Search Worlds Without End

Judith Tarr returns to the always fascinating character of Alexander the Great in this fantasy novel that springs from the legend that the Queen of the Amazons came to meet him in Persia, and became his friend.

Hippolyta was Penthesilea, or Queen of the Amazons. She ruled as war leader and high priestess of a scattered tribe of women warriors who had dwelt on the high plains to the north and east of Persia for time out of mind. They were not isolated---travelers came and went through their territory, bringing news from the west, and carrying tales of the warrior women back home with them.

But the Queen had a great grief in her life: her daughter and heir was a strange child. The girl had been born, so the Priestesses said, without a soul. And it was true that she was like no other child alive. She did not speak, and often seemed not to even see the people around her. She could not dress or feed herself, but she could ride and hunt like no other woman of the tribe. Many of the Amazons believed that the child must never be Queen, but that was a problem for a later time--Hippolyta was young and strong.

Selene, the niece of the tribe's Seer, was put in charge of the child, to be her nursemaid and guardian. And it was a good, though sometimes difficult, life for many turns of the years. But then one day news came from the West of a new Conqueror, a young man who came out of Macedon with a spirit like flame, intending to rule the whole world. The Queen's daughter responded to the tale as a woman in the desert would to the sound of falling water. That very night she stole out of the camp and rode west. Selene could not stop her, and so she must follow, praying that the Queen would understand. Hippolyta herself followed the next day, and so they rode together, controlled by the child's compulsion, until they had crossed the mountains and entered into Alexander's Empire, and under the sway of Alexander's powerful personality.

Taking the challenge of the great fantasy heroes such as Elric and Conan that only men can be the sword-weilding masters of the worlds of fantasy, this is an original collection of new stories of warrior-women in combat against dragons and demons, devils and despots.

Table of Contents:

• Amazons - (1978) - poem by Melanie Kaye
• Introduction: Our Amazon Heritage - essay by Jessica Amanda Salmonson
• The Dreamstone - shortstory by C. J. Cherryh
• Wolves of Nakesht - shortstory by Janrae Frank
• Woman of the White Waste - shortstory by T. J. Morgan
• The Death of Augusta - poem by Emily Brontë and Joanna Russ
• Morrien's Bitch - shortstory by Janet Fox
• Agbewe's Sword - (1979) - novelette by Charles R. Saunders
• Jane Saint's Travails (Part One) - shortstory by Josephine Saxton
• The Sorrows of Witches - shortstory by Margaret St. Clair
• Falcon Blood - shortstory by Andre Norton
• The Rape Patrol - shortstory by Michele Belling
• Bones for Dulath - shortstory by Megan Lindholm
• Northern Chess - shortstory by Tanith Lee
• The Woman Who Loved the Moon - novelette by Elizabeth A. Lynn
• Additional Reading - essay by Jessica Amanda Salmonson and Susan Wood

Table of Contents:

• Introduction: Art, History, and Amazons - essay by Jessica Amanda Salmonson
• For a Daughter - novelette by F. M. Busby
• The Battle Crow's Daughter - shortstory by Gillian Fitzgerald
• Southern Lights - novelette by Tanith Lee
• Zroya's Trizub - shortstory by Gordon Derevanchuk
• The Robber Girl - shortstory by Phyllis Ann Karr
• Lady of the Forest End - shortstory by Gaèl Baudino
• The Ivory Comb - shortstory by Eleanor Arnason
• The Borders of Sabazel - shortstory by Lillian Stewart Carl
• Who Courts a Reluctant Maiden - shortstory by Ardath Mayhar
• The Soul Slayer - shortstory by Lee Killough
• Nightwork - shortstory by Jo Clayton
• In the Lost Lands - shortstory by George R. R. Martin

Shadows of Aggar - Book 1 - Amazons of Aggar Diana n'Athena is an Amazon working for the Terran empire on the medieval planet of Aggar. Her mission is to rescue a downed pilot/spy from Aggar's wilds. But when the Council of Aggar demands Diana be bonded to a Shadow in order to be allowed to make the journey, things get interesting. Shadows are exceptional guides and fighters, but Elana is something more -- she has the gift of the Blue Sight.

As the two women race against time to prevent an all-out intergalactic war, they become erotically entangled, complicating both their lives and putting their mission in danger.

Gwyn, dey Sorormin and Royal Marshal, is called to the aid of Llinolae, a Blue-Sighted woman and Ruler of Khirla. The brigand Terran Clan is launching bloody raids on Khirla and may be behind a traitorous plot within Llinolae's own household. Llinolae's gift allows her to see out-of-time to receive council from a very precious couple - one Amazon, one Blue-Sighted -- but even that is not enough. With the help of Gwyn's bond-mated Sandwolves, and friends Brit n'Minona and the Shadow Sparrow n'Sappho, Gwyn and Llinolae struggle side-by-side against the Clan and find themselves caught in an ever-strengthening bond of love.

Return with Marion Zimmer Bradley and the Friends of Darkover to the planet of the Bloody Sun, the world of Darkover, there powerful families gifted with rare mental powers of 'laran' rule the land, where Terran technology is seen as the greatest evil, and survival often depends on a steady sword and quickness of wits. Here dwell the Free Amazons, who have set themselves apart from their male-ruled world, owing loyalty only to each other, living their lives as free citizens, equal to any man or woman, soldier or lord. the eighteen tales in the collection, including two by Marion Zimmer Bradley herself, tell the story of these Free Amazons, and are certain to enchant anyone who has fallen under the spell of the amazon heroines of Thendara House and City of Sorcery.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction: About Amazons (Free Amazons of Darkover) - essay by Marion Zimmer Bradley
• The Oath of the Free Amazons - (1979) - essay by Walter Breen
• The Legend of Lady Bruna - (1979) - short story by Marion Zimmer Bradley
• Cast Off Your Chains - short story by Margaret Silvestri
• The Banshee - (1980) - short story by Sherry Kramer
• On the Trail - short story by Barbara M. Armistead
• To Open a Door - short story by P. Alexandra Riggs
• The Meeting - (1980) - short story by Nina Boal
• The Mother Quest - novelette by Diana L. Paxson
• Child of the Heart - short story by Elisabeth Waters
• Midwife - short story by Deborah J. Ross [as by Deborah Wheeler]
• Recruits - short story by Maureen Shannon
• A Different Kind of Courage - short story by Mercedes Lackey
• Knives - short story by Marion Zimmer Bradley
• Tactics - short story by Jane M. H. Bigelow
• This One Time - short story by Joan Marie Verba
• Her Own Blood - short story by Margaret L. Carter
• The Camel's Nose - short story by Susan Holtzer
• Girls Will Be Girls - short story by Patricia Shaw Mathews [as by Patricia Shaw-Mathews]
• Growing Pains - short story by Susan Shwartz
• Oath of the Free Amazons: Terran, Techno Period - essay by Jaida n'ha Sandra (variant of Oath of the Free Amazons: Terra, Techno Period)