Pirate's Lass, The

Her greatest literary hero is a kickass, take-no-prisoners, seaborne scallywag who binds her breasts and slays devious figures while her bird parrots back lusty things the assassin has said during carnal pursuits. But for Penelope Humberton, while the idea of gunning down monstrous figures gets her heart pumping, her own ambitions are much safer: getting her bookshop and printing press off the ground, expanding her market, introducing more readers to the titillating world of Moxie Breastbind comic books. Safer, that is, only in theory. To move past small-time book sellers in Leinster, she needs to premiere her artist’s newest MB series at the convention in Geraldton, which means a three and a half week trek from her comfortable home in Leinster, travelling by camel train, through harsh desert, with company that’s ten-to-one men, and who’ve never heard of polite company. And bandits. Pedro Kimbers, the bandit king of the western Outback, the ‘Duke of the Desert’, as he’s known in Moxie’s world, is by now largely believed to be dead – the only reason she’s agreed to leave the town’s boundary. But when a ravaged and traumatized young woman comes wandering out of the desert halfway between Leinster and Geraldton, with gruesome tales of her bandit overlords, Penelope must decide how – and if – to help this woman, and face the reality of what these overlords might do to get her back.... Sex slaves, military agents, security contractors and bandit emperors collide in this standalone novella of The Mongolian Book of the Sky.