Prequel to the Daughters of the Dagger series

Mirabelle de Burgh is desperate to give her husband an heir. She's heard of the superstition that to buy a jeweled dagger from a blind old hag would ensure her of conceiving a child. One child for each dagger bought.

The old hag she hunts down has many jeweled daggers, but Mirabelle has limited coins and wants many children. Her greed gets her in trouble and she finds herself in a predicament which causes many circumstances in her life to change.

Four jeweled daggers and four daughters, each with a story, and a surprise later in life that none of them would ever suspect, in Daughters of the Dagger.

Spring has been raised as a warrior, not knowing she's been stolen as a baby by Cromwell Gunn. When her clan decides to launch a plan to seize their enemy's castle, she has no choice to go along with it. Shaw Gordon is laird and chieftain and also a widower with three children. He is looking for a wife. But he never expects the offer of his worst enemy's daughter in the form of an alliance.

Brody, captain of the Sea Mirage, finds himself a victim of his mutinous crew. When he's thrown overboard, he swims to an island. His vengeance of wanting to kill Old Man Muck, the pirate responsible for the upheaval, is what keeps him alive. Gwendolen Fisher is the daughter of a fisherman, trying desperately to fill the shoes of her three brothers, who have abandoned the family business and disappeared. When she spies a man adrift at sea, she convinces her father and the crew to help him. Once aboard the ship, the man is recognized as a pirate.

Hawke is the son of the well-known and respected laird Storm MacKeefe. When the King's chronicler arrives at the castle to record the heroic acts of the MacKeefe Clan, Hawke decides it is time for him to be noticed. But before he can devise a way to get mentioned in the Highland Chronicles, disaster strikes. A hunting trip turns into a deadly battle, and things go from bad to worse. Hawke is wounded and left for dead, and his grandfather, laird of the clan, is abducted by the enemy.

Lady Annalyse Granville is a cursed second-born twin. Because of superstition and fear that a second-born twin is naught but a spawn of the devil, she's been sent to live with the nuns. However, she returns to her father's castle at Christmastime at her sister's request. Her sister is the king's mistress and very pregnant with his baby. And what happens during Annalyse's visit changes her life forever.

Corbett Blake is a child who wants to be a knight and follow in his father's footsteps, but because he is gifted, he is sent to be a sorcerer's apprentice instead. Follow Corbett in this prequel in the Legacy of the Blade series.

Nicholas Vaughn is Lord of New Romney and also a Baron of the Cinque Ports. He directs a fleet of ships that service the king 15 days a year in exchange for special privileges. When Muriel Draper causes havoc on his wharf, he realizes she is a spinster - a woman who spins wool for a living - from the town. Her late father has angered the Clothmaker's Guild and now Muriel and her brother have been excommunicated from the guild and also left with a debt to the baron that he insists Muriel repays.

Can a rugged Highlander love a lass whose secrets threaten to ruin his one chance at redemption? And will a woman who has fallen in love with her captor be able to betray him if necessary?

Feared as a demon because of his two different colored eyes, as well as by his outlandish actions, Highlander, Onyx MacKeefe is known as a madman. While celebrating his birthday one cold night at a Lowland pub, he meets a bonnie Englishwoman who says she is searching for her father's murderer and thief. And when he recognizes the name of the person she seeks as his own mother, his birthday takes a bad turn.

Clever and bold, Ella Sutherland has won the right to call herself chief of her clan and struggles to hold onto the chiefdom against those who doubt a woman’s rule. When she’s captured by the darkly handsome Sinclair chief, she chooses death over wedding him and giving up her clan to their long-time enemy. For she has a secret, an oath she took years ago to protect and keep the clan seat for a great ruler to come. Cain refuses to let his brother, Death, honor Ella’s choice with an execution. He’s never before met a woman so brave and passionate.

A summons from court could be a dangerous thing, especially for Graham MacCoinnich. He says what he thinks, and his clan's treasonous rumblings coupled with their risky alliances cast both kith and kin in a dubious light. But King William's order turns out to be anything but dire. Surprising? Yes. Enticing? Without a doubt. The exquisite Lady Mercy Claxton, most cherished goddaughter of the king, requires a protective escort through Scotland and Graham is happy to offer his services.

The Douglas sisters, beauties all, are valuable pawns in their family's bitter struggle to control the Scottish Crown. But when powerful enemies threaten, each Douglas lass will find she must face them alone. Captured by a Laird Haunted by his father's violent death, David Hume, the new laird of Wedderburn, sets out to make his name so feared that no one will dare harm his family again. The treacherous ally who played on his father's weakness is dead and beyond David's vengeance, but his castle and young widow are ripe for the taking. The moment David lays eyes on the dark-haired beauty defending her wee daughters, however, he knows this frail-looking lass is the one person who could bring him to his knees. Wed at thirteen to a man who tried daily to break her spirit, Lady Alison Douglas is looking forward to a long widowhood. But when the fearsome warrior known as the Beast of Wedderburn storms her gates, she finds herself, once again, forced to wed a stranger. Alison is only a pawn to serve his vengeance, so why does this dark warrior arouse such fiery passion and an unwelcome longing in her heart? With death and danger looming, these two wounded souls must learn to trust each other; for only love can save them.

Lady Douglass de Clifford is reticent about marrying an English soldier who holds a Scottish castle for their king. Ater all, she doesn’t really believe the English should be battling the Scots for their own land. When she arrives in Dumfries, their party is unexpectedly ambushed. Besieged by rebel Scots, she is tossed from her horse, only to be saved by a Highland warrior who promises safety even as he absconds with her. She vows to run away, until his tender kiss makes her doubt everything she has ever known.

Lady Eve Sotherby dreams of escaping her horrid life in England, yet she has nowhere to run. So when she spies a posting for a companion in the Highlands, she seizes the chance to disappear. She’s heard tales about the barbaric Highlanders, of course, but no one can be worse than the beast she once foolishly agreed to wed. And never mind that she doesn’t meet any of the requirements for the position: must have no family, must love the cold, and must know the healing arts.

On the run from a dangerous man, Ava Sutton flees to the Isle of Mull off the coast of Scotland. Masquerading as a titled, English lady, Ava must convince the cynical and darkly handsome chief of the Macleans of Aros to wed her before the devil tracks her down. Tor Maclean, the new chief of Aros Castle, has sworn off marriage after his first wife tricked him into it. Despite his efforts to scare away the Englishwoman, his father arranged for him to wed, Tor is drawn to her fire, courage, and beauty.

At the flower-bedecked altar, the first touch of their hands ignited an all-consuming passion. Gavin Montgomery looked deep into her golden eyes and burned with desire for her...but his heart had been pledged to another. Humiliated and alone in a strange castle, Judith resolved to hate this husband who took her body but rejected her love...never admitting her fear of losing him.

Truth. Justice. Revenge. Behind these stands The Scotsman's Sword. When Lor Careston's quiet Highland village was attacked and burned, he felt helpless against the raiders who destroyed his home. Seeking revenge, but lacking the fighting skills he needs to execute his mission, he sets out to find the Ludus Caledonia - a mysterious fight guild that turns men into warriors. Lor trains hard, proves himself in the ring, and earns a place with the very clan that decimated his home, having decided to set his plan for revenge in motion from inside the clan.

English knight Sir Adam Dayne is offered the ultimate prize by the earl who raised him: lordship of Langford castle. All he must do is accept a betrothal to the Scottish Marcher warden's beautiful daughter, a match made to keep peace at the tumultuous Anglo-Scottish border. Sir Adam relishes the prospect - until he meets the woman he is to wed. Lady Cora Maxwell hates everything English, including the self-assured new lord who has claimed her hand in marriage. When Adam proposes a unique challenge, Cora is forced to face her greatest fears.

Duncan MacCoinnich's task... Travel to the twenty-first century Renaissance Faire, deflower the Druid virgins, and go home. Only his job is not so easily accomplished with the virgin in question, Tara McAllister. Time is running out. The evil is closing in on them both. Tara finds Duncan irresistible after what was supposed to be a mock hand-fasting binds them.

By edict of the king, the mighty Scottish laird Alec Kincaid must take an English bride. His choice was Jamie the feisty youngest daughter of Baron Jamison. Alec ached to touch her, to tame her, to possess her forever. But Jamie vowed never to surrender to this highland barbarian. Though his kisses fired her blood, shadowed secrets from Alec's past threatened Jamie's happiness. She brazenly resisted him - until one rapturous moment quelled their clash of wills.

All Highland warrior Gavin Patrick wants is to get back to his native Scotland. Before Gavin leaves the battlefield, he's given a final mission - escort Lady Marie Colette to her fiancé. Under no circumstances is he to lay hands on the beautiful heiress...no matter how desperate the temptation. Forced to pose as a married couple to escape from France, Gavin and Marie Colette find themselves thrown into peril...and each other's arms. As the danger mounts, so does forbidden passion.

1200 A.D.—After decades of warring between the Lairds of Kerr and Prudhoe Castle in Northumbria, a tentative peace is reached. The Lady Carington Kerr is sent to Prudhoe as a hostage to ensure her father's good behavior, and a more reluctant hostage there never was. Small and dark, with emerald eyes and a luscious figure, she is as gorgeous as she is fiery. Enter Sir Creed de Reyne; a gentle giant of a man, he is, by nature, calm and wise. He is the ice to Carington's fire.

Morgan Hayes grows up in the 20th century with a mysterious attraction to a hollow suit of armor that stands in the window of her mother’s antique store. She is 24 years old when she becomes entangled within the armor’s metal plates and is whisked back in time where she is mistaken for a twin sister she knows nothing about. Morgan is forced to marry King Henry’s favored knight, Derek Vanguard, Lord of Braddock Hall. Abandoned by his mother, Derek’s heart is as cold as the stone walls of his castle....

It should have been a case like any other: a missing princess, a king willing to pay in gold for her return. But before he realizes it, private investigator Eddie LaCrosse, a slightly shopworn sword jockey with a talent for discretion and detection, is swept up in a web of mystery and deceit involving a brutally murdered royal heir, a queen accused of an unspeakable crime, and the tragic past he thought he'd left behind.

New York Times best-selling author Hannah Howell is a master of Scottish historical romance. In Highland Hero, she shares four of her finest short stories featuring heroes as wild and captivating as the Highlands themselves.

In a small village in the nation of Droevinka, orphaned sisters Cline and Amelie Fawe scrape out a living selling herbal medicines in their apothecary shop. Cline earns additional money by posing as a seer and pretending to read people's futures. But they exist in a land of great noble houses, all vying for power, and when the sisters refuse the orders of a warlord prince, they must flee and are forced to depend on the warlord prince's brother, Anton, for a temporary haven.

A betrothal has been announced that will join together Britain's two most powerful families - a union of wealth and influence to rival even the King himself. However, not only does the ambitious King John oppose this wedding, but Milisant and Wulfric - the intended bride and groom - are equally unhappy with the arrangement. Two passionate, headstrong people, they resent being thrown together for purely dynastic reasons.

Seventeen-year-old Ismae escapes from the brutality of an arranged marriage into the sanctuary of the convent of St. Mortain, where the sisters still serve the gods of old. Here she learns that the god of Death himself has blessed her with dangerous gifts—and a violent destiny. If she chooses to stay at the convent, she will be trained as an assassin and serve as a handmaiden to Death. To claim her new life, she must destroy the lives of others.

Sharon Shinn's Twelve Houses books have fascinated fans and critics alike with their irresistible blend of fantasy, romance, and adventure. Now in Quatrain, she weaves compelling stories in four of the worlds that fans love in "Flight", "Blood", "Gold", and "Flame".

What do you do when your knight in shining armor lives, literally, in a different world? Most American teenagers want a vacation in Italy, but the Betarrini sisters have spent every summer of their lives among the romantic hills with their archaeologist parents. Stuck among the rubble of medieval castles in rural Tuscany on yet another hot, dusty archaeological site, Gabi and Lia are bored out of their minds … until Gabi places her hand atop a handprint in an ancient tomb and finds herself in 14th-century Italy.