Nibelung (Lora Ley #2)

Lora Ley is a half nixie half human who discovered her Nyx side in Book One - Secrets of the Nyx. Her name's pronounced Lorelei - the traditional German spelling is Loreley. She grew up during the Industrial Revolutions of Germany. The books take place in the 1890s, when Victoria was on the throne of England and Germany was a young country unified and defined by distinct borders just twenty years before.

The Nyx, nixe, nixies or Neck are water spirits who inhabit fresh water such as lakes and rivers. IShape-shifters, they can manifest in human form and can even fall in love and have children with humans. After a while, however, the Nyx pines for the river and love affairs with humans are rarely successful. In legend, Nyx often appear as evil spirits who lurk in swamps, rivers, lakes, wells, and may play mesmerizing music to lure hapless victims to their deaths. Nyx such as the brook horse appear mainly in northern legend.

In Book One, Lora's heritage is explained. She learns how her mother died, and discovers her own Nyx nature. She must make a choice between mortality and the world of magic, and it's not as easy as it seems. Emotions, mysterious grisly deaths, an obessessive police inspector, Lora's upcoming wedding, evil powers and the return of a past lover complicate matters.

In Book Two of the series, Lora and her friends travel back to the era of Germanic legend, dragons and heros on a quest to save the Nibelung treasure. Meanwhile a circus sideshow owner and his peculiar assistant devise a cunning plan to capture the Nyx themselves, and a King of Supernatural Beings rises to reclaim his throne.