In a world overrun by mutated beasts, defiance is a death sentence. Skirting the rules entirely, a data broker collects secrets of those who rule over the limited human space. Not driven by noble pursuits - she's simply ambitious. Unfortunately, a man set to inherit the hopeless war against the ever-changing nature takes notice, and he intends to cut her insolence out with a blade. Slow and agonisingly. A lesson must be taught. Yet, the spy vanishes into the overcrowded streets. A man whose ascent to power is stained with the blood of allies and enemies alike has a lot to hide, and she never lets him forget she's still out there. Watching. Poisoning the well even further. The manhunt gradually twists into a slow, burning obsession. When enemies close in on all sides, the warlord calls upon his shadow with an alluring promise of truce. Trust is a knife. He hands it to her. Further story is available at: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DRSX826G

All he wanted was to disappear. What he found wouldn't let him go. Humanity clings to survival in fortified cities, learning to live beside the horrors that slipped in from another plane. Monsters now walk freely among the ruins of the old civilisation. For a runaway boy scraping by on the streets, danger is nothing new. Hunted by violent men and ignored by a society too busy surviving, he's learned to trust no one. But when he crosses paths with a strange, otherworldly being - one unlike any he's seen before - his life takes a turn for the surreal. The creature is powerful, unpredictable, and completely alien in thought. It breaks boundaries as easily as bodies, and the boy wants nothing more than to be rid of it. But fate - or an unbreakable, incomprehensible will - keeps pulling them together. As tension builds and an uneasy bond begins to form, a far greater danger looms. And it's not from the monsters outside the walls. The story in full, including the explicit excerpts: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D5WL39BL (chapters 1 R - 12 BC) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CYT3Q7H7 (chapters 13 R - 25 R)