Seductive Studs ~ Panthers Lurking

November 27, 2015 by Alexis Duran

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 an excerpt from Curse of Salar, Book 3 in the Masters and Mages series, due to be released in January 2016. This scene is in the POV of Captain Rayn Nevar, a soldier who’s just attended a formal ceremony in the palace as head of the escort for Minister Havran. He can’t stop thinking about Prince Dezra.

From a distance across the hall, the prince had met Rayn’s expectations of a beautiful but pampered royal. Observing the prince provided more entertainment than listening to the speeches, but a persistent erection wasn’t enough to overcome Rayn’s natural aversion to undeserving elites and sorcery, both of which were wrapped up in the person of Prince Dezra.

Despite this, Rayn hadn’t been able stop staring at the prince. Prince Dezra sat motionless most of the evening and appeared to drift in a dreamlike state. Rayn had heard he was addicted to harrar and spent his life in a luxurious fog. In his trance, Dezra’s long black lashes brushed his high cheekbones, and his wide lips curled into an amused half smile. Rayn had seen the expression on the face of many an idle courtier.

Then Rayn’s training as a scout took over, and he soon decided the prince wasn’t dozing at all but intently listening to every word. His body had the tautness of a grazing deer aware of panthers lurking at the edges of his idyll meadow.

***

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.

***

Don’t forget to confine the hop at the Seductive Studs home page. Lots of steamy m/m goodness goin’ on.

Weekend Writing Warriors ~ Classified

November 15, 2015 by Alexis Duran

Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors, the best place on the inter-web to discover your next favorite book.

Well, my little NaNoWriMo dreams have already burned up in the flames of reality, but as usual it’s due to good things. I’ve received the first round of edits for Curse of Salar, which means the release date is scary soon! Plus, I’ve signed on for a project with a February deadline, so…poor Eli is going to be stuck with the space marines for a while longer. Maybe I’ll end up publishing the whole story in snippets.

Last week, after an exchange of insults, Eli told the man in black about the other slave ship in the hopes the other captives might be rescued. This excerpt is from my space-opera-in-progress, From Mars, With Love.

***

The man in black didn’t seem upset about being called a habi-brat. Maybe he’d never even heard the slang, having never set his sanitized feet on the ground.

Eli caught up with the closest marine and grabbed his arm. This earned Eli a smack to the chest that sent him stumbling backwards.

The marine’s voice crackled out of the mic in his helmet, “I heard what you said about the sweeper. I’ll mic it up to Con, but don’t hold your breath; we’ve got bigger fish to fry.”

“Aren’t you supposed to stop slavers?” Eli demanded.

“Yeah, but we’ve got a report on alien smuggling earthside and—”

“That’s classified,” the man in black said sharply. The marine shut up and hurried away.

***

EUREKA -- Episode 505 "Jack of All Trades" -- Pictured: (l-r) Colin Ferguson as Sheriff Jack Carter, Salli Richardson-Whitfield as Allison Blake -- (Photo by: David Gray/Syfy)

I don’t know about you, but I miss all the fun-loving end-of-the-world disasters Colin Ferguson narrowly averted every week on Eureka. (Photo by: David Gray/Syfy)

***

This post is part of an ongoing blog hop hosted by Weekend Writing Warriors. Every Sunday, participating authors post eight to ten sentences from a published work or perhaps their current work in progress. Then we hop to our fellow warriors’ blogs and check out all the fabulous fiction that’s happening! I heartily invite you to participate as a reader, writer, or both. It’s a great way to discover your next favorite book. Click here or use the address: http://www.wewriwa.com

Weekend Writing Warriors ~ Tell It To The Marines

November 8, 2015 by Alexis Duran

Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors! This week I’m back to the adventures of Eli, otherwise known as From Mars, With Love, my space opera in progress. Maybe with help of NaNoWriMo it will stop being in-progress and start being in submission. One can only hope.

When we last left Eli he’d been rescued by the mysterious man in black and the space marines. Mystery man made an off-hand comment about how careless Eli must have been to be captured by a slave ship. Eli takes offense.

***

“Careless? What the fuck do you know about it, habi-brat? Have you ever seen one of those sweepers? They’re bigger than a city–” Eli broke off as thoughts more important than his pride crowded to the forefront. “Hey, the sweeper might still be in the vicinity. They abducted a hell of a lot more people than are in this cruiser. It’s deep space capable so I bet it hasn’t reached launch speed yet. You can still save them!”

“Tell it to the marines,” the man in black said, “I’m only along for the ride.”

***

Rahul Kohli of iZombie, is not taking his gun-weilding responsibilities seriously.

***

My Sexy Saturday ~ Never Him

November 7, 2015 by Alexis Duran

Happy Sexy Saturday! It’s been way too long since I played, but wow, what a crazy October I had. Anyway, I’m glad to be back. At first I thought I didn’t have anything that quite fit this week’s theme “While you were sexy” which is a play on the movie “While You Were Sleeping”. Then I remember this little tidbit from a story of mine that was supposed to be a flash piece but rapidly morphed into a novella.

Drummond Alloway is a supporting character from To Catch a Threeve. I always wanted to give him his own story. Here’s the snippet in 7 paragraphs:

~~~

“Bloody Boulders of Briggar,” Drummond muttered. What was the crown prince doing wandering about alone at night? Prince Tyran had overseen the opening solstice festivities with his usual contemptuous expression firmly in place, withdrawing in boredom hours ago. Had he snuck back out to participate in the common people’s lewd celebrations? The thought made Drummond’s breeches uncomfortably tight in the groin area. The thought of grabbing the severely underdressed princeling and giving him a bit of common discipline brought a rush of heat to Drummond’s face.

“Oh, no. Not him. Never him,” Drummond pleaded with the unfamiliar sensations taking control of his body. Tyran was a typical noble; snooty, spoiled, self-absorbed and irritatingly sharp of tongue. That he was beautiful only added to his disturbing personality.

“Men are not beautiful,” Drummond said to the prince’s back. “They are brick shaped ogres like me, or they are fey, flighty creatures like this here…” It was no good. Drummond considered leaving the prince to his nocturnal gadabout, but by now it was obvious Tyran was either sleep walking or in a trance. This was confirmed when the prince walked into the icy river without slowing. He’d chosen a place where the water was deep and the current swift. He waded in, rapidly up to his waist.

Drummond lunged after him, catching Tyran by an arm just as he was about to vanish beneath the surface. Drummond wasn’t much of a swimmer, particularly not when fully dressed in leather doublet, wool tunic, breeches and weighted down with sword and sheath on a thick belt. Prince Tyran kept trying to move forward and they both ended up under water, Drummond’s arms wrapped around the prince’s waist, his bulk pushing him deeper instead of rescuing him as he’d intended. He struggled to find purchase on the rocky bottom and burst to the surface, bringing the prince along with him.

The prince awakened from his trance spitting, thrashing and flailing. “Where am I? What are you…? Help! Help! I’m being murdered!”

“Oh, shut up. I’m saving your silly ass, Your Highness!”

Despite the thrashing bundle of muscles in his arms, Drummond managed to drag the prince out of the water and collapse with him in the shallows along the shore. As soon as Drummond relaxed his grip, Tyran scrambled away on all fours, coughing and cursing. Drummond couldn’t help but observe the tight royal ass flex and ripple as the sodden fabric of his nightshirt clung to every curve and crevice. This is my reward for saving it, Drummond thought, giving in to the small pleasure now the prince was out of danger.

~~~

Poor Drummond. If only he could find a nice boy to settle down with.

Don’t forget to continue the Sexy Saturday hop. There’s a lot of sexy snippets out there for your enjoyment, only a click away.

Seductive Studs ~ Such Devotion

November 7, 2015 by Alexis Duran

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 an excerpt from Curse of Salar, Book 3 in the Masters and Mages series. In this scene Prince Mira is dreaming of a forbidden dalliance with a soldier from outside the court. His allegedly devoted servant Jai has made the mistake of revealing his jealousy.

***

Jai blanched white beneath his tan, his eyes wide. “No! Please believe me Prince Mira, I think only of you.” He advanced, knelt in front of Mira and took his hand, which he kissed and pressed to his forehead. Mira almost believed him. It would be pleasant to believe in such devotion.

He placed a palm on Jai’s silken hair, a signal he was no longer angry. Jai shifted his cheek so that it pushed against Mira’s cock and smoothly slid a hand along Mira’s thigh.

Mira sat back against the edge of the wall and placed his hands behind him on either side. Jai deftly undid the tie of Mira’s loose pants. Mira titled his head back and gazed up at the faint spray of stars. The lights of the capitol city dimmed their radiance, as life in the palace dimmed all the keener sensations of life.

***

Stay tuned for the soon to be revealed release date!

The blurb:

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

Prince Mira 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 Matisse. Mira is irresistibly drawn to the rough soldier and his longing for a simple sexual encounter quickly morphs into a dangerous obsession.

Captain Rayn Matisse knows he should stay far away from Prince Mira, but his desire for the beautiful young man overrides all common sense. Despite the fact that Mira’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 Mira’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 Mira’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 Mira must decide if ultimate power is worth the ultimate sacrifice.

***

Don’t forget to confine the hop at the Seductive Studs home page. Lots of steamy m/m goodness goin’ on.

Weekend Writing Warriors ~ And now for something completely different

November 1, 2015 by Alexis Duran

Hi! Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors. I’ve been MIA way too long and my list of excuses is even longer, so I’ll spare you the sob story and move on to the snippet.

This week I’m excited to announce the release of the anthology ShadowSpinners: A Collection of Dark Tales. No erotica, but plenty of chills. My snippet is the first ten lines from my story Reduce Reuse Recycle.

***

JAKE WONDERED WHY HE WAS IN THE BATHTUB with his clothes on. Icy moonlight wavered in the through the obscuring glass and stroked the ceiling with crystalline wave patterns. The faucet dripped a rhythm he couldn’t quite place. His fingers curled stiff and blue against the white porcelain. He hadn’t planned on dying so young, but then he hadn’t planned on being a drug-addicted sex worker either.

Alternately aware and unaware of his surroundings, his skin tingled and then went numb. His heart fluttered then stalled. Droplets from imaginary steam slid down blue tiled walls and collected on his eyelashes. He tried moving, but that didn’t pan out. He relived the choices that led to this moment, this pathetic death in a stranger’s bathtub.

***

Yeah, it’s a little dark. If you like fiction with an edge, A Collection of Dark Tales is now available in both print and ebook versions on Amazon. ShadowSpinners is an amazing group of writers and I’m pretty tickled to have been included.