Praise for C.E. MURPHY and her books
THE NEGOTIATOR
Hands of Flame âFast-paced action and a twisty-turny plot make for a good read ⦠Fans of the series will be sad to leave Margritâs world behind, at least for the time being.â âRT Book Reviews
House of Cards âViolent confrontations add action on top of tense intrigue in this involving, even thrilling, middle book in a divertingly different contemporary fantasy romance series.â âLOCUS
âThe second title in Murphyâs Negotiator series is every bit as interesting and fun as the first. Margrit is a fascinatingly complex heroine who doesnât shy away from making difficult choices.â
âRT Book Reviews
Heart of Stone â[An] exciting series opener ⦠Margrit makes for a deeply compelling heroine as she struggles to sort out the sudden upheaval in her professional and romantic lives.â âPublishers Weekly
âA fascinating new series ⦠as usual, Murphy delivers interesting worldbuilding and magical systems, believable and sympathetic characters and a compelling story told at a breakneck pace.â
âRT Book Reviews
Leaving a world is hard to do. Three books in, and as a writer youâve really gotten into its depths and peopleâve begun to ask interesting questions that make you think of things you never thought of before. There are backstories to fill in and futures to consider, and they rarely settle back to sleep without putting up a bit of a fight.
This is the second time Iâve finished a trilogy, and the second time that Iâve been left thinking, âThere are still a lot of books I could write for this worldâ¦.â E-mail has suggested that people might be glad if I didâand someday I very probably will.
But now itâs back to the Walker Papers for me! Iâve written a lot of books since Coyote Dreams, and I miss Jo and the gang, so I hope Iâll see all of you there in a few monthsâ time.
Catie
For Sarah
who was the first to want an Alban of her own
Thanks are, as usual, due to both my agent,
Jennifer Jackson, and my editor, Mary-Theresa Hussey, for their insights. It turns out Matrice really did read the acknowledgments in the last two books, and it was with great relief that I discovered she thought Iâd gotten it almost entirely right this time.
Iâll never be able to say thank you enough to cover
artist Chris McGrath, or the art department, who have worked together to give me gorgeous books to show off.
Ted (and my parents, and my agent, but mostly
Ted, since heâs the one who has to live with me) did a remarkable job of keeping me more or less functional during the writing of this book, and that was no easy task. I love you, hon, and I couldnât do this without you.
NIGHT MARES DROVE HER out of bed to run.
Sheâd become accustomed to another sort of dream over the last weeks: erotic, exotic, filled with impossible beings and endless possibility. But these were different, burning images of a manâs death in flames. Not by flame, but in it: the color of her dreams was ever-changing crimson licked with saffron, as though varying the light might result in a happier ending.
It never did.
The scent of salt water rose up, more potent in recollection than it had been in reality. It tangled brutally with the smell of copper before the latter won out, blood flavor tangy at the back of her throat. She couldnât remember if sheâd actually smelled it, but her dreams tasted of it.
Small kindness: fire burned those odors away, whether they were real or not. But that left her with flame again, and for all that she was proud of her running speed, she couldnât outpace the blaze.
There was a dragon in the fire, red and sinuous and deadly. It battled a pale creature of immense strength; of unbreaking stone. A gargoyle, so far removed from human imagination that there were no legends of them, as there were of so many of their otherworldly brethren.
Between them was another creature: a djinn, one of mankindâs imaginings, but not of the sort to grant wishes. It drifted in its element of air, clearly forgotten by dragon and gargoyle alike, though it was the thing they fought over. It faded in and out of solidity, impossible to strike when it didnât attack. But there were moments of vulnerability, times when to do damage it must become part of the world. It became real with a weapon lifted to strike the dragon a deathblow.
And she, who had been nothing more than an unremembered observer, struck back. She fired a weapon of absurd proportions: a childâs watergun, filled with salt water.
The djinn died, not from the streams of water, but from their result. The gargoyle pounced, moving as she had: to save the dragon. But salt water bound the djinn to solidity, and heavy stone crushed the slighter creatureâs fragile form.
The silence that followed was marked by the snapping of fire.
Margrit ground her teeth together and ran harder, trying to escape her nightmares.
She struggled not to look up as she ran. It had been almost two weeks since sheâd sent Alban from her side, and every night since then sheâd been driven to the park in the small hours of the morning. Not even her housemates knew she was running: she was careful to slip in and out of the apartment as quietly as she could, avoiding Cole as he got up for his early shift, leaving his fiancée asleep. It was best to avoid him, especially. Nothing had been the same since heâd glimpsed Alban in his broad-shouldered gargoyle form.