Mark Willoughby Series

When Mark Willoughby is confronted by a woman who looks like both a witch and a ghost, his life abruptly changes. For it appears that he is “The One Marked by Willow” destined to save a strange land called Lazaronia, whose inhabitants have been cursed with infertility. Only the King and Queen managed to have a child, a daughter. But there is nobody in Lazaronia to marry her when she grows up. The King’s jealous brother Ignarius (who cast the infertility spell) has murdered King Lazarone and tried to pass himself off as the King. However, he couldn’t convince the Queen Regent, who has had to rule the land and simultaneously search the universe for a husband for her daughter. As if the idea of never seeing his family again isn’t enough, Mark also has to free the Goddess Lazaria, imprisoned on her ice-bound moon by Ignarius.

The story of how the young future King Lazarone III and his distant cousin Esmeralda find and hatch what appear to be the last eggs from the last two dragons of Lazaronia. A short-story prequel to the Mark Willoughby series.

“Where did she take you?” a voice hissed in his ears. “Tell me and I’ll let you go.” “Where did who take me?” Mark gasped. ... “... Where did that old hag Lazaria take you in your dreams?” “Nowhere: she just showed me how you—how you sent part of yourself out on the wind.” “And the dragons—the baby dragons? You saw those too, didn’t you?” There could be only one reason for Ignarius’s interest in Flame’s babies—and the wizard makes it quite clear that he is more than a match for any dragon. How can Mark and the Princess Esmé make sure Ignarius doesn’t succeed in killing Platinum, Ebony and Ash—especially as Ash is crippled and will never learn to fly properly? But when Flame leaves Mark to look after her babies, it seems it isn’t just the wizard who poses a threat to their safety. Mark finds himself helpless to stop the dragonlings from being stolen by a strange race of little people with extraordinary powers ...

... He looked down—straight into a pair of fiery yellow-green eyes. ... Mark caught a glimpse of a cavernous mouth full of sharp yellow teeth. The creature seemed to have no substance, but changed shape more rapidly than clouds in a high, blustery wind. Its eyes winked on and off. ... Each time they reappeared they came closer. ... Then suddenly the air seemed to get even colder and he saw there were two pairs of baleful eyes. ... Sharp icicles seemed to ripple through his bloodstream as realisation dawned: the creatures slowly circling him were trying to freeze him to death. The search for the golden key of the Tower of Kaleidoscopic Light has brought Mark and Esmé, separately, down into a terrible place of darkness and death where terror stalks them on every side. And it seems that even in Castle Lazarone treachery lurks ...

In the centre of the bier lay Ignarius in a simple white robe. ... A silver coronet was his only adornment. No king could have looked more regal or dignified. ... It was hard to believe so much evil existed within him. “Touch him!” Mirabell hissed into Esmé’s ear. ... The contact sent shudders of revulsion right through her. ... She found it impossible to believe living flesh could be so cold. Mirabell whispered again: “We’re going to drain the warmth from your body to warm him—transfer the beat of your heart to his—drive the breath from your lungs to make him breathe again.” Esmé felt her heart lurch in shock. Did Mirabell mean what she thought? She turned to look at the sorceress—and the glint of relish in Mirabell’s eyes told her the answer. Horror flooded through her. Its frigid touch seemed to turn her blood to ice. Mirabell has captured the white unicorn and all thirteen dragons and also stolen the Godking’s treasure. Now she has snatched the Princess of Lazaronia. For it seems that only the life in Esmé’s body can bring the wizard out of his eternal sleep. But the sorceress’s evil experiment means certain death for the Princess ...

“Who are you?” she whispered as she felt the full force of his magnetic power. “Come home, dear Esmé, and forget all this nonsense. The Earthling Mark is unworthy of you. He betrays you at every opportunity. You’ve seen how he flirts with all the girls in sight.” Esmé’s eyes filled with tears ... and she felt again the bitter pangs of jealousy. “Yes,” she said sadly. “Come home, Esmé. ... Come home and forget him.” ... “Yes,” she repeated in a whisper. “Yes, I will.” With Esmé in the power of the wizard Ignarius, whom she thinks is her father, Mark has a hard time ahead of him in his battle to save Lazaronia and its princess. And, to make matters worse, the wizard has brought Will Marksby—a handsome 19-year-old Earthling—to Lazaronia and has spelled Esmé into accepting him as the One Marked by Willow. Ignarius wants the Princess either married to Will or dead. And he’s determined to try both.

... the black shape loomed above him ... he felt its claws clamp around his middle ... Tensely he waited for those sharp talons to pierce his flesh. ... Feathers fluttered only centimetres from his face. ... the creature’s carrion stench hit his nostrils. ... ... The creatures waited—and waited ...And the chieftainess got tired of waiting and allowed her gaze to wander elsewhere. ... “They’re coming—the mighty lords—the Lords of Piksenville—on ferocious, fire-breathing steeds!” ... The Chief Angel of Death stared in the direction of his mate’s raised claw.... He signalled: “All right: in for the kill.” ... Then, as one, two cruel, open beaks jerked downwards. Left to die in Lazaronia’s desert, Mark learns Esmé is aware of his plight. But she is nearly half a world away—with not enough time to stop the fearsome vulcarrions known as the Angels of Death from tearing him to pieces.

Humans have nearly driven the unicorns of Lazaronia to extinction, mainly for the beauty and value of their silver ivory horns. But a power with an even more evil purpose is now determined to wipe them out and succeeds in killing Albishadewe’s parents, leaving him wondering if he is the last of his kind. While searching for other unicorns, he seeks refuge as a member of a pony pack, knowing he is safe in the open until his horn starts growing. Just as his itching forehead tells him that time has come, a young woman, accompanied by her unicorn-hunting mistress, suddenly confronts him in the Silver Forest of Argentsiana. Albishadewe knows he should flee. But there is something about Dahrya that makes him stay. She claims to be an ordinary woman—a mere servant—yet how come she can see him in the forest, where even sorcerers’ eyes see only shadows? Could she be Argentsiana, the lost blind Goddess of the Silver Forest? Albishadewe must unravel the mystery of who Dahrya is to save his land from the evil swamping it. But the knowledge brings him more grief than he can bear ... Winner of the Bronze Award in the Fantasy—Other World division of the 2014 Global Ebook Awards.

Within moments Esmé felt the full force of a refusal that could break even the strongest mind—a refusal that turned her power against her with a towering, almost unbelievable rage. The twisting rainbows from her fingertips bent like hairpins, aiming their might at her head. For long moments Esmé had to put all her concentration into forcing them back. But it was no good: she had to drop her hands and command the light to go out. Mark and Esmé are about to face their final battle against the forces of evil swamping Lazaronia, and Esmé needs to consult The Voice of Judgement. To do this she must command the power of the Tower of Kaleidoscopic Light. But the tower tries to turn her power against her. And the Voice of Judgement rightly refuses to admit her, because for someone still living to enter the presence of the Voice of Judgement is strictly forbidden.

After her mate is killed by an evil that is relentlessly driving unicorns to extinction, Argent takes her foal Silvranja to a huge cavern full of their ancestors’ bones. There Silvranja is cared for by the Piksenvolk, a race of small people who live in Piksenville under Geheimberg (the Secret Mountain) while Argent goes in search of the legendary Albishadewe to take the place of her murdered mate. But the evil that killed Quicksilver succeeds in killing her too. Silvranja, fearing she is the last of her species, soon learns that other species, even humans, are threatened with extinction. To restore the balance of nature she must leave the safety of her secret hiding place to find Albishadewe and help the humans in a fight for the survival of the land. In doing so she is forced to learn what it’s like to be human and nearly loses her life and that of her unborn foal. Shortlisted for the Tom Fitzgibbon Memorial Award in 1998 (when Vince Ford's comedy 2MUCH4U was the winner).

Rahti (14) has dreamt all his life of his mother abandoning him at birth. But this night his dream tells him exactly where (at the gates of Olwen House) and he goes off to find out why the owners didn’t adopt him, thus setting in motion a very complex spell woven by her. But she didn’t bargain on his freeing his father, the fallen god Fallanein, from his place of banishment. Fallanein promises Rahti help, for which Rahti must do two things. The first is hard enough. But Rahti finds he can’t possibly do the second ...

Iggie, illegitimate son of Lazaronia's two vilest sorcerers, now both dead, believes his father Ignarius, twin to the late King Lazarone III, should have been king. Iggie, who never knew his father, goes in search of his stepfather, an outcast god (Lazaronia's equivalent of Satan) convinced Fallanein can help him claim his rightful place as heir to the throne. He finds Fallanein trapped in a place of eternal cold and darkness. But in releasing the fallen god through a rift that he makes, Iggie drowns the whole of Lazaonia in snow and ice. Even worse, he frees an evil monster, known as the Hydralon. And Fallenein isn’t the ally he hoped for.