Showing results by author "Sylvia S. Gravehorn" in All Categories

The Empire sent death. We answer with blood. I was a milkmaid in a quiet village. Now, I am the axis of a new world. As the violet rot of the Slick consumes the North, the rules of the living have been burned away. An Imperial host marches on our walls, but they are no longer men. They are a glass army, hollowed out and hungry for the uncorrupted. To survive the coming storm, we must become something more terrifying than the monsters at the gate. Kozan is the shield that holds the line. Vita is the blade that stalks the dark. And I am the soul that binds them together. Through the ancient ...

I was a "dry branch," cast out and forgotten. Then I found the monster on the hill. They called me the empty pot. A wife who could not bear fruit. In the village of Briarwood, I was less than a servant. I was a ghost. Until the day the northern fires rose, and the goblins came to claim what was left of me. I fled to the Black Iron Estate, a fortress of shadows and stone. I expected death. Instead, I found General Kozan. He is a mountain of moss-green muscle, scarred by a thousand wars. He is the Iron-Tusk, a creature of violence and ancient power. But in his library, he is a man of books ...

I went to the Wastes to buy a massacre. The price was my womb. My family is dead, slaughtered by the Baron and the Bishop. I have no army and no gold. All I have is a desperate plan to petition K'rog, the Chieftain of all Orcs. They call him the Stone-breaker. He is a mountain of scarred green muscle and primitive fury, a warlord who commands a legion of beasts. He does not want my jewels. He demands a different currency. "I want a mate. A small, soft mate to breed warriors for my line." The contract is simple. I surrender my body to his bed, and he destroys my enemies. I expected pain. I ...

Five primal monsters. One relentless wilderness. A survival story written in blood. The rules of the "civilized" world are gone, replaced by the raw law of the Northern Wastes. In this landscape of bone and grit, there is no room for the weak. There is only the hunt, the heat, and the heavy weight of the orc brood. This collection follows the collision between the human world and the primal forces that haunt the mist. It is a journey defined by the rough musk of wild things and the loyalty of creatures who would kill to keep what is theirs. In the North, submission is the only path to ...

I came for their treasure. I became their prize. The job was supposed to be simple. Infiltrate the Ashen Reach, locate the camp, and lift the Sun-Stone before the orcs woke up. I am Insolanza, and I don't make mistakes. But Muz and Korg aren't just guards. They are predators. Muz is a mountain of iron and silence. Korg is a scarred blade with a wicked grin. They were waiting for me. Getting caught should have been the end. Instead it was an invitation. They didn't kill me. They bound me. They decided to test just how much the little mouse could take. I expected pain. I didn't expect the ...

I sold my body to buy a massacre. Now I fight to keep my chains. I walked into the frozen wastes of my own free will. I stood before K’rog, the Chieftain of the Orcs, and offered him the only currency he would accept: my womb in exchange for the heads of the men who slaughtered my family. I expected a cold transaction. I expected to be used and discarded once the debt was paid. I was wrong. K’rog didn’t just want a breeder; he wanted a queen. Marked by his antler bead and claimed by his rough touch, I have ceased to be the noblewoman I once was. My body is changing, answering his ...

The Butcher’s Math is failing, and the Empire is at the gate. As the Steward of a crumbling estate, Maren has spent months balancing the ledgers of hunger and hope, but the arrival of the Imperial column changes the equation entirely. Lord Aris did not ride into the vitrified waste to save a discarded Warlord; he came to reclaim a territory the Crown already considers a grave. Kozan remains the furnace at Maren's back, a High Orc General whose protective fury is the only thing keeping the "Slick" from the walls. But even his Sovereign Command is fraying. To manufacture a cure, Kozan has ...

A broken estate. A poisoned spring. A secret that changes the arithmetic of survival. Kozan is a retired High Orc General who wanted nothing more than to tend his vines in peace. But the Black Iron is in ruins after the siege, and a mysterious violet slick is bleeding into the mountain's veins, turning the water to stone. Maren is the Steward of the house, a woman once discarded by her village as a dry branch. She is the clinical mind tracking every sack of grain and every barrel of salt. She is the only one who knows how to distill a cure for the creeping rot, and the only one who can ...

The world is choking on its last breath. The Oracle never lies. Xanthe was raised on stories of the Lord-beast at the heart of the Labyrinth. She was taught that her life was a small price to pay for world order. When the fields shrivel to ash and the sacred river dies, she has no choice but to descend into the cold, shifting stone of the world's oldest promise. She expected to be a sacrifice. She expected the end. Instead, she finds a king forged from violence and geology. Theron is twice the height of any man, a mountain of obsidian hide and scorched bone horns. He does not want her blood...

Five hundred starving refugees. Six doses of medicine. One monster standing in the gap. Maren was the village "dry branch," a woman cast out from the valley floor to the gates of the Black Iron Estate. Now, the tables have turned. As the steward of the fortress overlooking her former home, she is the only thing standing between her old neighbors and an early grave. But the mathematics of survival are brutal. The grain stores are failing, a violet plague is turning the living into glass, and the secret growing in her womb is a biological countdown she cannot stop. Kozan is a High Orc General...

Faith is a fragile shield against the winter. Sister Severa is a holy warrior sworn to the Pale Queen. Captured by the orc clans, she expects a martyrdom of blood and fire. Instead, she is cast into a killing blizzard. She is given a single, brutal chance to live: cross the Black River before the hunter finds her. Gor'ak is the horde's most lethal butcher. He does not know mercy, only the pulse of the chase. While the storm tears at Severa's flesh, the predator draws near. He is not looking for a kill. He is looking for a prize to claim. In the silence of the snow, sacred vows are a hollow ...

I was the university mouse. He is the void that eats the world. I lived in the margins, hiding in oversized sweaters and caffeine-fueled insomnia. Then I downloaded the file. VOID_SCAN_FINAL_02.PDF. 300 megabytes of bad ideas and a ritual that was never supposed to work. Now, I don’t sleep alone. Heathcliff is seven feet of polished jet and cold crystalline skin. He is a monster of shifting shadows and burning white eyes who doesn’t care about the laws of men. He didn’t come to save me; he came to claim the "open wound" of my soul. From the drug-fueled red altars of elite campus ...

I was a Senior Associate at a top Manhattan firm. Now, I have ears, a tail, and a non-negotiable craving for marshmallow Peeps. Julia Ashworth, Esq., does not do "biological emergencies." She does fourteen-million-dollar mergers, charcoal Cucinelli suits, and high-stakes litigation. But when a dormant shifter gene detonates in the middle of a high-stakes deposition, the Senior Associate finds herself trading her Juris Doctor for a pair of velvet ears and an uncontrollable craving for Nutella. The "Restlessness" has arrived, and it does not care about fiduciary responsibility. Julia has two ...

Magic is a dinner bell. The monster is her only shield. Seraphina of the Sun Spire had a simple plan. She would reach the Black Keep, outwit the Baron, and secure her family legacy. She did not count on the Null Hunters. These nightmare creatures do not just kill. They gorge themselves on the very magic she spent years perfecting. In the frozen mud of the Craglands, her power is a liability that will get her eaten. Jow is a scarred orc mercenary. He is crude. He is brutal. He is also the only reason Seraphina is still breathing. When their carriage shatters in the wilderness, Seraphina is ...