Search Worlds Without End

The debut novel from an extraordinarily talented twenty-five-year-old author. Fantasy's next global star has arrived.

Lenk can barely keep control of his mismatched adventurer band at the best of times (Gariath the dragon man sees humans as little more than prey, Kataria the Shict despises most humans, and the humans in the band are little better). When they're not insulting each other's religions they're arguing about pay and conditions. So when the ship they are travelling on is attacked by pirates things don't go very well. They go a whole lot worse when an invincible demon joins the fray. The demon steals the Tome of the Undergates - a manuscript that contains all you need to open the undergates. And whichever god you believe in you don't want the undergates open. On the other side are countless more invincible demons, the manifestation of all the evil of the gods, and they want out.

Full of razor-sharp wit, characters who leap off the page (and into trouble) and plunging the reader into a vivid world of adventure this is a fantasy that kicks off a series that could dominate the second decade of the century.

THE TOME OF THE UNDERGATES HAS BEEN RECOVERED...

...and the gates of hell remain closed. Lenk and his five companions set sail to bring the accursed relic away from the demonic reach of Ulbecetonth, the Kraken Queen. But after weeks at sea, tensions amidst the adventurers are rising. Their troubles are only beginning when their ship crashes upon an island made of the bones left behind from a war long dead.

And it appears that bloodthirsty alien warrior women, fanatical beasts from the deep, and heretic-hunting wizards are the least of their concerns. Haunted by their pasts, plagued by their gods, tormented by their own people, and gripped by madness personal and peculiar, their greatest foes may yet be themselves.

The reach of Ulbecetonth is longer than hell can hold.

She comes.

The skies bleed. The earth groans. The sea howls. The world is rent asunder as the Kraken Queen claws her way from hell. And the only ones standing in her way are a young man with a piece of steel and a voice in his head, his many companions, and their many, many problems.

As Lenk journeys to the Island of Jaga, the tomb of Ulbecetonth, he is hunted. By enemies, by the woman he loves, by the demon he has to kill, by an army of any number of bloodthirsty purple berserkers, savage lizardmen, vicious monsters, and colossal demons.

In the lands where sky and sea have forgotten they were ever separate, Lenk and the companions' destinies await at the tip of a sword and the mouth of hell.

Her magic was stolen. She was left for dead.

Betrayed by those she trusts most and her magic ripped from her, all Sal the Cacophony has left is her name, her story, and the weapon she used to carve both. But she has a will stronger than magic, and knows exactly where to go.

The Scar, a land torn between powerful empires, where rogue mages go to disappear, disgraced soldiers go to die and Sal went with a blade, a gun, and a list of seven names.

Revenge will be its own reward.

An outcast mage caught between two warring empires must either save the world or destroy everything she loves...

Sal the Cacophony -- outlaw, outcast, outnumbered -- destroys all that she loves. Her lover lost and cities burned in her wake, all she has left is her magical gun and her all-consuming quest for revenge against those who stole her power and took the sky from her.

When the roguish agent of a mysterious patron offers her the chance to participate in a heist to steal an incredible power from the famed airship fleet, the Ten Arrows, she finds a new purpose. But a plot to save the world by bringing down empires swiftly escalates into a conspiracy of magic and vengeance that threatens to burn everything to ash, including herself.

Every city has its secrets, every man has his demons.

The city of Cier'Djaal has grown rich from the silk its horse-sized spiders spin. From their unimaginable wealth, the fasha ruling class built a city the likes of which legends strain to capture: spires that glitter gold in the desert sunlight, streets choked with people carrying burdens of coin and silk, a world where the differences between thieves and nobles are so small that an outsider might not even know.

And where there is wealth, there is war.

A radical upstart cult has risen from the slums and sewers of the city, intent on toppling its wealthy masters and spilling their gold upon the streets for the downtrodden. The ruling thieves' guild has come to meet them with fire and blade, intent on preserving the rule of their own bloody law. Foreign armies intent on conquering the city and their opportunity to use the violence as an excuse to seize the city's vast wealth for itself. And beneath human heels, the tribal shicts and ferocious tulwar clans seethe, waiting to strike back against the society that has trampled them underfoot.

And into this, Lenk comes seeking a new life. A life where he can set his sword down and leave the violence of his adventuring life behind him.

But there are whispers of something darker behind the wars, a sinister hand moving pieces across a board, intent upon ushering in a new world, free of gods, of fear, of humanity. And its gaze has just settled upon Lenk.

The heart of civilization bleeds.

Cier'Djaal, once the crowning glory of the civilized world, has gone from a city to a battlefield and a battlefield to a graveyard. Foreign armies clash relentlessly on streets laden with the bodies of innocents caught in the crossfire. Cultists and thieves wage shadow wars, tribal armies foment outside the city's walls, and haughty aristocrats watch the world burn from on high.

As his companions struggle to keep the city from destroying itself, Lenk travels to the Forbidden East in search of the demon who caused it all. But even as he pursues Khoth-Kapira, dark whispers plague his thoughts. Khoth-Kapira promises him a world free of war where Lenk can put down his sword at last. And Lenk finds it hard not to listen.

When gods are deaf, demons will speak.

The great demon Khoth-Kapira has broken free of his prison and taken his first step upon the mortal world. And he owes it all to Lenk. Believing that the demon will heal a broken world that the gods have abandoned, Lenk serves as reluctant champion to Khoth-Kapira's cause. But as the desperate and fearful flock to Khoth-Kapira's banner, begging for salvation, Lenk begins to doubt his patron's great designs.

The city of Cier'Djaal, meanwhile, has become the field for the last great battle of mortals. And as humans, shicts and tulwar prepare to tear each other apart, none are aware of the ancient horror that marches upon their tiny wars.

At the tip of a spear or beneath the heel of demons, the reign of mortals ends.