It’s been more than twenty years since tragedy prompted Luna Valens to walk away from her pack. Scarred by her past, she’s done her best to lead a normal human life. Thanks to a potion that suppresses her magic, nobody around her has a clue that she’s a werewolf. Until… Her potion supplier disappears, her family reestablishes contact, and a mysterious werewolf with a metal detector and a penchant for calling her my lady saunters into her life.

His mother was one of the most powerful wizards in the Nurian Empire until she abandoned her people to become a notorious pirate. That choice doomed the family she left behind to a life of disgrace. Yanko White Fox doesn’t remember his mother, but as the only gifted child in the family, he is expected to erase the mark she left on them all.

Imperial law enforcer Amaranthe Lokdon is good at her job: She can deter thieves and pacify thugs, if not with a blade, then by toppling an eight-foot pile of coffee canisters onto their heads. But when ravaged bodies show up on the waterfront, an arson covers up human sacrifices, and a powerful business coalition plots to kill the emperor, she feels a tad overwhelmed. Worse, Sicarius, the empire's most notorious assassin, is in town. He's tied in with the chaos somehow, but Amaranthe would be a fool to cross his path. Unfortunately, her superiors order her to hunt him down.

Arwen Forester may be a socially awkward introvert, but she’s an expert tracker, archer, and forager who has a pickling recipe for every vegetable in the garden. Unfortunately, none of these skills earn her a lot of money. And when the taxes go up on her father’s farm, she’s not sure how to help him keep the property. Then someone offers her a lucrative new gig: Hunt down a haughty half-dragon criminal with the power to incinerate those who irritate him.

McCall Richter finds criminals, con men, and deadbeats better than anyone else in the empire. She’s proud of her success and that she owns her own spaceship, especially since she struggles to understand human motivations, can’t tell when people are lying to her, and is horrible at recognizing faces. Being autistic in the empire is frowned upon—and there’s a handy normalization surgery to correct it—but she’s managed to prove her worth and avoid irking the tyrannical regime.

As a commoner, Kaylina Korbian's duty is to bow to aristocrats, avoid rabble-rousers, and call the haughty royal rangers "my lord"—especially the arrogant Vlerion of Havartaft. Handsome, powerful, and a legendary swordsman, he's the last person you'd want to cross. Naturally, Kaylina irks him at their first meeting, and he arrests her. Unbeknownst to her, the city is dealing with political strife and assassinations, and the rangers are on edge. Kaylina must work with Vlerion to clear suspicion from her name, even as she unearths a dark secret about him that will either bind them together.

In the final days of the empire, Cyborg Corps Colonel Leonidas Adler plans to die in a manner befitting of an imperial officer. He will fight until his last breath, giving his life to defend Emperor Markus, as it was meant to be. But when the emperor himself summons him for a final special mission, how can he refuse?

When Delia chose to major in archaeology, she didn't imagine herself scrounging for pickaxes and gold pans to sell on auction sites. What she doesn't imagine is stumbling across a decapitated body in an old mine near Prescott. Something dangerous has come to the mountains, and two Harley-riding strangers are the only ones who seem to have a clue. They speak a language Delia has never heard and carry mysterious artifacts she's never seen. Investigating these strangers might lead her to discoveries that change archaeology forever.

Long before Casmir Dabrowski and Kim Sato leave their world for the epic adventures of the Star Kingdom series, long before they outwit terrorists and mercenaries and do battle on a galactic scale, long before they become best friends and roommates...they have to meet for the first time. This is that story.

Telryn "Trip" Yert has always been a little odd, with hunches that are too accurate to explain. Magic is feared and forbidden in Iskandia, so he's struggled his whole life to hide his eccentricities. As a boy, he was forced to watch his mother's execution. Her crime? Witchcraft. Understandably, Trip wants nothing to do with the power that lurks within him, always threatening to reveal itself. Instead, he dedicates himself to serving as an officer in the king's army, to battling pirates and imperial conquerors. He longs to become a soldier as respected and renowned as General Zirkander.