by
Shrike, the Butcher of Blackthorn, is a legendary warrior of the fae realms. When he wins a tournament in the Court of the Silver Wheel, its queen names him her Oak King - a figurehead destined to die in a ritual duel to invoke the change of seasons. Shrike is determined to survive. Even if it means he must put his heart as well as his life into a mere mortal’s hands.
Wren Lofthouse, a London clerk, has long ago resigned himself to a life of tedium and given up his fanciful dreams. When a medieval-looking brute arrives at his office to murmur of destiny, he’s inclined to think his old enemies are playing an elaborate prank. Still, he can’t help feeling intrigued by the bizarre-yet-handsome stranger and his fantastical ramblings, whose presence stirs up emotions Wren has tried to lock away in the withered husk of his heart.
As Shrike whisks Wren away to a world of Wild Hunts and arcane rites, Wren is freed from the repression of Victorian society. But both the fae and mortal realms prove treacherous to their growing bond. Wren and Shrike must fight side-by-side to see who will claim victory - Oak King or Holly King.
- 1 Read list
Publisher: Independently Published
Cover Artists:
Genres:
Pairings: M-M
Heat Level: 5
Romantic Content: 4
Ending: Click here to reveal
Character Identities: Gay
Protagonist 1 Age: Ageless/Immortal
Protagonist 2 Age: 26-35
Tropes: Badass Hero, Hurt / Comfort
Word Count: 150000
Languages Available: English
The Court of the Silver Wheel
The Fae Realms
Autumnal Equinox
The crisp wind howled across the tourney field, scattering scarlet leaves. Their hue matched the blood trickling from the wounds of the fallen, who lay in a haphazard pattern as if the wind had scattered them as well. Some struggled upright and limped towards the boundary of the mêlée, where their squires and servants waited amidst the roaring crowd to staunch their wounds. Some crawled. Some could do little more than groan as they waited out the battle’s end. A few would never rise again.
Two combatants remained on their feet, their sword hilts locked together in a contest of brute strength, their snarling faces inches apart.
READ MOREShrike, who had slain several of the corpses on the field, stared unblinking into the mercurial eyes of his opponent. These eyes belonged to a knight whom the court considered quite beautiful, and it was said the knight’s altered their colour with his moods. To Shrike, they had appeared gleaming green when the battle commenced. Now they’d faded to an icy blue, and paled with every passing second as he watched them. The knight’s lips had taken on a blue tinge as well, twisted in a lupine snarl to reveal doubled canines as sharp as his longsword. The blood-slicked blade crossed against Shrike’s own to form a shining scarlet X between their close-pressed chests. The well-honed edges—Shrike’s with more nicks and notches than the knight’s—scraped against the ringed mail beneath the knight’s tabard and scored the leather armour over Shrike’s tunic.
“Yield!” the knight hissed between clenched teeth.
Some scant moments before, an errant shield-bash had split Shrike’s lip open. Shrike had cut down the shield’s wielder, who now lay groaning into the dirt a stone’s throw away. Still, Shrike’s lip bled. He licked the blood from his chin now and darted his head forward between the crossed blades to crush the knight’s mouth beneath his kiss.
The knight jerked his head back—or attempted to, at least, before Shrike bit his tongue.
And in that instant of shock and outrage, Shrike sank his dagger into the hollow beneath the knight’s flailing left arm.
Blood poured forth. Each successive wave came weaker than the last, the blade having pierced the knight’s heart. The hot torrent soaked through Shrike’s tunic sleeve. The copper stench of fresh-spilt blood joined with the miasma of gore that hung over the tourney field.
Shrike stared into the knight’s eyes as their ice-blue faded to silver-white. Then they rolled back, and the knight collapsed in Shrike’s arms. His sword scraped against Shrike’s cheek as it fell to the ground. Blood for blood, Shrike supposed, and dropped him.
The victory horn resounded over the tourney field. The rising cheer of the crowd swallowed up its echo.
Few of the fae scattered around him were dead. Fae did not perish so easily. Even a knife to the heart could heal with time. The mercurial-eyed knight, like most of his rank lying broken over the tourney field, had a squire, a page, and very likely a gentle lover to tend his wounds and mend his armour so he might fight another day. Shrike, as a mere knave, had none. He would not have been permitted to stride out on the tourney field at all if the queen had not called for a general mêlée in which fae of all rank could compete for her favour.
And as the pages and squires and gentle friends swarmed the battlefield to rescue the wounded, Shrike stumbled through alone, a single minnow swimming against their overwhelming current, towards his queen.
COLLAPSE
