Welcome to Seductive Studs, the blog hop dedicated to m/m romance by the people who read, write and review it.

This week I’m sharing another excerpt from Curse of Salar, Book 3 in the Masters and Mages series, release date January 5, 2016.

I’m picking up right after last week’s snippet.  Prince Dezra is getting a little hot and bothered at an official state function.

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Stop it, he ordered himself, or people will mistake the heat in your face for rage at the Armazins. You’re not supposed to care. Not supposed to care that his family had been wiped out. A burning desire to stand and rain curses on the head of the traitorous Armazin minister swept through him. He stared at his feet and thought about diving into the bathing pools in the courtyard garden. The image helped cool him off until Captain Nevar joined him in his vision, naked and wet, sending Dezra into another spiral of lust and rage. And yet he sat stone still, suppressing wave after wave of powerful emotion. When would this agony end?

Finally the minister concluded her speech, and the Armazins withdrew. Now the captain avoided looking at him. Dezra took this as a victory. As a living god, he could be intimidating when he put his mind to it. No one was ever entirely purged of superstition, after all. He watched the captain’s easy movements with pleasure, his strong back muscles detectable beneath the fluid silk shirt as he returned to his table at the far end of the hall.

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Blurb for Masters and Mages 3: Curse of Salar

In the desert kingdom of Jahar, the rule of mages has been overthrown and the ancient lineage of sorcerer kings wiped out. Prince Dezra and his sister are the last living members of the royal family and are held prisoners in their ancestral palace.

Prince Dezra lives a life of lies and deceit. In order to stay alive, he must pretend to be a drug-addicted wastrel, trusting no one, isolated from even his sister who has chosen to cooperate with the government that executed their parents.

Into his lonely existence comes a man who should be his sworn enemy; Captain Rayn Nevar. Dezra is irresistibly drawn to the rough soldier and his longing for a simple sexual encounter quickly morphs into a dangerous obsession.

Captain Rayn Nevar knows he should stay far away from Prince Dezra, but his desire for the beautiful young man overrides all common sense. Despite the fact that Dezra’s ancestors destroyed Rayn’s family, the captain finds himself in a position of protecting the prince from the many schemers who believe the last of the mages should be annihilated.

When treachery leads to Dezra’s escape, he is at last free to bond with the serpent god Ka’alar and develop his long repressed powers. Only the arrival of a mysterious monk with powers greater than Dezra’s stops the prince from using black sorcery to destroy all who stand in his way, including Rayn.

As Jahar edges toward another war between masters and mages, Rayn must question his devotion to his increasingly deadly lover while Dezra must decide if ultimate power is worth the ultimate sacrifice.

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