Authors Note: This story is complete and sitting on my hard drive. The novel is 49,188 words long in twenty chapters. I will be posting two chapters per week, roughly 5,000 words per post, on Fridays.

Alex comes home one day and his wife, Carrie, tells him of a problem in Mike and Lisa's marriage. Mike is his best friend since middle school. It seems that Lisa caught Mike cross-dressing and came unglued. She had come to Carrie looking for solace and support for divorcing Mike. But Carrie told her about a Phil Donahue show she'd seen as a teenager featuring married cross-dressers and said that cross-dressing really was no big deal.

Lisa was offended that Carrie wouldn't back her up and said, "If it was your husband, you wouldn’t think it was so cool," and left in a snit; part of her anger now directed at Carrie.

Carrie, on the fly, hatches a plan to help Lisa see that if it was her husband, she'd still think it was no big deal. Alex somewhat reluctantly goes along with it and discovers things about himself that he never knew existed.

When you come across a bear in the wild, there is a very handy rhyme that tells you what to do. “If it’s brown, lay down. If it’s black fight back. If it’s white goodnight”. And even though I was staring straight into a set dark brown eyes framed by a big bush of curly brown hair, laying down definitely was not the right course of action. For these eyes did not belong to a ferocious mammal with razor sharp claws, but instead a 16 year old girl who was very excited to meet her online friend for the first time. The latter feeling a lot more dangerous than the former to me right now.

The strength of the pirates has surprised the searchers but they know there is no time to lose to prevent any further attacks. A two-pronged assault is planned but this will require Ursula to use some of her unusual talents. When the troops finally join battle with their enemy, there are some unexpected discoveries.

The Voyage of the Visund

A tale of Anmar by Penny Lane

80 - Combined Operations

Queen Dana of Highwinds the Elf Kingdom inside the Empire has a problem. One that she cannot fix personally. The problem is with a small minority of her population. A problem that has been brought to her attention by the half elf son of a problematic Duke. What is a Queen to do? She calls on help from a friend. The question now is does she realize what she is letting loose on her kingdom?

Chapter 11

“We should go to London,” Grace said after a while.

Greg didn’t move, but said, “We’re descending right now. We’re almost there.”

Grace sighed and turned to look at him. “Look. I know it was tough seeing what happened to Gracie, but we’ve got a job to do here.”

Part Eight

"The Nazis have sponsored multiple expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic and several mountain ranges," said The Solution, frowning. "Including the Himalayas. Could they have found something here, closer to home?"

"Viking hacksilver," guessed The Infiltrator. Being pragmatic, or perhaps merely hopeful.

“Hey now, it’s all right buddy.” Riley said as I was smudging my face into her chest. As I pulled back from the embrace I looked up into Riley’s comforting blue eyes and steady myself once again.

“I’m starting to feel that this might be a little more than a poorly planned ruse to participate in a dota tournament. Just know that I will always be there for you, my little friend. Jason or Emily, whatever floats your boat”

She ended her uplifting words with a little wink. But honestly, I had no idea how to respond.

Diva Dismayed: Chapter 9 – And then not
Not long after my probationary weeks at the salon had passed, Mrs Millward called me into her office. I was a little nervous, wondering if I had done something wrong, though I couldn’t think of anything. I was glad when instead she said she’d had the strangest telephone call. “It was long-distance. Can you guess who it was from?”

I couldn’t imagine and said so.

Part Seven

The team found a small clearing near the beach, and settled in for a well-deserved rest. They had another uncomfortable day to pass, the enforced idleness weighing heavily on them. To their surprise, though, most managed to get plenty of sleep. They were all tired, even though they all had more than human physical traits. This was largely because of the combined stress of their mission and the relief of accomplishing their mission, rather than because of any actual exertion. Now, they only needed to escape.

"Rona? What on earth are you doing here? Weren't you supposed to be sunning yourself in Cancun or Acapulco?" I said when I answered the door.

"I was actually sunning myself in Thailand, but the opportunity to do some good business was enough to get me on a plane home."

Life and Love are far more complicated than we can possibly understand. For one young cop, a journey of self-discovery will teach them that true strength was inside them all along.

Part Six

After a quiet if uncomfortable day the team was more than ready for some activity. As they moved into position for their night's work, the commandos were making their way cautiously through the darkness of a heavily wooded section northwest of the camp. However, they soon noticed something in the distance.