If you fancy something different for a short Christmas read, have a look at The Quest.

A few years ago, I wrote a few hundred words about a distant and hidden kingdom where dragons lived alongside the humans who understood them. They were trying to keep the outside world at bay, fearful that their secrets and delicate relationship would be destroyed.

A year ago, I was asked to contribute to a collection of short stories on the theme of The Twelve Days of Christmas. I revisited the world I’d been creating and set my 10,000 word story in a parallel universe during their equivalent of the Victorian-era period.

The safe world of the dragon people has long since been breached and the industrial revolution has well and truly taken control of the dragons who can fuel the machines and engines of progress. But the people who understand the dragons are reviled and driven to hide their knowledge.

Against this background, two estranged sisters – one of whom has decided to conceal her identity and one of whom refuses to do so – have to work together in bitter midwinter to find their younger brother who has run away to the city. But they are thwarted by demands to solve a riddle which the mysterious Mr Beringer says is a key to fighting the anarchy which threatens the nation.

The Quest is the first in a series of four in which the Drethic family seek to prove their loyalty to their country and find the missing Queen.

Available as an ebook at 99p or 99c (US) and also in paperback at £2.99 – a different tale for midwinter.