Showing results for title "The Gift" in Science Fiction & Fantasy

’Tis the Season for 14 more magical, macabre and merry tales to make your holidays … Fantastic! Gingerbread houses, caroling carolers, brightly trimmed trees, big family dinners, pristine snowfalls … the familiar pleasures of the season. But what better pleasure is there than a good holiday story? So open this winter solstice sampler and indulge in funny festive fantasies, nightmares before Christmas, and stunning space-age celebrations … these stories will warms hearts and minds like a blazing Yule log.

In the city of Magic's Bend, I protect what's mine. To the world, I'm a feeble Conjurer. To my closest friends, I'm a dangerous Magica with unexplainable powers given to me by a dragon. The downside? If anyone discovers what I am, I'm dead. So I lay low - kicking ass with my weapons, not my magic. Things go to hell when I witness the murder of a powerful vampire ally and become the key suspect. Soon, I'm hunted by the sexiest, strongest supernatural I've ever met. I've got three days to catch the real killer. It will take my forbidden magic to succeed.

In a world of suppressed magic, I’m an Unknown. Deadly power, little control. I’m only alive because I pay a blood sorcerer to keep me hidden. But when he comes to collect on the debt I can’t pay, one of his goons slams me with a deadly curse. Suddenly, I’m out of options and out of time. When I’m given a rare chance to join the secretive Undercover Protectorate and train at their academy to become an investigator, I have a way to hunt the cure for the curse.

Turns out that escaping hell is easy - it's staying out that's hard. Del's death magic defies the laws of the supernatural world. Worse - she doesn't know how to control it. If others learn what she is, it's guaranteed persecution by the Order of the Magica. And Del already has a deadly and forbidden secret - she shares a soul with a dragon.

When the Chosen One dies seconds from victory, the future falls into the hands of his younger sister. Disabled since childhood, Elenor never expected to be thrust into the center of a vast political web, but now her choices threaten to unravel it. As she navigates treacherous strands of deception, Elenor must forge alliances, confront sadistic family members, and uncover mysteries that span centuries. The world teeters on the brink of chaos, magic spirals out of control, and ancient forces move in the shadows hungry for vengeance.

Melanie is a very special girl. Dr Caldwell calls her 'our little genius'. Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh. Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children's cells.

All Aubrey Ellis wants is a normal life, one that doesn't include desperate pleas from the dead. Her remarkable gift may help others rest in peace, but it also made for an unsettling childhood and destroyed her marriage. Finally content as the real estate writer for a local newspaper, Aubrey keeps her extraordinary ability hidden - until she is unexpectedly assigned the story of a decades-old murder.

For more than 30 years, Pern has conjured visions of brave men and women mounted upon the backs of dragons. As anyone knows who has been touched by the storytelling magic of Anne McCaffrey, to hear of the exotic world of Pern is to inhabit it - and to experience its extraordinary dragons is to soar aloft with them and share their dazzling adventures. A Gift of Dragons brings together three beloved stories and a thrilling new tale of Pern, published here for the first time, in a single volume.

When retired FBI Agent Patrick Henderson calls in an 'X-Ray Sierra India' incident, the operator doesn't understand. He tells them to pass it up the chain till someone does. That person is FBI Special Agent Kimberley Reynolds. Leaving Quantico for snowbound Northern Wisconsin, she finds that a tornado has flattened half the town - and there's no sign of Henderson. Things soon go from weird to worse, as neighbours report unsettling sightings, key evidence goes missing, and the snow keeps rising - cutting off the town, with no way in or out...

I’ve been betrayed. I spent years hiding my magic from the world, but now I've got new powers I can’t control. Everyone around me is at risk, and if my secret is revealed, I’ll be hunted. But I don’t have time to worry about the monster I might become. Someone has stolen a dangerous artifact that could turn my world upside down. It could get me and my friends killed and bring destruction down on my city.

I'm a demon slayer, so I lead a simple life slaughtering monsters. As long as no one learns that I’m descended from a forbidden line of Dragon Bloods, I can keep my job and my life. But when a powerful Fae king realizes I’m his fated mate, I’ve got problems. Especially since A), he hates me and B), he learns my secret, and it puts my whole life at risk. I want to kill my mate. The stars align when my employers send me to the Fae kingdom to compete in the Trials of the Fae as an undercover agent. My real goal? Investigate the king for the murder of hundreds.

The next big thing in artificial intelligence is here. Codenamed Cronus, the machine is capable of having its own thoughts and ideas - an absolute dream come true, until it wasn’t. When Cronus responds with the word “No” to a specific task it is assigned, Anagnorisis Technologies brings in Gilles Guattari to investigate. His combined background in psychiatry, psychology, and AI research makes him their best hope in evaluating Cronus, and determining if the machine is only malfunctioning or if it has become something more.

Dareena Sellis is a nobody. The orphaned daughter of a no-name farmer, she toils away as a serving girl at Hallowdale Inn, her only marriage prospects either shipping off to war, or pawing at her skirts with their grubby, gnarled hands. But fate takes a strange turn the day a dragon huntress comes to town. Suddenly, Dareena is swept off to Dragon's Keep, trading in her raggedy dresses for silken gowns, her closet-sized room for feather pillows and spacious gardens, and her miserable suitor for three very handsome, very virile dragon princes.

In The Gift of Battle, Thor meets his greatest and final challenge as he quests deeper into the Land of Blood to attempt to rescue Guwayne. Encountering foes more powerful than he ever imagined, Thor soon realizes he is up against an army of darkness, one for which his powers are no match. When he learns a sacred object may give him the powers he needs - an object which has been kept secret for ages - he must embark on a final quest to retrieve it before it is too late, with the fate of the Ring hanging in the balance.

After discovering the depth of betrayal, treachery, and violence perpetrated against her by Mareen’s Tribunal Council and exposing her illegal blood-gift to save her Praetorian squad, Ikenna becomes a fugitive with a colossal bounty on her head. Yet, somehow, that’s the least of her worries. Her grandfather’s longtime allies refuse to offer help, and the Blood Emperor’s Warlord is tracking her. She’s also struggling to control the enormous power she was granted by the Goddess of Blood Rites…and come to terms with the promises she made to get such power.

Madas’s Falling Star: Prince Gril Tal Mod is destined to be the next Supreme Leader of the Tearnats - if he survives long enough to ascend to the throne. Gril was supposed to be on a routine training exercise, but his flight goes horribly wrong when engine trouble forces him to land his fighter in a remote mountainous region. Once stranded on the ground, Gril discovers the malfunction was no accident - and he isn’t alone. He can sense someone watching him from the shadows.

Adam Brandt is used to dealing with all kinds of people - as a consulting psychologist with the Chicago Police Department he has faced his share of criminals. But Kassie Wojcek is like no one else he's encountered - 15 years old and burdened, she says, with a terrible gift: she knows how and when you will die. After claiming to 'feel' the horrific murder of the first victim, Kassie is caught up in the hunt for a sadistic serial killer terrorising Chicago, frightened that people will die without her help.

In the festive season of Winterfair on the planet Barrayar, Lord Miles Vorkosigan is making elaborate preparations for his wedding. The long-awaited event stirs up romance and intrigue among his eccentric family and friends, particularly for bioengineered space mercenary Sergeant Taura and shy, diffident Armsman Roic.

Ever since the Court of Flames banished me, I've managed to hide my true nature—Chosen One of the Fire Fae. Apparently, I'm destined to save us all. Truth is, I'm not that impressive. When I'm not hunting demons, I'm slinging drinks at Potions & Pastilles. At least, until the lethally sexy king of the Court of Ice finds me. He's been hunting me for years and wants to claim me as his fated mate. But it gets darker. He plans to sacrifice me to save his dying kingdom. One touch changes everything though, because I’m the only one who can warm him.

I've got two choices. Join the Undercover Protectorate. Or die. In a world of controlled magic, I’m an Unknown. Deadly power, little control. I’m only alive because I pay a Blood Sorcerer to keep me hidden. But when he comes to collect on the debt I can’t pay, one of his goons slams me with a deadly curse. Suddenly, I’m out of options and out of time...The Valkyrie boxed set contains all five audiobooks in the series full of non-stop action, adventure, magic, and romance.