Search Worlds Without End

A horror tale about the Witch Bride, second wife of a King, and the discord between her and her young stepson.

This short story is included in the anthology Worlds Seen in Passing: Ten Years of Tor.com Short Fiction (2018), edited by Irene Gallo.

Read the full story for free at Tor.com.

Koschei the Deathless is to Russian folklore what devils or wicked witches are to European culture: a menacing, evil figure; the villain of countless stories which have been passed on through story and text for generations. But Koschei has never before been seen through the eyes of Catherynne Valente, whose modernized and transformed take on the legend brings the action to modern times, spanning many of the great developments of Russian history in the twentieth century.

Deathless, however, is no dry, historical tome: it lights up like fire as the young Marya Morevna transforms from a clever child of the revolution, to Koschei's beautiful bride, to his eventual undoing. Along the way there are Stalinist house elves, magical quests, secrecy and bureaucracy, and games of lust and power. All told, Deathless is a collision of magical history and actual history, of revolution and mythology, of love and death, which will bring Russian myth back to life in a stunning new incarnation.

Jamethiel Knorth, Priest's Bane and Dream-Weaver, has returned victorious from Tai-tastigon, but trouble dogs the Kencyrath.

There is intrigue among the Highborn. The Randir and his allies want the larger houses to decide for all nine, which would strip the Highlordship from the Knorth. At Omiroth, a senile king struggles against his venal son-in-law--but if neither of these can rule, the next in line is a mother-dominated child. Kindrie Soul-Walker is captured and thrown in a secret dungeon, a political prisoner. And a Kendar administrator, dissatisfied with the use that Jame is making of the gates, schemes against her, and then against her house and her brother, Torisen Black Lord, Highlord of the Kencyrath.

While Tori defends Gothregor and Kindrie rots a secret captive, Jame rides south to Bashti. Here she confronts an unready and presumptuous heir, a withholding and manipulative paymaster, and invisible assassins. Her formal errand, meanwhile, is to compete in martial games with secret stakes--which she fears are a cloak for a massacre, or worse.

Sixteen-year-old Deka lives in fear and anticipation of the blood ceremony that will determine whether she will become a member of her village. Already different from everyone else because of her unnatural intuition, Deka prays for red blood so she can finally feel like she belongs.

But on the day of the ceremony, her blood runs gold, the color of impurity – and Deka knows she will face a consequence worse than death.

Then a mysterious woman comes to her with a choice: stay in the village and submit to her fate, or leave to fight for the emperor in an army of girls just like her. They are called alaki – near-immortals with rare gifts. And they are the only ones who can stop the empire's greatest threat.

Knowing the dangers that lie ahead yet yearning for acceptance, Deka decides to leave the only life she's ever known. But as she journeys to the capital to train for the biggest battle of her life, she will discover that the great walled city holds many surprises. Nothing and no one are quite what they seem to be – not even Deka herself.

It's been six months since Deka freed the goddesses in the ancient kingdom of Otera and discovered who she really is... but war is waging across the kingdom, and the real battle has only just begun. For there is a dark force growing in Otera--a merciless power that Deka and her army must stop.

Yet hidden secrets threaten to destroy everything Deka has known. And with her own gifts changing, Deka must discover if she holds the key to saving Otera... or if she might be its greatest threat.

Mere weeks after confronting the Gilded Ones - the false beings she once believed to be her family - Deka is on the hunt. In order to kill the gods, whose ravenous competition for power is bleeding Otera dry, she must uncover the source of her divinity. But with her mortal body on the verge of ruin, Deka is running out of time - to save herself and an empire that's tearing itself apart at its seams.

When Deka's search leads her and her friends to the edge of the world as they know it, they discover an astonishing new realm, one which holds the key to Deka's past. Yet it also illuminates a devastating decision she must soon make...

Choose to be reborn as a god, losing everyone she loves in the process. Or bring about the end of the world.

After the fall of Summerland, Jane McKeene hoped her life would get simpler: Get out of town, stay alive, and head west to California to find her mother.

But nothing is easy when you're a girl trained in putting down the restless dead, and a devastating loss on the road to a protected village called Nicodemus has Jane questioning everything she thought she knew about surviving in 1880s America.

What's more, this safe haven is not what it appears--as Jane discovers when she sees familiar faces from Summerland amid this new society. Caught between mysteries and lies, the undead, and her own inner demons, Jane soon finds herself on a dark path of blood and violence that threatens to consume her.

But she won't be in it alone.

Katherine Deveraux never expected to be allied with Jane McKeene. But after the hell she has endured, she knows friends are hard to come by--and that Jane needs her too, whether Jane wants to admit it or not.

Watching Jane's back, however, is more than she bargained for, and when they both reach a breaking point, it's up to Katherine to keep hope alive--even as she begins to fear that there is no happily-ever-after for girls like her.

From one of fantasy's biggest recent breakthrough authors comes an exciting, brand new series.

The demons...

In the endless forests of the Wild, humanity scratches a living by the side of the great Godroads, paths of crystal that provide safe passage and hold back the infernal tide. Creatures lurk within the trees, watching, and plucking those who stray too far from safety.

The Deathless...

In crystal castles held aloft on magical currents, seven timeless royal families reign, protecting humanity from the spread of the Wild and its demons. Born and reborn into flawless bodies, the Deathless are as immortal as the precious stones from which they take their names. For generations a fragile balance has held.

And the damned...

House Sapphire, one of the ancient Deathless families, is riven by suspicion and madness. Whole villages are disappearing as the hunting expeditions holding the Wild at bay begin to fail.

Then, when assassins strike, House Sapphire shatters.

Nothing lasts forever.

The Deathless is the first novel in an astonishing new series from Gemmell award-winning author Peter Newman.

THE REBEL
For years, Vasin Sapphire has been waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. Now, as other Deathless families come under constant assault from the monsters that roam the Wild, that time has come.

THE RUTHLESS
In the floating castle of Rochant Sapphire, loyal subjects await the ceremony to return their ruler to his rightful place. But the child raised to give up his body to Lord Rochant is no ordinary servant. Strange and savage, he will stop at nothing to escape his gilded prison.

AND THE RETURNED...
Far below, another child yearns to see the human world. Raised by a creature of the Wild, he knows their secrets better than any other. As he enters into the struggle between the Deathless houses, he may be the key to protecting their power or destroying it completely.

THE WILD HAS BEGUN TO RISE

THE BATTLE

House Sapphire has a new leader, but High Lord Vasinidra cannot stand still for a moment. The monsters of the Wild are hunting with a new intelligence and purpose, and one Deathless family is already on the brink of extinction.

THE BETRAYERS

In the forests of the Wild, Chandni faces a choice that will transform her or destroy her. Far above, her two sons are reunited at last and forced to confront their true origins.

AND THE BOUNDLESS

Pari Tanzanite has never stayed within the rules. On a desperate journey to the source of her world's magic, Pari will discover secrets even she could never have imagined - secrets that will change the rules completely.

A NEW POWER IS APPROACHING

The Curse shaped Aster's life from birth. At first, she believed her father was its only victim, and determined to save him from it. In doing so she learned that the Curse had stricken everyone in the magical realms known as the Kingdoms -- and that, in an attempt to protect her, her father had himself created it. Now he is dead, a victim of his own sorcery. But the Curse has not ended with him. Her father's actions, his dread spell, were only the shadows cast by a much deeper, older conflict, which is now unwinding the universe itself.

As the sun fades and the stars wink out, Aster must follow a clue from her dead father to the highest, furthest domain -- beyond the fairy-tale kingdoms, through fantastic and terrifying realms of gods and demons, to the very source of reality, the beginning and ending of everything. There she might finally set things right. Her path is narrow, and the sacrifices necessary for even a tiny chance at success are unacceptable.

For the Curse has also released a rot at the very heart of the High and Faraway, an evil more ancient than time itself. It is against this unwavering malevolence that Aster, Errol, Billy, Dusk and Delia must pit themselves. They must do so without their friend Veronica, a girl murdered decades before and brought back to life by Aster's magic. For as Veronica discovers her own vast power, she stares into the face of the enemy and sees in it her true self...