I came back to find that "Stolen Away," a fantasy romance short story in a Venetian-inspired setting, is available in the October issue of The Samhellion.
The formatting's a bit wonky, so I went ahead and posted it on my site as well.
More after I recover from jetlag and meet a deadline.
Put up the beginnings of a couple of the science fiction stories that are progressing nicely.
Put up Beneath Their Masks. No actual sex in this story; putting it in would have meant writing a different, longer arc.
Emaris woke cradled in Tedraun's arms, a row of faces staring down at her. Masks lined the walls of every chamber in his home, every imaginable beast depicted in a cacophony of shapes and colors.
"It's a good thing Mayfly Night's finally come," she murmured into his ear.
Put up the second one, "From a Garden Evening":
They had always told her that subtlety was best, but in their excitement they gave her a gold-embroidered robe to wear, and set jewels in her hair, and sprayed too much perfume upon her wrists, behind her ears, between her breasts. They all but pushed her through the curtain of tiny threaded bells, which announced her presence to the man sitting patiently upon a cushion on the garden patio.
She sank to the ground and made obeisance gracefully, not looking up until he said, "How are you called?"
"Mayremie, my lord," she said. He was, of course, quite unlike all the descriptions. But no seated man was that tall, especially if he was usually astride his war-steed, and no shoulders could be as broad without armor. It had taken no giant to conquer all the known lands of the east, only a man. This man.
I started two new stories; snippets are up:
