to be the Tzar of Novo-Svitsevo. Now, he is merely a broken man, languishing in exile after losing a devastating civil war instigated by his estranged husband, Alexey Balakin. In hiding with what remains of his court, Dimitri and his spymaster, Vasily Sokolov, engineer a dangerous ruse. Vasily will sneak into Alexey’s court under a false identity to gather information, paving the way for the usurper’s downfall, while Dimitri finds a way to kill him for good. But stopping Alexey is not so easy as plotting to kill an ordinary man.

Hannah is not human, and she's not sure what will happen when she stops pretending otherwise. Still stuck in a slowly mutating body on Earth and still waking up in a fantasy world whenever she sleeps, Hannah's stress continues to mount every single day. As magic continues to spread to her friends—whether they like it or not—Hannah is forced to confront what that magic means about her and what her terrifying Goddess wants her to do with it.