A kingdom divided cannot stand. For those caught in the middle, it means death. For centuries humans and dragons existed side by side in Alveria, bonded by their care of one another. But no longer. After decades with no viable eggs, humans far outnumber dragons, and the survival of the species appears bleak. The outlook for everyday humans is little better as rogue dragons raid and torment villages. Yet it's far worse for the tamers, beaten and killed simply for serving the noble dragons. But eking by at the bottom of Alverian society isn't any easier for seventeen-year-old Kaelan Younger. Harder still when her loyalty to the dragon crown is no secret. But when her dying mother reveals a horrifying truth about her identity, Kaelan is thrust into a world for which she is ill prepared. Faced with a new life at the proving grounds for humans and dragons alike, Kaelan must reconcile not just her past but embrace the future laid out before her. When her responsibilities as an Akademy tamer collide with her feelings for a powerful dragon shifter, it will take everything she has to prepare for the danger threatening them both. The fate of the dragons she has sworn to serve rests in her hands. Now Kaelan is no longer an outsider. She's the enemy.

Summoned to the royal palace by the King, Alaith spends his days either handling the dragons that plague the kingdom, or holed up in his lonely tower. Unusual in appearance, manner, and his method of taming dragons rather than slaying them, his only distractions from his painfully outcast state are caring for the tamed dragon who resides with him, and admiring the handsome Lord Trey—and arguing with the infuriating Prince Rythe.

Katla, idiot of idiots, last warrior of Lundr, should know better than to release a dragon. Sacrificing humans to keep the dragons away may be less bloody than war, but it's repulsive and cowardly. Real warriors fight their enemies head on. And that's exactly what Katla intends to do. Her plans go south when, instead of preventing the sacrifice, she frees a sleeping dragon and is kidnapped to his frozen castle. Between his speed and bestial form, escape would be hard enough. But the dragon is compassionate, too-and nothing slays a lonely warrior faster than a kindhearted grouch. Soon, Katla is trapped between raging factions of her own heart. Stopping the sacrifices will recommence an age-old war, one she and her peace-loving dragon would wage from opposing sides. Now that they have tamed each other, could they truly go back to being enemies? Icy curses, blood magic, and sassy banter collide as a heroic dumbass finds herself falling for a dragon shifter in this comedic and heartwarming romance.

There was once an old, old castle--it was so old that its I walls andtowers and turrets and gateways and arches had crumbled to ruins, and of all its old splendour there were only two little rooms left; and it was here that John the blacksmith had set up his forge. He was too poor to live in a proper house, and no one asked any rent for the rooms in the ruin, because all the lords of the castle were dead and gone this many a year. So there John blew his bellows, and hammered his iron, and did all the work which came his way. This was not much, because most of the trade went to the mayor of the town, who was also a blacksmith in quite a large way of business, and had his huge forge facing the square of the town, and had twelve apprentices, all hammering like a nest of woodpeckers, andtwelve journeymen to order the apprentices about, and a patent forge and a self-acting hammer and electric bellows, and all things handsome about him. So that of course the townspeople, whenever they wanted a horse shod or a shaft mended, went to the mayor. And John the blacksmith struggled on as best he could, with a few odd jobs from travellers and strangers who did not know what a superior forge the mayor's was. The two rooms were warm and weather-tight, but not very large; so the blacksmith got into the way of keeping his old iron, and his odds and ends, and his fagots, and his twopenn'orth of coal, in the great dungeon down under the castle. It was a very fine dungeon indeed, with a handsome vaulted roof and big iron rings, whose staples were built into the wall, very strong and convenient for tying captives up to, and at one end was a broken flight of wide steps leading down no one knew where.. Even the lords of the castle in the good old times had never known where those steps led to, but every now and then they would kick a prisoner down the steps in their light-hearted, hopeful way, and, sure enough, the prisoners never came back. The blacksmith had never dared to go beyond the seventh step, and no more have I--so I know no more than he did what was at the bottom of those stairs. John the blacksmith had a wife and a little bab

Destined to Slay In the small homestead of Dronias, where monsters terrorize, young Julianna is a dragon killer - or so she's been trained. Destined to be one of the great slayers like generations before her, Julianna is eager to fulfill her destiny of defending her village. A Sword Infused with Power On her eighteenth birthday, she embarks on a journey to kill her first dragon, a right of passage like so many before her. Magic Goblin sword in hand, Julianna tracks down her beastly target but finds herself unable to deliver the final blow. A War Centuries Old In her moment of weakness, with sword poised, Julianna suddenly finds herself no longer staring down the emerald eyes of a dragon. Instead, a handsome young dragon shifter named Ash is staring up at her with beseeching eyes. Danger and Betrayal Forced into an unlikely alliance in an attempt to prevent a needless and bloody war between their nations, Julianna and Ash must survive a world where danger lurks around every corner, and where not everyone is hoping for peace. A young adult sword and sorcery adventure, Slayer is an epic fantasy novel packed with plenty of action, twists, thrills, and magic. The first book in the Dragon Tamer series by USA TODAY bestselling authors Armitage and Culican, Slayer is sure to have readers begging for more.