Twelve previously-unpublished Wraeththu short stories and novelettes of doomed love and invincible desire.
A collection of genre short stories by Storm Constantine.
A fantasy novel of warring factions in a richly-developed world. Fire magic is outlawed and those who wield it punishable by death. Liese ten Haven, a maga in the city-state of Uitenbech, finds herself in possession of a deadly legacy.
A novel set in Storm Constantine's Wraeththu Mythos, featuring the horse-hara of the Gimrah tribe.
In the ruined City of Ghosts, beside a misty inland sea Moon, a young Wraeththu har, comes of age, unaware of his heritage and the secrets his broken father has kept for so long. The future is about to change. Strange hara appear in the city and they are looking for his father. They know him by a different name.In the city of Immanion, the infamous har Calanthe has ousted Thiede from power and a new age has dawned for Wraeththukind: the reverberations of its arrival shakes every corner of the earth. In the wake of this event, a remarkable child is conceived, affected by weird energies to become something more than the sum of his parents. Pellaz, the Tigron of Immanion and sovereign of all Wraeththu, discovers a huge and terrifying threat to his hara, just as they are trying to establish themselves in the ruins of human civilisation. It's a threat from beyond earthly reality, and it's searching for avatars to work in its name.The Forest of Gebaddon is about to spew forth its captives, the disempowered Varrs. Their bitter leader, Ponclast, will be transformed into a foe worthy of taking on the Tigron himself. In the twisted forest he spawns his young, who can walk between the worlds.In Galhea, the erstwhile stronghold of the Varrs, the Parasilian family have created a thriving community. They never think of Ponclast, who regards them as traitors to their tribe. Then the attacks begin, by assailants who cannot be seen. Help can't be sought from Immanion because the ethers are in chaos, making communication impossible. Cobweb, stranded as head of the family, must change his being to avert disaster.Once the reality of the threat becomes clear, the warring factions of Wraeththu must unite to protect their world and venture into unimaginable new territories. Will the Tigron make the ultimate sacrifice to protect his hara?
Though they believe themselves to have inherited the earth from humankind, the androgynous and magical Wraeththu have yet to learn the truth about their origins. After an eerie and powerful Festival night that surpasses all others, two hara, Ulaume and Flick, are inspired to embark upon separate journeys in search of meaning and truth. Somehar - or something - is calling them, through dreams and eerie visions. Their paths cross, and they find they share a single destiny: to discover who holds power in the fabled city of Immanion and to defend the outcast harling Lileem, who is linked to the strange Kamagrian tribe.Seel, the leader of the Sarocks, thought that the mysterious and powerful Thiede was done with him, after the part Seel played in making Thiede aware of a young and special har named Pellaz, who had come to Saltrock for inception. When Pellaz left the town, Seel knew Thiede had plans for the har, which were perhaps malign, but suppressed his misgivings. There was nothing he could do about it. Then Cal, Pellaz's lover, returns to Saltrock alone, with a horrifying tale to tell and soon, after shattering events occur that end in murder, Seel realises he can't escape Thiede, or the destiny that's set for him.Fitting chronologically between the novels The Bewitchments of Love and Hate and The Fulfilments of Fate and Desire from The Wraeththu Chronicles this first volume in The Wraeththu Histories takes up the tale of prominent characters from the original trilogy, and what happened to them while Pellaz and Cal were involved in meeting their own challenging destinies.
A collection of the rare and uncollected short stories by Tanith Lee, fantasy and horror.
Tanith Lee wrote hundreds of short stories in her lifetime, many of which appeared only in small press magazines and anthologies, and other rare publications. A great many of these pieces have remained uncollected, unseen by a wider readership. Strindberg's Ghost Sonata and Other Uncollected Tales is the first of three anthologies to be published by Immanion Press that will showcase a wide selection of these sought-after tales.From the horror fantasy of 'Persian Eyes' set in ancient Rome, via the fantastical fairy-tale realm of 'Among the Leaves So Green', through the frozen landscape of 'Cold Spell' and into the doomed city of 'The Woman', this collection spans the genres of horror and fantasy, showcasing Tanith Lee's ability to conjure wondrous, vivid and mysterious worlds. The book includes a story that has never been published before - 'Iron City', which was written in 1987 - as well as two tales set in Tanith's Flat Earth mythos; 'The Pain of Glass' and 'The Origin of Snow', the latter of which only ever appeared briefly on the author's now defunct web site.This collection presents a jewel casket of twenty stories, and even to the most avid fan of Tanith Lee will contain gems they've not read before.Contents: Strindberg's Ghost Sonata, Among the Leaves so Green, Beauty is the Beast, Ceres Passing, Cold Spell, Elvenbrood, Felidis, Goldenhair, Herowhine, In the Balance, Iron City, Last Drink Bird Head, The Origin of Snow, The Pain of Glass, Persian Eyes, Question a Stone, The Three Brides of Hamid-Dar, A Tower of Arkrondurl, Two Lions, a Witch and the War-Robe, The Woman
As Wraeththu struggle to uncover the secret of their origins, it is now time for second generation hara of this androgynous race to make their mark on history.Darquiel har Aralis lives among the hidden tribe of Olopade, unaware of who his family are. All he knows is that he was brought to Samway before he emerged from his pearl, and that his parents might be dead or disgraced - but were surely famous. As he grows up, Darq realises he is different to any other har. After a disastrous attempt to incept his closest friend, the human girl Amelza, he attracts the attention of the mysterious and powerful Thiede and learns that his origins are more astounding than he imagined. Shadowy factions and bizarre entities wish to take control of him, and he must disappear into the ancient landscape of Anakhai until his powers have developed and he is strong enough to confront these dangerous forces. Among the Nezreka, a tribe steeped in wolf magic, Darq begins to learn of his destiny.Loki har Aralis is the favoured son of the ruling family in Immanion, but he too is unaware of his real heritage, or the secrets that surrounded his creation. He is abducted from home to the stark realm of Thanatep, where forests of ancient towers are all that remain of a race that once controlled the life essence of multiple realms.Geburael har Teraghast is the high-son of Tigron Pellaz but holds his family in contempt. Living in exile with his half-brother, the peculiar Diablo, Geburael believes that the great Aralisian dynasty in Immanion must fall, and he is more than prepared to be instrumental in its destruction. His first and perhaps greatest task will be to convince Loki he should feel the same way.Meanwhile, the Kamagrian Lileem uncovers the greatest secret of all in the realm of the Black Library, and catalyses events that will bring the three young hara into conflict, the outcome of which will decide the fate of all Wraeththu on earth.
She took the rose and lifted it. It had a strange hot smell in the cold of the cave. It brushed her mouth and broke. She felt the burning blood go over her lips and down her chin. It had no taste, and yet… She raised her hand, in the cup of which all the blood had gathered and drank it down. No more than water. Yet water in thirst. It was not water, but fruit. It was wine. She must have more… 'There will be more,' he said.Tanith Lee was writing grimdark fantasy even before it was known as a genre. Gritty, savage and darkly erotic, Vivia is one of the author's darkest - and finest - works. Immanion Press is proud to bring it back into print with this second edition.Vivia, the neglected daughter of a vicious warlord, discovers strange, lightless caverns deep beneath her father's castle. Here she finds an entity she believes is a living god and, in her loneliness, seeks its favour. After war and disease devastate her father's lands, Vivia is taken captive by the hedonistic Prince Zulgaris. Kept as his concubine, Vivia intrigues the cruel, eccentric prince. He sees in her aloof indifference something to match the darkness of his own soul, unaware of what she once invoked and how it changed her. She drinks blood and feeds without remorse upon the young girls that Zulgaris brings to her.In the great city of Starzion, Vivia begins to understand her own nature. To Zulgaris she is a plaything, treasured like the bizarre contraptions he keeps in hidden workrooms and the unspeakable mutations of human flesh he conceals beneath his palace. But in this callous, barbaric land, where life means very little, and the spectre of the plague haunts the alleys and markets of even the greatest city, circumstances can change very quickly. No life is safe, and treachery abounds. Perhaps, in such a brutal world, only remote pitiless creatures like Vivia can survive unscathed. But at what cost?
Vaetta is not human. Vaetta is a synthetic female who looks human, a Valkyrie-model agent, but far more than a mere robot. Her world is overcrowded, and its resources have reached the breaking point. The humans who govern this parallel Earth need a solution to their civilization's problems - and quick! The perfect opportunity seems to present itself when a strange, androgynous visitor appears from an inexplicable portal to another world. His name is Tyse, and he too is seeking help, because his people, a Wraeththu tribe, are also under threat. He reveals how his world is sparsely populated, following the demise of humankind and the rise of a civilization known as Wraeththu who now hold power. In Vaetta's world, the Wraeththu have never even appeared...To Vaetta's creators, Tyse's arrival seems to offer a golden opportunity - a resource-rich world ripe for the taking and the portal to reach it. The existing inhabitants, living in the ruins of a former civilization, and not even human, can hardly impede plans for mass colonization. Vaetta is chosen to lead a troupe of Valkyries to Tyse's Earth to scout, explore and begin preparations for invasion.But Vaetta soon discovers that her owners' assumptions are incorrect and what waits for her on the other side of the Conduit - the portal to Tyse's Earth - is a situation far beyond her own people's imaginations. Just who and what is the mysterious Dragon? Why do alien emotions begin to course through her synthetic mind? Some things just don't make sense to her, until a fatal meeting through which she discovers a history with far-reaching implications covering all realities.A deft and page-turning climax to E. S. Wynn's popular 'Gold Country' series, 'Voices of the Silicon Beyond' opens up intriguing new vistas in the Wraeththu Mythos.
Storm Constantine is a mistress of shadow fantasy, exploring the dark and the weird in human nature and the natural world. Her short stories cross genres from science fiction, to horror, to fantasy, and this collection is the fifth to showcase her uncollected works.'Long Indeed Do We Live' is set upon a desiccated, barren future earth, where life exists only in artificial domes. But the spirit of nature - perhaps vengeful - is persistent and can find its way through the cracks. 'From the Cold Dark Sea' is a Lovecraftian story of the peculiar inhabitants of a mansion, next to the ocean in Cornwall. A young woman goes there to restore a mysterious old book that seems to tell a weird history of creatures of the sea. The peculiar inhabitants of the nearby town might well have stepped from the pages. 'A Winter Bewitchment' spins an elegant tale of fantasy, exploring the mysteries of feminine allure. A countess, bored of her marriage, wants one last splendid fling, but it's the witchcraft of her young companion which enables this, and the results are unpredictable. 'The Saint's Well' is a tale of the unseen in the landscape and how ancient beliefs persist in hidden corners of the countryside. An agent of the Vatican investigates the alleged manifestation of a saint in a small Welsh village in the 1950s. Is this down purely to the imagination of a child, or something more - and of much earlier times?These are but tasters for the tales within this collection, which presents Storm Constantine at her story-telling best."Storm Constantine is a myth-making Gothic queen, whose lush tales are compulsive reading. Her stories are poetic, involving, delightful and depraved. I wouldn't swap her for a dozen Anne Rices." Neil Gaiman
Tenebrae sum.I am the darkness. Darkness, I…Rachaela's daughter Ruth is dead - and now she has a new child with her Scarabae lover Althene. Anna is no ordinary girl. She matures with preternatural speed and Rachaela can't dispel the feeling that her daughter is Ruth reborn. But if Ruth wasn't evil, she was certainly dangerously unstable - a threat to all. It's difficult for a mother to connect with a child she feels isn't quite what she seems - or is far worse than she seems. But perhaps Anna doesn't have that streak of insanity, and it's only Rachaela's fevered imagination. Perhaps she's nothing more than a bright, new member of the mysterious Scarabae family, (themselves something greater than mere human), who is an asset not a potential disaster.Anna's parents and the other Scarabae aren't aware that another member of the family has become aware of the girl - the father of them all, the almost mythical Cain, who lives apart from the world in a frozen wasteland, where's he's constructed a bizarre reproduction of Ancient Egypt within a pyramid of ice He wants not only Anna, but other children he believes are reincarnations of people from the past - the earliest times of the family. But what does he want them for? Soon, the kidnappings begin…Meanwhile, Miranda Scarabae continues to grow younger, into a beautiful woman, bewitching the grizzled biker Connor. Uncle Camillo, himself no longer an aged man, has a new set of friends who live upon the streets of London. It's inevitable his eccentric presence will change them. And Malach, alone in the Netherlands, grieving the death of Ruth - despite her amoral wickedness - becomes aware his love might be reborn, and is pulled from his melancholy to find her: to save her.As lives and stories twist and intertwine, the tale of the Scarabae draws to a vivid and powerful climax in the final volume of The Blood Opera Sequence.
The Scarabae, a mysterious family, who are not entirely human, have been forced to leave the burned ruins of their reclusive home in a remote part of England. Most are dead at the hands of Ruth, a child created through incest with the purpose of repopulating this ageing branch of the family. Scarabae must breed with Scarabae, but Ruth was a tragically misjudged experiment.Rachaela, Ruth's mother, trails listlessly with the survivors of the Scarabae. She is one of them but still can't feel that she is. Yet where else does she belong? The Scarabae relocate to London, and roost within a baroque old mansion. Here, they lick their wounds, but bizarrely appear to be growing younger…Ruth has also come to London. The people she seeks shelter with are often cruel or warped. Ruth cold-bloodedly removes them from the world. She has already learned how to kill, but not how to cover her tracks. When the Scarabae see news stories of a murderous black-haired girl, they know who's responsible. And they must call upon another strand of the family to help them trap and control this threat to their invisibility within the world.Malach and Althene arrive at the Scarabae mansion; beautiful and merciless beings. While Malach initiates the process of finding and containing Ruth, Rachaela struggles to resist the ambiguous allure of Althene, who is far more than she seems.First published in 1993, and long out of print, Immanion Press is proud to release this new edition, which includes seven illustrations and an introductory essay by Freda Warrington, author of The Blood Wine series.
"Tanith's work is lush and rich with beauty, darkness, and sensuality. More than almost anyone else whom I have ever read, Tanith's work sounds like it was meant to be read aloud, perhaps while huddled around a fire in the dark forest or in the quiet and still air within an ancient temple."Jeremy Brett, (Cushing Memorial Library & Archives, Texas A&M University) Tanith Lee wrote fifteen stories for the acclaimed US genre magazine 'Realms of Fantasy', which ran from 1994 to 2009 and was founded and edited by her close friend, Shawna McCarthy. Venus Burning: Realms collects all these stories in one volume for the first time, some of which only ever appeared in the magazine and will therefore be new to some of Tanith's fans.The stories in this collection are among her best work, in which Tanith takes myth and fairy tale tropes and turns them on their heads. You might find fantasy swordsmen (Woman in Scarlet), vampires (Israbel), werewolves (Moonblind), dragons (The Children of his Old Age), ghostly dolls (Doll Skulls) and tales reminiscent of the Arabian Nights (I Bring You Forever), but these are nothing like stories of those genres you've read before. Lush and lyrical, deep and literary, Tanith Lee created fresh poignant tales from familiar archetypes. This book also includes three previously uncollected stories from her Flat Earth mythos."We published fifteen of Tanith Lee's brilliant works. All of those wonderful, mystical, gorgeous, glorious stories are in this volume, and I'm so glad that Immanion Press is sharing them with new (and old) readers."Shawna McCarthy - founder and editor of 'Realms of Fantasy'
Prenumerera på vårt nyhetsbrev för att få fantastiska erbjudanden och inspiration för din nästa läsning.
Genom att registrera dig accepterar du vår personuppgiftspolicy.
