Top 5 Tips For Hanging Out With The Black Harbingers
(5) Don't ask about London's treasure. As a
half-troll, London is formidable in size and strength. Because she's only part
troll, she's not bound to any one bridge in the city. Still, she likes
collecting baubles and pretties, storing them I a treasure box buried under her
favorite passover. Many won't find any value in the rocks and polished glass
she finds, but there are always those who believe that there are least one or
two items of value worth taking the risk. The last time someone stole London's
horde, she'd chased the French-Canadian captain back to his vessel. Even with a
harpoon through one leg, she'd retrieved her chest and sunk the unlucky ship.
At least once a year, someone finds where London has buried her treasure only
to lose their lives when she takes it back. If she thinks you're interested,
she might just break a limb or two to dissuade your curiosity.
(4) Don’t call Hog fat. Not only will you get a
beat down for being disrespectful, Hog is a hedge witch. Able to walk the line
between life and death, hedge witches can also create way points, following
both physical lines (streets) and metaphorical ones (connecting unrelated
archways). Piss him off and you could walk through a doorway and exit through
another on the other side of the hemisphere.
(3) Whatever you do, don't scoff when you are
told Thorne is a scorpion shifter. You would think that hearing her shifter
type would garner a bit of caution and people would keep a respectful distance.
But there are those who are infinitely stupid and don't think before they
speak. There has been more than one poor fool who believed that Thorne
transforms into a palm-sized scorpion, not stopping to remember where scorpion
shifters actually came from... The blood of Medusa created Thorne's people. The
older they are the bigger their shifted form. Thorne is considered young by her
people's standards, meaning her scorpion is the size of a Newfoundland. Some
don't believe this until they see her shift, then they piss themselves before
fleeing.
(2) Don't take scale shed from Newt. At one
time, snake shifters believe those born like Newt—who couldn't make a full
shift—were the sacred children of the revered Mayan supreme god Itzamna. But in
recent history, many came to believe those who couldn't achieve full transformation
into a snake weren't children of a god but the product of too much mating with
humans. Zamna's like Newt were forced from the snake pits and many died, unable
to adjust to living alone among the humans. Those who survived where later
sought out by the snake shifters who belatedly realized the error of their
assumptions. They couldn't breed without ingesting the discarded scales of
those shunned Zamna. Nowadays, the Zamna leave the pits of their own accord and
collaborate with other Zamnas to sell their shed. If you take one, thinking to
make a tidy profit, you'd better rethink your logic. Female snake shifters can
scent shed from miles away. They are deadly and will gleefully tear you to
pieces in order to claim the coveted scale. Newt has been known to send a small
bag of shed to his enemy and then letting slip where there are unclaimed scales
to be had for free.
(1) No matter how tempted, don't kiss
Nightingale. No one knows which fae court Night came from and he has never
invited anyone to ask. Those who dare to speculate why Night doesn't live among
his own people whisper he was spurned because of his deadly kiss. Not that he
has killed anyone by puckering up but people are known to forget little things,
such as what they did that day, to big things like who they are. So if you want
to keep your memories intact, no matter how tempting Night is, don't press your
lips to his because no one comes away unscathed.
Thank you for stopping by and reading!!
Title: Death Mask
Series: Black Harbingers MC
Author(s): Lexi Ander
Cover Artist: Kirby Crow
Categories: Gay, Urban Fantasy, Fairy Tales,
Roughhouse Raiders
Length: 43,000 words
Release Date: November 9, 2016
Blurb:
Grim Misery, the President of the Black Harbinger Motorcycle
Club, discovers a wounded warlock and four werepups aboard the club's LSD
shipment. And the news kept getting better and better. Not only is the warlock
sitting on the edge of death, he's illegally bonded to the werepups, which
could trigger a war with the werewolves—and he turns out to be Misery's
estranged husband.
Years ago, Griffin turned Misery away to be with another warlock by the name of Marcheso Aldo. Misery left everything behind, even his family, but couldn't shake the heartbreak Griffin caused. With Griffin thrust back into Misery's life, he discovers things aren't as they seem... and everything is about to get much, much worse.
Years ago, Griffin turned Misery away to be with another warlock by the name of Marcheso Aldo. Misery left everything behind, even his family, but couldn't shake the heartbreak Griffin caused. With Griffin thrust back into Misery's life, he discovers things aren't as they seem... and everything is about to get much, much worse.
Excerpt:
Chapter
One
"Death is not the greatest loss in life.
The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live." ~Norman Cousins
"Prez,
you're gonna want to take a look at this." Nightingale, Sergeant in Arms
of the Black Harbingers MC, called to me from the tail end of the box truck
that recently arrived from the docks. The products the vehicle carried included
the much-awaited shipment of LSD for the city's elder vampires. The goods were
late by one week, and I had some agitated parasites on my hands. If someone so
much as fucked with the shite, they would be in a world of hurt, because I had
no qualms feeding the arseholes to the bloodsuckers.
The clubhouse
for the MC was a repurposed three-story library. The block had been slated for
demolition after World War II to make way for a strip mall or some such. I
loved the building, with its Grecian columns, marble floors, and the liberal
use of dark woods. She had character, and after I greased a few palms, she
became our clubhouse, our home.
On the
ground floor, to the rear of the building, were two bay doors. Semis could back
up to one of them, allowing people to walk into the bed without using a ramp.
The second bay, vehicles drove directly onto the dock. Granted, unloading the
boxes was harder, but we didn't have to worry about prying eyes and for this
shipment, we needed complete privacy.
By the
tone of Night's voice, I wouldn't like what I'd see. One of the prospects had
been sent to retrieve the truck from the docks. Not quite members of the MC,
prospects were initiates working through the probationary period. Simply put,
they were the club's gofers. They did anything and everything the brothers asked
of them. They guarded the bikes in public places, manned the doors at the
parties, and made sure no one unauthorized entered the clubhouse. If a
brother's old lady needed to go somewhere, a prospect escorted them. The list
of shitty duties was endless. At the end of the probation period, the brothers
voted the prospect in or out, but until then, the prospect did what they were
told, without complaint. Our newest prospect, Tinman, who'd picked up the box
truck, stood off to the side looking concerned, but not afraid.
"The
truck was where you'd said it'd be, Misery. There weren't any problems and no
one followed me," he said, without prompting.
When I
rounded the rear of the non-descript vehicle, the door was rolled up, exposing
the back of the compartment, stacked with boxes. Nightingale stood with his
arms crossed over his chest, his cut hidden by the muscular bulk of his arms.
At one time, he'd been a Noble Fae. From which court, I'd never asked. When
most preternaturals came looking to join the Black Harbingers, they left behind
who they once were. The brothers only cared about the here and now, content to
leave whatever hell they'd escaped in the past. We all carried secrets best
left undisturbed, and we let sleeping dogs lie, so to speak.
Those who
didn't know of Nightingale's origins wouldn't have believed he belonged to that
waif-like race. He'd shed his litheness, becoming a motherfucking powerhouse of
strength and muscle. Even his unnaturally-white hair, which many people assumed
the poor bastard had gone gray early, didn't soften his appearance. Most bikers
didn't have facial piercings because they stumbled into too many fistfights,
but not Night. He wore a ring in the right nostril and two in his bottom lip
that he fiddled with when something bothered him, like now. When he met my
gaze, his green eyes were troubled. Then the scent hit me.
Blood.
When I
went to ask what the fuck he was waiting for, Night placed a pale finger over
his lips, biding me to listen. The sound was faint, but the soft whines of some
kind of dog or… Well, fuck me sideways.
"Someone
find Hog and Lalios." My request was made in a low voice, but the brothers
jumped to it as if I'd yelled. Perhaps they felt my tension or they, too,
scented the blood wafting from the back of the truck, now that the door had
been raised.
More than
one person drew a weapon. Grabbing the handrail on the side of the door, I
readied to climb into the back.
"Misery,"
Night called to me softly, but I ignored him.
Even if
werewolves had hidden in the truck, I didn't worry about my safety. The sound
of the pitiful, tiny snarls and growls intensified when my heavy boots struck
the bed. Pausing to listen, I couldn't hear an adult voice among the pups. With
the scent of blood heavier in the confines of the cabin, I surmised the parent
was severely injured. A werewolf in pain was a dangerous creature, more animal
than man. Blinded by the agony, instinct would take over, and he, or she, would
attack first to protect their young. If that were to happen, then I was the one
equipped to handle the werewolf. Sure, I could be hurt like anyone else, but I
was hard to kill. Living for almost two hundred years had proven that.
Listening
intently, I heard three, perhaps four distinct voices, which was surprising. Nowadays,
werewolves lived longer than they did five hundred years ago. When they became
the stuff of folklore, people stopped hunting them. Since they lived a more
peaceful existence, the number of litters they birthed dropped off to where
pups were now born singly to couples every hundred years or so. The young were
precious to the packs and there being four here made my skin crawl with
foreboding. The day kept getting better and better.
Giveaway
The giveaway will run through midnight on November 25th.
Must be 18 or order to participate.
Giving Away Two (2) Signed Paperbacks of Death
Mask
Lexi has
always been an avid reader, and at a young age started reading (secretly) her
mother’s romances (the ones she was told not to touch). She was the only
teenager she knew of who would be grounded from reading. Later, with a pencil
and a note book, she wrote her own stories and shared them with friends because
she loved to see their reactions. A Texas transplant, Lexi now kicks her boots
up in the Midwest with her Yankee husband and her eighty-pound puppies named
after vacuum cleaners.
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