Showing results by author "Valerie Gaumont" in All Categories

Esmeralda has served as godmother in the Seven Thousand Kingdoms for several hundred years. She arranged countless Cinderella tales and heroic quests, dealing in both happy endings and in setting the occasional curse when she can’t talk kings out of it. She has seen it all. She chafes at the restrictions placed on her by the Assemblage, the ruling body that governs all those with magic and wishes desperately that something would change. When the Kingdom of Charalond starts persecuting all those with magic, it seems she may get her wish. Princess Aria is cursed. She knew all her life that ...

After surviving an attack by the Brotherhood, Ivy tries to get back to normal life preparing for the launch of Wildwood's retail venture. Wounds start to heal and nightmares fade. Normality seems in almost in reach. Unfortunately, others have different expectations. The head of the Seers shows up demanding Irina and Nick be turned over to him as they are part of the Seer Clan and Hamilton demands she figure out who else the Brotherhood paid off. Can Ivy protect her friends and figure out who is trying to kill them before more attacks occur?

Having fled Balosh and the assassin Harold Red Hand for the safety of the Hidden Kingdom, Nameless settles into the Academy to catch up on his studies before the other students return for autumn classes. But things don't go as smoothly as he hoped. No one knows what skills he will develop or when but his new friends are prepared to help where they can even though his rising power proves unexpected and hard to control. While Nameless learns to trust those around him and struggles with his new identity as someone other than the Prince's assistant, he stumbles into plots and political ...

Ivy and her family begin their lives at Wildwood, working on finishing construction and creating what they and their clans need. But as work begins, the Shadow Council, the ruling body for all of the hidden clans, collapses leaving uncertainty in its demise. Worries arise as Ivy expects old grudges to be redressed and new feuds to begin among the volatile clans. But as she seeks security, bulking up the protections around those she most cares about, a new threat arises. The Brotherhood, a group thought long ago exterminated has returned and as Ivy investigates her own past, seeming answers ...

While watching her two younger cousins in the countryside, Norah is captured by a raiding party and sold as property to Lord Tessian. Knowing that her talent mark means she has special abilities, he sequesters her with the other girls he has managed to accumulate with similar skills. She is renamed Rabbit by her owners and forced to use her skills to benifit Lord Tessian as he plans his climb up the social hierarchy of the Baronies and of Heldan proper. As Rabbit, Norah must hide her true name and plan her escape before she can be used as a bargaining chip. Will the other girls join her in ...

When Jamie's Great Uncle Albe goes missing, he leaves behind a large estate, a house in the middle of nowhere and a legacy Jamie never suspected. He finds out that the creatures of the Fae are real and it was Albe's job as Keeper of the Crossroads to keep the more destructive members of the Fae from devastating the human population. Time is running short as the Lune Merdos approaches and ancient rites threaten to destroy the crossroads, eliminating the one thing that separates the human world from that of the Fae. Now the job of Keeper is Jamie's, can he manage to find out who killed Albe ...

It was an accident. Alice Appleton had one skill in the magical community, creating shields. Her shields keep the shadow creatures, monsters with a taste for magic infused blood, away. Despite its usefulness, she is viewed as one of the lesser trades, her skills called to a job site after plumbing and wiring was done, but before insulation and drywall. Although paid very well, she is not one of the hidden magical community’s powerhouses. She is not of the elite and not in charge of anything. While she disagrees with some of the restrictions placed upon her by the Commission, she has no ...

After several mysterious deaths, what remained of the Chambers family was divided, each sent to a different city. After seventeen years of living on her own, Ivy Chambers is summoned to the Shadow Council. The Shadow Council rules life within The Society. Every one of the hidden clans, whether Vampire, Fae, Shifter, Seer or like Ivy, Mage must abide by its rulings. Their main goal? To keep the clans hidden from the normal world around them. While Ivy doesn't know what brought her to the attention of the Shadow Council, any more than she knows why her family was separated, she knows she must...

Menjah, born strong with the powers of the Old Blood, flees from the high priest who wants to use her powers for his own ends. But the mountain sanctuary that offers her refuge is not all that it seems. Teras, Menjah's father is captured by a terrifying race known throughout Sedovan as the Riders. But those born of the Old Blood can not be enslaved by the mind magics the Riders use on humans, throwing their world into turmoil. Wanash, the young Rider desperate for the acknowledgement of titled status is forced to stand in a whirlwind of change, adapting his thinking and leading his people ...

In Pontuse, the Capitol City of Balosh, noble lords employ assistants to amuse and entertain them as well as to distract others from their shortcomings and intentions. Despite being an orphan without a name, Nameless holds the prize position of Assistant to Prince Roland, heir to the throne of Balosh. While he dances and performs acrobatic feats to distract from Roland's often less than regal nature, things aren't exactly what they seem. The Queen looks at Nameless with anger and hatred and when the Prince is sent to the neighboring Kingdom of Genarai to negotiate a treaty, she arranges for...

When his wife died aboard The Defender in the Matrovean attack, all Michael wanted to do was join her in death. He sought oblivion, but the Guild needed his skills as a cartographer as they sent teams inland to survey the planet outside of the town limits of Haven. Pulled back from the edge of oblivion for one last job, Mateo promises Michael that there are plenty of things on the alien world that could kill him if he looks hard enough. Hoping for a quick death, Michael agrees, but soon finds out there is more to the survey than he expected. Will Michael find the death he craves and doom ...

After helping a group of families evade capture Elena finds herself stranded skyside during the off season. Despite the presence of Will Thompson, whose ship hitched a ride at the last second, she is feeling pretty good about the situation. Most of the political movers and shakers of the Guild safely returned to Earth at the end of the season taking their mixed political plots with them. Even though there is a lot to do, she feels free of some of the weight that has been placed on her shoulders. But it isn't all a pleasant vacation. The Matrovean raiders are still expanding their territory ...

Against all odds Elena has found herself named as a member of the Ruling Council of the Guild of Families. After the destruction of the Docking Facility and the resettlement of the Guild onto Haven, life is starting to steady and become more stable. For the first time in a while, Elena feels like she can breathe freely. Haven is doing well, her business is prospering and as an added bonus the military has decided to mothball its channel riding program. Relieved to no longer be pressed for meetings with Smith, Elena is looking forward to a return to her new normal thinking her life might ...

Elena Calabrese managed to open an earth-based store with very few people realizing that her wares come from several different galaxies. The merchant society called the Guild of Families is conducting business as usual, trying to stay as secret as possible while the military launches their own program of ship building, trying to build their own Channel riding ships that do not rely on Guild trained pilots to operate. The program’s, lead man, Will Thompson, managed to get several of his crew onto the planet RJ457. While bowing to the inevitability of an alliance with Thompson and his men, ...

Earth side, Elena Calabrese, Captain of the Storm Chaser and member of the Guild of families has opened a store settling repackaged alien goods to a earthly population. While the business thrives, she is occupied skyside with the newly opened channel and the planet, RJ457 it leads to. The Council has granted conditional rights. Making those rights permanent depends on the Librarians finding what they need on the planet. Elena finds herself working with several dangerous councilors as well as the untouchably powerful House of Librarians. While things are going well at the moment, success ...

Elena has been welcomed back into the Guild of Families, an ancient guild with the skill to navigate channels to cross space. When she left it was because she feared The Calling, thought to be a disease that crippled pilots. Not wanting to risk her crew, Elena left the Guild and stayed away for five years, building a new life for herself with Calabrese Imports. However the Guild’s secret was leaked and Elena’s return was required. Caught between the Guild and the military, her options were limited. She returns to life in the Guild aboard her ship, The Storm Chaser, her hold full of off ...

All she wanted was a cup of coffee. What she ended up with was getting knocked out and interrogated by the military. They knew she owned an imports store. They also knew she was a member of the powerful Calabrese family, one of the families that made up the Guild. Elena was once a pilot, capable of taking a sailing vessel from the oceans of earth and into ancient channels that reach across space and into other worlds. After being gone for five years she is suddenly thrust back into the world of Guild politics she had left behind, walking a thin line between mafia like laws and the ...

When life became too painful Steve walked out and became someone new. For years he buried all of the details of his life and spent his time dealing with the unpleasant details of others. It is a trait others have come to rely on. Steve Roberts became the man who could fix any problem. So when Nick turns up with a dead girl in his bed, Steve is the first one he calls. Getting rid of the body however, proves to be the easy part. Too much about the girl reminds Steve of his own long buried past. Now the past has caught up with him and his carefully crafted world is coming apart at the seams. ...

All her life Cassie has seen strange things. First it was the strangers with feathers and beaks, then there were the normal looking folks who, when her skin touched hers, sent her vision someplace else. Told always to hide what she saw, Cassie worked hard to fly under the radar. But when more of these strange others came to town, hiding became harder and she was caught. Luckily the ones who caught her seem more interested in training her than killing her, at least for now. She begins her training as one of the mysterious Walkers, but is that really what she is, or is Cassie Wilson something...

After the dawn ritual on her eighteenth birthday, Cassie is welcomed by those of Abraham's pantheon. While she knows she isn't a Walker no one is quite willing to tell her exactly what she is other than 'family'. They are excited about the skills she might develop as her training begins and she realizes that she is the latest entertainment to break up the long monotony of their eternity. As she struggles to maintain her place in the regular world and complete her midterms, the mystical world and her newly developing abilities threaten to intrude. The line between her separate worlds is thin...