An epic end is near!

Later this month Worldshaker, the epic end to J. F. Lewis's Grudgebearer trilogy, comes out!  If you like your sword and sorcery with dragons, fae, and a world more detailed than our own, this series is for you.  Read on for an exclusive excerpt!

“Outstanding...one of the most uniquely layered and complex universes since Frank Herbert's Dune.”

—Starburst Magazine

Uled, the originator of the carnivorous Aern, the plantlike Vael, and the reptilian Zaur, has completed his plan to return from the dead, unleashing an army of undead creatures on the living world.

Kholster, who only recently became the god of death, must work together with other new deities to bring balance to the heavens and stop Uled. Can he prevent Uled's undead army from ravaging the world in time to save Rae'en and those he still loves in the mortal realm?

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Child tucked firmly against his chest, Striappa ran, his sharp black talons gouging furrows in the tile floor. Chaos erupted about them in a tortured reflection of the battles raging in the Guild Cities, outside the walls of the Long Speaker’s tower. The manitou’s fur-covered ears rang with the clamorous din within and without, raised voices combining to form another voice, a meaningless babble of aggression and fear . . . the dying, the injured, and the aggressors all becoming one cry. Music, he imagined, to the war god’s ears.

Clutching Caius Vindalius, the winged little son of the crystal-twisted young woman Kholster had entrusted to the Long Speakers’ care, even more tightly to his feathered and furred chest, Striappa shivered both at the tickling touch of the babe’s tiny hands on that warm band of thick fur where breast feathers met belly feathers and at the recalled sharing of his grandmatron. His surroundings, the sound of them, drew out remembered tales of the great wars before most manitou left the lands of the shape-locked and founded the Gathering Isles, far off to the west in the grand expanses of the Cerrullic Ocean, away from the violence of those melded sounds.

Noona shared the vibrations of this third voice, taught the clutches of her family and those who nested with them to recognize it, and, when they heard it, to migrate home. “The voice of war is one the manitou no longer wish to hear,” she’d told Striappa and his siblings as they’d curled near the fire pit, snatching at the flames with their claws to harden them and to learn the strength of the fire, how to resist it, how to let it move through them, how to feel the way it changed and flowed and perhaps apply that to their shapeshifting, if they could.

“But fighting is glorious, right, Noona?” Striappa had asked.

Noona’s face had morphed from the friendly beaked and feathered visage that had spat scrumptiously softened foods into his maw when he had been too young to hunt for himself to a spiny face of leathery skin, a mouth of sharp fangs. Great curling horns had erupted from her

brow, as tusks had sprouted from her morphing muzzle. The bands of alternating fur and feathers of her body had flattened into bony plates of armor, jutting spikes rising up from the ones she chose. Talons had become claws and seized him, forcing him down, head close to the flames. Solid black eyes like those of a shark had glared at him from a face no longer warm or comforting, making him ill inside.

“Am I glorious or terrifying?” Noona had growled, in the harsh tones of a non-avian throat.

“Both,” he’d answered squawkily.

“Yes.” She’d smiled, still ghastly in her aspect. “Both is right, my little one.” Releasing him with a grunt, she had turned her back to the flames, leathery wings stretching out to take flight.

“Where are you going, Noona?” Clohi, one of Striappa’s sisters had asked, but Striappa had known, even before Noona had spoken the words.

“To hunt, my lovelies.” The barb at the end of her long tail caught the light as she flew. “All change has its price, and most amount to blood in the end. I’ll be back soon.”

*

“Run, Striappa,” a grizzled voice snapped in his ears, “or fly or whatever it is you manitou do the quickest.”

“I am running, Master Sedric,” the manitou squawked back at the hazy smoke-formed image of the Elder Long Speaker. Sedric might know everything there was to know about Long Speaking—Striappa cer­tainly could not send his mind out across hundreds of miles as a being of smoke—but he knew more about shapeshifting than Sedric ever would, and it was hard to move quickly and change at the same time. Sedric was right, though; if Striappa was going to get Caius to safety, he knew he was going to need his wing-arms free at some point, so he was trying to create a belly pouch to hold him. “Pouches are hard.”

“You weren’t thinking about pouches, child.” Sedric’s smoky lips pursed. “You were brain-fogged by tales your Noona told you as a cub.”

“Hatchling,” Striappa corrected, before he could stop himself. He darted for the open doorway through which Sedric’s smoky sending had emerged, but Sedric waved him off toward the far stairway.

“Too much fighting that way; you’ll need to fly out of here.” Sedric groaned, then vanished, eyes ablaze with inner light, a ball of burning, crackling red manifesting at the center of his brow. He reappeared when Striappa paused halfway up the stairwell to get the pouch right. It had to be easier for girls, or surely they would never bother. Striappa kept losing the opening or making something more mouth-like, into which one would not want to place any infant one wanted to keep.

“Oh for Torgrimm’s sake, Streep. Why are you stopping now?”

Streep. Striappa’s hackles rose at the barb. Even a single-shaped human as enlightened as Master Sedric thought it was okay to drop in a nickname, despite how insulting that was to—

“I know exactly how insulting it is,” Sedric said with a sigh. “You keep stopping, and I can’t guide you much longer. The fighting at Castle-guard is getting worse, and Cassandra and I—”

“Then shut your changeless maw, ’dric, and let me finish!” Striappa growled, beak giving way to fang-filled muzzle. The anger, the desire to prove Sedric wrong, gave Striappa the extra bit of inner energy needed to complete the change, and he slid the quiet, almost contemplative, baby into his belly pouch. The weight took a brief adjustment to muscles and bones, so he wouldn’t be off balance when he flew or, Gromma and Xal-istan both forbid, if he needed to fight. He let the start of a barbed tail begin to sprout . . . just in case.

“Master Sedric,” Striappa began.

“Yes, yes.” Sedric waved away his comments with hands of wispy smoke. “We’re both sorry for insulting each other. Well, you regret insulting me in any case. Now move!”

At the top of the stair, the manitou looked out into the hallway. Near the top of the spire now, close to the Apex Chamber, there were supposed to be guards: at least one Far Flame and a Long Fist, plus a Master Long Speaker. Striappa was none of those things, just a Long Speaker, and a weak one by human standards, though quite strong when compared to the scant gifts most manitou Long Speakers possessed.

Two screams rang out, preceding a female Long Speaker in master’s robes, who poked her head down into the stairwell that opened up in the center of the chamber above.

“Striappa?” She ran down to meet him. Her face was wide and strong and well-fed. “I’m Arin. Master Sedric said I was to allow you access to the Overview.”

She held her hand out, calloused palm up so he could scent her if he wanted. Or was he meant to take it? He did, impressed by the strength of the muscles coiled beneath her skin. Exceptional for a human.

“What happened to the other guards?” Striappa asked, as he followed Arin up the stair and out into the Overview. From inside the walls of the vaulted chamber a thinly applied layer of mirror-smooth Aldite crystal allowed initiates of the Guild a panoramic view of the city below and granted them the option, if necessary, to focus and amplify their abilities . . . a secret the leaders of the surrounding cities had, in the opinion of the Long Speaker’s Guild Leadership, no need to know . . . and exactly the reason why no Long Speaker (or Far Flame, in particular) was allowed unaccompanied access to the Apex.

On a normal day, the top of the spire served as the point from which the strongest Long Speakers relayed messages from other Long Speaker schools and outposts, acting as hubs of information, collecting, recording, and relaying data as needed. A single door broke the seamless expanse, allowing access to a circular balcony where two more guards should have stood.

Striappa spotted the interior Far Flame and Long Fist guards, his neck feathers ruffling at the sight. They lay dead at the exterior doorway, each with a knitting needle poking out of their skulls. One still twitched, prompting Arin to kneel next to him with a gentle clucking of her tongue as she adjusted the angle of her knitting needle and stilled him forever.

“Poor things,” Arin explained, when she noticed his gaze lingering on the bodies. “I hope whomever is the god of death today is kind to them. They were loyal to the city rather than the Guild . . . and Master Sedric insisted there wasn’t time to argue the point with them.”

Striappa eyed her, still studying her scent, tail barb twitching. “Come. Come.” She straightened with a limberness better suited to a manitou her size than a human and gestured at the open exterior door. “Hurry along now.” Arin shooed him. “I can’t take my full attention

from the transmission flow, or I’ll miss something and risk a resend.” “Don’t resends happen all the time?” Striappa asked.

“Not when I’m on duty.” Arin’s eyes sparkled with pride and, perhaps, a trace of gentle madness. Or was that loyalty? It could be hard to tell with humans. “I have a perfect transmission record.”

“Ah.” A movement at Striappa’s belly drew his attention. Baby Caius peered over the pouch edge, looking at the dead men with inhuman blood-red eyes.

“Oh.” Arin beamed, eyes alight with delighted appraisal. “What I wouldn’t give to have an apprentice come to me with a look like that in his eyes.”

“You could take him,” Striappa offered. “You have a Matron Guard’s scent about you. You could—”

“He has no outward reach,” Arin told him. “He has gifts, but he’s thrifty with them, keeps them all directed inward. His body will be his weapon and his mind its architect. Reach out to him. Can you feel his thoughts?”

“No,” Striappa answered. “I thought it was because he was so soon out of the egg and my abilities are not very—”

“I can feel them.” The large woman reached out to the child and cooed at him, but the child’s eyes followed hers, ignoring the hand as if it were of no import. “But give him a few years and a little practice and to those of us with the Long Ways, it will be as if he doesn’t exist.” Her smile did not falter when she added, “We should kill him.”

“But Master Sedric told me—” Striappa bared his claws.

Caius laughed.

“Put your claws away, little manitou.” Arin laughed, too. “I’ll abide by Sedric’s will because I am so sworn. But you mind what I said. That one should have never been brought here. He’s a little sponge and they took him to the center of the Guild Cities where all manner of knowledge could slip into his mind and stick there. What seeds have been planted in that fertile brain amid all of this bloodshed, I shudder to think.”

At a loss for words, Striappa squawked a challenge at her, but Arin made no move to impede him. Fluffing up his feathers, the manitou walked out onto the scant balcony. The cities of Loom and Lumber were burning. Rioters streamed through Commerce, the central city. The standing guard of Warfare could be seen deploying throughout the con­joined Guild Cities, working in tandem with various members of the Long Speaker’s Guild. Bridgeward, the great Southern Gate stood closed,

its walls manned by Dwarves and the Aernese Token Hundred. Even if the Guild Cities fell, the Bridge would stand fast.

Mason, to the southwest, seemed quietest of the embattled metropoles, so Striappa flew in that direction. Once he was clear of the city, he could find a tree or a cave and sleep until dusk. He preferred trav­eling at night, particularly at the rising and setting of the suns, when he was more comfortable and his sight was better. He wasn’t alone in the sky. Bat-like Cavair swooped from place to place in the city, some assisting the guard, others taking part in the looting. Ignoring them as best he could, Striappa flapped toward the strong stone walls of Mason. As he drew closer, he could see the massive ever-open gates had been secured. Archers manned the arrow-slitted walls, taking shots at any who drew too near.

Turning circles in the sky, Striappa surveyed the flow. He didn’t like the look of those bowmen, and flying too high might endanger the baby. Humans did not do so well at high altitudes. Still . . . A few more revolu­tions took him higher and higher until he felt certain he was out of bowshot. It would have been stupid to die in the open having already escaped the Long Speaker’s tower and the violent divide that had, in the Guild Cities at least, spread even to those of the Long Talents. Initiate versus initiate in the absence of Master Sedric. How fared Sedric? he wondered. If Master Sedric and Mistress Cassandra fall at Castleguard, what will become of the—?

Bands of multicolored light filled the air, blinding him mere heart­beats ahead of the explosion. The mind lash accompanying it nearly took the thought out of him. Protected by his weakness in Long Speaking, Striappa felt the gift burn out (not for good, he hoped) and fade, rather than experiencing more drastic results. Striappa dropped a double handful of wing-lengths in the air, but flapped, beak bloody, back to a safer altitude soon thereafter, concentrating on the feel of the infant breathing in his pouch to ensure they did not travel high enough to cause him harm.

Striappa looked back long enough to watch the spire fall in a flicker of slow motion, fading in and out of sight as if—

No. There was no time to speculate.

Master Sedric had given him a mission: get the child out of the city. Get the child to safety. Await further instructions once the child was safe. And so he flew and tried not to think of the body he’d seen in the after-image, arms wide, amid the wreckage and the falling chaos, eyes closed in concentration as she kept the transmission river flowing on the swift trip down.

*

Burned out and abandoned, the farm looked safe enough to the young manitou. The dead—and there had been dead—lay cold in the ground, yet no rebuilding had begun, and the barn seemed vacant enough despite the smells clinging to it. Best of all, it was out of the rain. Water falling from the sky did not bother Striappa. A manitou of his clutch could easily shift from feathers to leather wings if flying lightly-boned, but the lightning disconcerted him. When his Long Skills were functioning he would have risked it, but the infant didn’t like flying through it all, and though the child did not cry, Striappa was mildly concerned about keeping the boy warm and dry.

So, once the water had risen too much for him to shelter under the small, well-built bridge he’d found (and he didn’t much like sheltering that low to the ground in any case), he’d circled back to perch in the loft of the barn.

Striappa had not meant to doze, but he had been tired and not entirely certain the bloody beak and the fading of his powers was not a sign of a head injury. He was surprised to hear little Caius’s burbling coo.

Pain came next, sharp and sudden, burning him through the back and lungs.

He slashed back reflexively, talons catching a dirty ragged shirt instead of finding purchase in the meat of Striappa’s killer. Shifting into a more land-friendly form hurt, but he had to defend Caius against—

“Name’s Hap,” spat the hard-looking human with murder in his eye. He wore a coat of plates, with a layer of rags sewn over the top to make it look less like armor. Angry hanging-scars at his throat burned red from recent exertion. Little Caius hung in a sling looped under the coat, but over Hap’s shoulders. In either hand, Hap held cruel-looking daggers. Both bore blood. “My boy’s name is Caius. Where’s his mother?”

“Hap?” Striappa squawked numbly.

“Happrenzaltik Konstantine Vindalius.” The man gave a slight nod.

“I have been your murderer this evening. Now where is Cadie? Slight little thing, three-colored hair. A crystal twist. Burned down that house fighting whoever killed my crew. She wouldn’t have left the child behind, and you’re here with the child. It doesn’t take a scholar to know one sun rises right after the other.”

“Murderer?” Shifting came too hard. Things which should have melded together ripped and tore.

“Shifting won’t do you any good now, you dumb squawker,” Hap snarled. “I cut you nice and proper cross your core muscles. What you’re doing will only make the wounds hurt worse and you die faster.”

“Why?” Striappa managed, as the world began to blink in and out of focus, field of vision narrowing.

“I was hoping you could tell me where the boy’s mother is. Cadence Vindalius.” Everything went dark, and Striappa felt himself drop to the dirty straw. “And barring that, a man has to eat.”

*

Striappa gasped as the pain vanished and he found himself back in the family nest he had missed since the great storm had wiped it away when he was little and they’d had to rebuild. When he’d been a hatchling, there had been no warsuit-clad Aern standing in it. Removing a helm that bore the likeness of a horned lion’s skull, the Aern looked down on him with a stern face, made less frightening by eyes with black sclera and jade-rimmed amber-colored pupils, which, though unusual, possessed and conveyed a sad understanding.

“You’re an idiot, but you’re a well-meaning one, and you died in the keeping of an oath, so I have no particular disdain for you.” Kholster, the new god of death, ran a hand over his red hair, his forearm bending his wolf-like ears down each time he did so. “Do you want to go back and try things again, or do you want to be judged by the Bone Queen?”

“I’m dead,” Striappa said, more awe in his voice than fear.

“Yes.” Kholster bared his teeth, showing off his upper and lower doubled canines in a sarcastic grin. “And you aren’t the only one who will be dying tonight. If it helps at all, you seem a nice enough soul to me. Minapsis will not likely find you wanting.”

“What will happen to the baby?” Striappa asked.

“I don’t know, and you never will.” Kholster’s tone sang to Striappa of barely constrained impatience.

“Is something wrong, sir?” Striappa asked. “You seem to have greens down your gob about something, if I’m using that phrase correctly.”

“Yes.” Kholster held out his hand. “There are a great number of things going wrong right now. Come along. I fear one of me will be required in some tunnels very soon now, and if I’m needed I would like to go myself.”

“You were mortal until recently, weren’t you?” Striappa obediently took the god’s hand. It felt like he had taken the hand of a statue that had decided not to crush all of the bones, but only just.

“I was.”

“The people who might need you, in the tunnels, were they friends of yours?”

“One was,” Kholster said, as the world went all to stars and Striappa felt himself begin to flow from one place to another. “The others are friends of my daughter.”

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Worldshaker will be available in stores on February 21.

Inside the mind of Imago Bone

Ever wanted to get into the mind of a character? Well, even deeper than literally reading his or her thoughts and actions throughout a book?

Take a glimpse inside the failing mind of Imago Bone in Chris Willrich's newest book The Chart of Tomorrows. This handy list was written by Bone to help him remember the people he's met, the places he's seen, and the creatures that tried to kill him.  Sounds like a helpful list, if you ask me.

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IMAGO BONE’S NOTES ON
PEOPLE, PLACES, AND THINGS
BECAUSE HE IS GETTING OLDER
AND HIS MEMORY IS TAXED

A-Girl-Is-A-Joy: Also, Joy Snøsdatter, Joy. Daughter of Snow Pine. Chosen to be the Runethane, champion of the Bladed Isles. It might have gone easier for her if she hadn’t.
A Tumult of Trees on Peculiar Peaks: Also known as the Scroll of Years. A landscape painting that either contains or accesses a pocket dimension of accelerated time. You see, Gaunt? I can use magical jargon too.
Aile: A headwoman of the Vuos people. I heard of her much later, yet somehow I feel she belongs here.
Alder: A former wizardly apprentice, my comrade at the Gull-Jarl’s steading.
Alfhild: A human raised as one of the fey uldra-folk. A princess of the uldra, no less. It seems to have affected her mind.
All-Now, the: Mirabad term for the compassionate creator of the universe.
Anansi: An exploratory ship from Kpalamaa.
Arngrimur Townflayer: One of the Nine Wolves. You may notice a theme in their names.
Arnulf Pyre-Maker: One of the Nine Wolves.
Ash-lad, or Askelad: A peasant hero from folktales.
Aughatai: Jewelwolf’s horse. There was something very wrong with that horse.
Beinahruga: Cairn.
Bone: A fool. No, that’s not all. An old fool.
Brambletop: A young woman of Larderland. It hurts to think of her now.
Breakwing Island: A troll-inhabited island beside Spydbanen.
Cairn: A Chooser of the Slain.
changeling: A troll or uldra child, left in place of a kidnapped human child.
Chart of Tomorrows, The: The Winterjarl’s protean book, full of cryptic passages and alarming maps.
Chooser of the Slain: An agent of the old gods of the Bladed Isles.
Claymore: A troll.
Clifflion: Grand Khan of the Karvaks.
Corinna: Princess, later queen, of Soderland. I was never sure where we stood with her, but I was always sure she was in charge.
Crypttongue: A magic sword Gaunt wielded for a time. I hate magic swords.
Deadfall: A sapient magic carpet. Before I met it, those words would not have seemed frightening.
Dolma: An exiled warrior of Xembala. For a time she helped my son. I am grateful.
Draug: A spirit creature found upon the sea and within the Straits of Tid. Draugar can take the forms of dead folk you’ve known.
Draugmaw: An unnatural, gigantic maelstrom. It has Draugar in it.
Einar Bringer of Wailing: One of the Nine Wolves.
Eldshore, the: A slowly crumbling but still mighty continental empire.
Erik Glint: A foamreaver and Larderman.
Eshe: Priestess, wanderer, warrior, spy. Possibly our employer.
eventyr: Fairy tales.
Everart: Rabble-rouser of Soderland. Quite good at it.
Fiskegard: Independent-minded islands founded by fishermen, nominally part of Oxiland, periodically filled with itinerant workers. I came from a family of fishermen, and the scent was like home.
Five Fjords: A shaky alliance of the towns of Lillefosna, Vestvjell, Vesthall, Grimgard, and Regnheim.
Floki: A slaver.
Foamreaver: Can be a seafarer, trader, raider, or all of them together.
Freidar: An old tavernkeeper and Runewalker. Husband of Nan. Kind to Innocence, he was a good companion when we sailed aboard Leaping Bison.
Gamellaw: A region governed by old laws under which steadings are the unit of civilization, not nations. Takes in Svardmark from the Morkskag to the Chained Straits, and all of Spydbanen.
Garmsmaw Pass: A mountain pass connecting Garmstad territory to northern Svardmark.
Garmstad: A town and territory allied to Soderland.
Gaunt: What I call Persimmon when we’re about our errands. The other half of my mind.
Gissur Mimurson: An Oxiland chieftain.
Gold-Jarl, or Gull-Jarl: Ruler of the small country of Gullvik.
Grawik: The steading of Ottmar Bloodslake.
Great Chain of Unbeing: A huge artifact absorbing the power of the dragons whose immense bodies gave form to the Bladed Isles.
Grunndokk: A town paying tribute to the Gull-Jarl.
Gullvik: Name of a town and a small domain in Svardmark.
Gunlaug: An overseer at the Gull-Jarl’s steading.
Haboob: An efrit, a spirit of the desert.
Hakon: The retired king of Soderland.
Harald the Far-Traveled: Chieftain of the Laksfjord region.
Havtor: A slave in the Gull-Jarl’s steading. May his name be honored.
Haytham ibn Zakwan ibn Rihab: Inventor and gentleman of Mirabad, daring to combine natural philosophy and magic. He gave the world ballooning. I might regret that, had I never flown.
Heavenwalls: Vast fortifications of Qiangguo—and beyond!—which somehow channel the land’s vital breath.
Hekla: Huginn Sharpspear’s companion. I think she was more formidable than he.
Huginn Sharpspear: A chieftain, lawyer, and tale-teller of Oxiland.
Imago: What Persimmon calls me, amid the least or greatest dangers.
Inga: She was half of the duo responsible for Peersdatter and Jorgensdatter’s Eventyr. A mighty fighter, and brave.
Innocence Gaunt: Our son.
Ironhorn: A Karvak general.
Ivar Garm: Lord Mayor of Garmstad Town.
Jaska: A girl who turned Innocence’s head in Oxiland.
Jegerhall: The steading of Arnulf Pyre-Maker.
Jewelwolf: Wife of the Grand Khan and a powerful leader in her own right. As if that wasn’t enough to make me nervous, also knowledgeable in magic. Sister of Steelfox.
Jokull Loftsson: Strongest of the Oxiland chieftains.
Jotuncrown: A settlement of humans in thrall to the troll-jarl in the Trollberg.
Joy: What we all called A-Girl-Is-A-Joy.
Katta, called the Mad: One of many names for the wandering monk of the Undetermined whom we knew. A big-hearted person, though I think he regarded me as a miscreant. Truly I have no idea why.
Kantenings: The humans of the Bladed Isles, excepting the Vuos, who stand apart.
Kantenjord: It means something like “Edge-lands.” Outsiders know it better as the Bladed Isles.
Karvak Realm: The empire of the Grand Khan.
Karvaks: The mightiest nomads of the steppes.
Klarvik: A town in Soderland.
Kolli the Cackling: One of the Nine Wolves.
Kollr: A young follower of the old gods in Oxiland, whom Innocence befriended.
Kpalamaa: A mighty realm of the South. If Qiangguo is not the world’s most advanced nation, it is this.
Laksfjord: A surprisingly pleasant community near the Morkskag.
Langfjord: The steading of Kolli the Cackling.
Lardermen: Elite group of foamreavers, who made their name bringing supplies past a blockade.
Leaftooth: Head monk of the Peculiar Peaks.
Liron Flint: Explorer, treasure hunter, friend.
Loftsson’s Hall: Steading of Oxiland’s most powerful chieftain, with many allied folk nearby.
Lysefoss: A settlement beside a spectacular waterfall. I’d have appreciated it more if we hadn’t been running for our lives.
Malin: She was half of the duo responsible for Peersdatter and Jorgensdatter’s Eventyr. A brave soul. An unusual mind.
Meteor-Plum: The guardian of the Scroll of Years sometimes goes by this name.
Mirabad: Name for both a great city and the caliphate it commands. Once its power made the world tremble; its wealth and learning still make the world envious.
Morkskag, the: The haunted forest that divides “civilized” Svardmark from the Gamellaw.
Mossbeard: A troll.
Muggur Barrow-Friend: One of the Nine Wolves.
Muninn Crowbeard: Once a foamreaver styled “Surehand.” He changed, more than once.
Nan: An old tavernkeeper and Runewalker. Wife of Freidar. Those two were kind to Innocence and did as much as anyone could to protect their homeland. I, a selfish man, am in awe.
Nine Smilodons: The Karvak soldier we traveled with for a time.
Nonyemeko: Captain of Anansi.
Northwing: A taiga shaman in service to Steelfox. Powerful as friend or enemy. I would know.
Numi: A Swan-church novitiate whom Innocence befriended.
Ostoland: A heavily wooded island, of somewhat insular folk.
Ottmar Bloodslake: One of the Nine Wolves.
Oxiland: A volcanic realm, and some associated islands, in Kantenjord’s northwest. A bleak country, settled by stubborn people with notions of democracy. Clearly they are mad. It’s tempting to join them.
Painter of Clouds: Swanlings use this term for what Mirabad’s people call the All-Now; they got the name from the People of the Brush.
Peersdatter and Jorgensdatter’s Eventyr: A surprisingly useful book of folk-tales.
Peik: A boy from Klarvik, by his own account absolutely the most truthful person that this or any other world has known.
Persimmon: See Gaunt. She is the one who should be writing this down; she has the gift for words. But she forgets little and doesn’t see the need. She remembers the time I did this, and the time I did that, and the other thing. And yet she is still with me.
Qiangguo: A vast realm of the East. If Kpalamaa is not the world’s most advanced nation, it is this.
Qurca: Steelfox’s peregrine falcon, bonded to her spirit.
Rafnar Dragon-Axe: One of the Nine Wolves.
Ragnar: Half-brother of Corinna of Soderland.
Red Mirror: A Karvak soldier.
Roisin: A Swanling priestess. A fine person, surely, but a little too cozy with
Rolf: A young Swanling of Oxiland, whom Innocence befriended.
Rubblewrack: A troll, or so she appeared.
Runethane, or Runemarked Queen or King: The one who commands the energies of the Great Chain of Unbeing.
Runewalkers: Traditional mages of Kantenjord. Their power derives from tracings of  mystic runes. Some of their tracings are enormous.
Ruvsa: Pirate queen of Larderland.
Schismglass: A magic sword, akin to Crypttongue but antagonistic.
Skalagrim the Bloody: One of the Nine Wolves. I’ll say no more about him.
Skrymir Hollowheart: Lord of trolls in Spydbanen and, effectively, everywhere else.
Skyggeskag, the: An elder forest in Soderland, cousin to the Morkskag.
Snow Pine: Once known as Next-One-a-Boy or simply Next One. A bandit of Qiangguo and a companion to Persimmon and me. Our best friend.
Smokecoast: The largest settlement of Oxiland.
Soderland: Strongest and richest of the local kingdoms, principalities, chiefdoms, and what-have-yous. Therefore, the biggest target.
Splintrevej: Maze-like scattering of islands in the heart of Kantenjord.
Spydbanen: The northeastern of Kantenjord’s main islands, and home to its most violent jarls, including the troll-jarl. The Vuos people live in its extreme north.
Steelfox: A princess of the Karvak Realm, determined to conquor the Earthe in the memory of her father, the first Grand Khan.  Even with all that in mind, I liked her.
Storfosna: A town in Soderland.
Stormhamn: A town in Soderland.
Sturla’s Steading: The home of Huginn and Hekla.
Styr Surturson: An Oxiland chieftain.
Surtfell: The great volcano of Oxiland.
Svanstad: The capital of Soderland and largest city in the Bladed Isles.
Svardmark: Kantenjord’s largest island, home to what passes for its civilized lands.
Swan Goddess: The deity said to have sacrificed herself to save the world. Accounted the daughter of the Painter of Clouds.
Swanisle: An island nation, closer to the continent than are the Bladed Isles. Gaunt’s homeland. Legend has it it’s the petrified body of the Swan Goddess. I am not weighing in on this.
Swanling: The Kantenings call the Swan Goddess’s followers this.
Tlepolemus: A fellow far-traveled adventurer who became a Larderman.
Torfa: Jokull Loftsson’s wife. By report, an exemplar of Kantening ferocity.
Trollberg, the: The troll mountain-fortress beside Jotuncrown.
uldra: A varied nonhuman folk who sometimes dwell underground and sometimes in other worlds entirely.
Undetermined, the: An enlightened being venerated in the East.
Varmvik: A town in Soderland.
Vatnar: An important churchman of Oxiland.
Vinderhus: A whaling community in Oxiland.
Vuos: A human community distinct from the Kantenings. They herd reindeer and have shamanistic beliefs.
Vuk: A man of the Wagonlords on the continent, my comrade at the Gull-Jarl’s steading.
Walking Stick: An itinerant official of Qiangguo. Also a wulin warrior, capable of esoteric combat moves. A good ally, and a bad enemy, to have. He’s been both.
Wiglaf: A legendary warrior, whose fate was tied up with the swords Crypttongue and Schismglass. I don’t envy him.
Winterjarl, the: Harbinger of Fimbulwinter and Ragnarok, or so we thought.
Wormeye: A troll.
Xembala: A paradisiacal eastern land, a source of ironsilk. There are times I’d like to be there.
Yngvarr Thrall-Taker: One of the Nine Wolves. He surprised us at the end.

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For all things Gaunt & Bone, check out The Scroll of Years and The Silk Map!

Father's Day is Coming.

It's been less than a week since the season finale of Game of Thrones, and this Sunday we're supposed to be showering dads everywhere with something they'll love. We see an action-packed, fantasy-driven void that needs to be filled! Skip the cutesy coffee mugs and uninventive gift cards and give him something that will get his adrenaline pumping.

Read more in this months' Pyr-a-zine enewlstter!

Oathkeeper has arrived

Looking to jump into a new series? Miss the old days where elves and dwarves could still swing a sword? Well, news this month is the second book in J. F. Lewis's Grudgebearer Trilogy, OATHKEEPER, and we've got an excerpt for you!

If you like what you read, don't forget to grab the first book GRUDGEBEARER, so you...ya know...know what's going on.

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Night birds called in the outer dark, joining a chorus comprised of tent fabric shifting in the gentle breeze and the chirps, cries, and grunts of nocturnal creatures. Rivvek loved those sounds; even the sea lapping against the pier at Oot contributed to the unscripted opus.

Combined with the scent of stale air inside the tent and the snores of another person nearby, the sensorial collage conjured memories of brighter days camping with his father the king . . . even hunting trips with his younger brother before Dolvek had become so insufferable. Rivvek had hoped his brother’s encounter with Kholster would be transformative.

If it had been, Rivvek couldn’t see it.

Elsewhere in the ramshackle encampment, Oathkeepers and Oath-breakers alike slept soundly, dreams little disturbed by the Grand Conjunc-tion’s approaching end.

Their world is about to change in ways they cannot even imagine, he thought, blind to the turning of the gears in the great destiny machine.

The great destiny machine.

Rivvek smirked at the thought of it. Once he’d believed the gnomes worshipped a literal device that wove the skein of mortal fates. When he’d realized numbers were the gnomish religion and their great destiny machine merely a codified method of determining likely outcomes, he’d been sorely disappointed . . . and then, years later as he lay healing under the care of the Vael, he’d learned to do the math.

The gnomes played a game with triangular tiles: trignom. Queen Kari of the Vael had given him a set during his convalescence. He had never learned to play well. Irka, Kholster’s son—a perfect double called an Incarna—always beat him, but Rivvek remembered building patterns with the double-sided num­bered tiles atop the stiff and pungent plaster in which the Vael healers kept most of him wrapped, and knocking them over to watch the trignoms fall.

The whole world was like those tumbling tiles if you knew how to look at it, and, eyes having been so painfully and thoroughly opened, Rivvek knew no other way.

My graduation approaches.

Rivvek considered his true education to have begun at the Grand Con­junction a hundred and thirteen years ago. It marked his thoughts then as

clearly as the scars he’d received afterward warped his flesh. Was it fair to hold the lack of such learning against his brother? An Eldrennai who still had his magic, whose body was whole and hale?

Prince Rivvek lay in the dark, incapable of slumber, stacking up the trignoms in his thoughts, looking at them from every angle and doing the math. The first tile would be flicked over soon. It was a tile he would have given almost anything to protect, to place his hand over the tile and hold it in place safe and secure. There were three ways to stop it he could accomplish alone, but then the pattern changed, and the new designs woven into the great destiny machine spelled doom for the Eldrennai.

He wasn’t sure why the Zaur hadn’t started burning Root Trees yet. The math said they should. Perhaps his formulae were off in that regard, but his calculations, his own personal version of the great destiny machine, was far more accurate when it came to the Eldren Plains and the politics and machi­nations of the Eldrennai.

Those sums spelled destruction now. He had not yet been born when Uled had created the Aern, a race of warriors to defend against the reptilian Zaur and their magic resistance. For each new problem, it now seemed, Uled had created a new race and with each race, the path to doom had become more and more difficult to avoid.

Uled had wanted to restrict the Aern’s ability to breed, creating them all male, thinking he could use low-born Eldrennai women with little magic and no connections as brood mares for his warriors, but bearing Aern, with their bone-steel and unique nutritional properties, rendered an Eldrennai female barren, often after the first birth.

Nine in ten. Rivvek saw the statistics in his head, marveling at how much cruelty could be concealed when suffering and evil were disguised as numbers.

To solve the breeding issue, Uled had created the plantlike Vael, their bodies designed to be both appealing to the Aern and easily capable of pro­ducing many Aern offspring, quite rapidly if the raw materials were available in sufficient quantities.

Two gallons of blood per infant to be awakened. . . . Words from Uled’s notes haunted Rivvek, but he’d needed to know, to understand, so that he could get the numbers right. His predictive model required deadly accuracy.

On the page, everything looked like it would work, but chaos, the natural tendency for change, had not been accounted for in any of Uled’s plans or designs. First came the appearance of female Aern, then male Vael.

Worse were the changes and complications brought in by individuals in

power. Enslaved by Uled’s magic, unable to refuse a command, or break an oath, the Aern might have remained under complete Eldrennai control forever. Given the pride and arrogance so common to Rivvek’s ancestors, in fact, the entire bloodline of Villok, Rivvek was still astonished it had taken as long as it had for an Eldrennai king to break his word to Kholster, First Born of Uled’s Aern, thus releasing the Aern from the spells that bound them.

From there, even Rivvek’s predictions would have been wrong had he been alive to make them. In prolonged battle against a magic immune warrior race in possession of nigh unbeatable warsuits, even in limited numbers, Rivvek would have projected a complete genocide for the Eldrennai. His cal­culations would have failed to account for the Vael’s inborn desire for peace and mediation as well as the Aern’s affection and respect for them.

The six hundred years of peace they had enjoyed had been a statistical anomaly. Rivvek wondered whether other Eldrennai comprehended how lucky they had been that the uneasy truce had lasted a year, much less six hundred. Even if Dolvek, Rivvek’s brother, had not so stupidly broken the truce by moving the warsuits the Aern had left behind as part of the truce, it would have ended eventually. At that time, the oath made by Kholster to slay every Eldrennai would have come into effect, and the path upon which they now walked would still be theirs. Only the date had been variable.

But, as his own scarred body told the world, there are varying levels of ruination. One can be scourged near to death, be broken, and laid waste to and still heal to emerge from the flames, if not whole, then . . . still useful.

“Kings die,” he whispered, his voice breaking, the words strangled. “Fathers die.” He pushed on, forcing himself through a verbalization of the hateful truth. “Everyone dies eventually. It’s making sure that death has as much meaning as . . . as . . .”

Optimize your life and you will be rewarded in the next. That was what the gnomes believed. Rivvek was certain Torgrimm, as god of birth and death, had made it happen. Would Kholster, in his new role as Harvester, do the same? For the gnomes? Rivvek did not doubt he would. For King Grivek?

Eyes closed more against that idea than the dark, Rivvek’s ears perked up. His melted ear tugged against the tender flesh at his temple as he eaves­dropped on the Kingsguard. Their appointed rounds kept them stationed far enough from the cluster of deiform statuary to avoid disturbing the Conjunc­tion itself, but close enough that the brave Eldrennai could charge to their deaths in King Grivek’s defense. Rivvek assumed their voices were overheard just as easily by the Vael and the Aern at Oot as they were by him.

“Now that Kholster’s dead,” a husky-voiced Eldrennai muttered to someone, “our King will make things right between the Grudgebearers and us. You wait and see, Dace.”

Was that Thalan speaking? Rivvek decided it must be.

“You think so, Thal?” Dace breathed.

“She’s not even half a hundred yet,” Thalan chortled. “You think this kholster Rae’en can out-negotiate an Eldrennai king with over half a millen­nium on the throne?”

This then, Rivvek thought, sitting up, is the peril of my people: arrogance unrivaled by any other race and self-deception enough to make Kilke himself blush.

“My prince?” Sargus stirred. Rivvek opened his eyes, making out the aura of Sargus’s life force more easily than he could his features in the night—another “gift” from his time beyond the Port Gates. When one stood too close to a Port Gate or wore armor made of Ghaiattri hide, one could see, as if through a thin veil, the creatures of the Ghaiattri’s realm. Rivvek’s sight afforded him a dual view of reality, particularly at night, the never-dark of that other place seeped into his perceptions. With it came a light that illu­minated the spirits of sentient beings around him. Sargus shone as a whorl of colors, dark, rich purples wending through golds and blues shot through with the occasional bloody red or coal black.

When bending his mind to a problem, the black, red, and purple spread through Sargus, filling him up, the borders assuming jagged lines. Now he was mostly blues and golds. Colors Dolvek thought of as safer. He hadn’t been able to completely codify the internal palettes of others, but the inner black was not good.

Sargus had fallen asleep reading. Blinking to focus on the real world as much as he could, Rivvek barely made out the glint of the other elf’s goggles in the scant light that crept in from outside. A full moon.

“I’m sorry to wake you,” Rivvek whispered.

“I shouldn’t have fallen asleep,” Sargus answered. “Shall I—?”

“No,” Rivvek interrupted. “Let me do it. I need the practice.”

Rivvek heard an intake of breath as if Sargus had been about to object, but the Artificer held his tongue.

A prince still has pride, Rivvek chided himself, even a magic-crippled one. Rivvek rubbed his eyes, clearing away scratchy motes of “sleep” from the corners. He took a long deep breath, held it, let it out again.

Mustering a supreme effort of will, Rivvek forced his inner power to its utmost. Veins stood out on his forehead. His scars grew hot then aching— pain a constant chaser to the savor of his magic now—and fire raged forth: a

gleaming white flame no bigger than the wisp atop the wick of a lit candle hovered above the tip of his index finger.

Warm illumination filled the tent, revealing the smiling face of Sargus where he sat in the strange folding-chair contraption of brass and leather that let him adjust the back to recline or sit up straight if needed. Rivvek didn’t know how it could be as comfortable as Sargus claimed.

Thoughts focused on the bit of mystic flame, Rivvek crossed the tent and lit a lantern sitting upon a small camp table. Wiping a bead of sweat from his cheek, Rivvek scratched absently at his nightshirt, as the pain in his scars faded with the magic. The heat would take longer to dissipate, a side effect for which none had been able to provide adequate explanation.

“Find anything we missed?” Rivvek nodded at the leather tome open on Sargus’s lap.

“No.” Sargus closed the volume, shifting it from his lap to a nearby camp table. “We do still need to make sure we take care of the Stone Lord, just in case—”

“One son and two daughters,” Rivvek interrupted. He waved to his left in the vague direction of the other Aiannai tents, the temporary homes of those who had followed him to Oot hoping their prince and their new status as Oathkeepers would save them from the Aern. “Each to inherit in an order we’ve already hammered out. They relayed their request via Caz’s warsuit Silencer. I handled it on my last trip.”

“Who took them in?”

“Is it horrible that I don’t remember?” Rivvek yawned. “But with Lady Flame, the Sea Lord, Lady Air, and the Stone Lord . . .”

“That’s all of the elemental council dealt with except for Hasimak.” Sargus yawned despite himself. “He is more powerful than you realize. Were he to oppose us, he could still—”

“No.” Rivvek pulled his nightshirt over his head revealing Kholster’s scars upon his back: a diamond shape at the base of his spine with two par­allel lines marking each facet, the right-angled wedges at each shoulder, and a thumb-width line along his spine. Far from the only things that marked his back, the scars of the First of One Hundred merely filled in the space not marked by the various elemental foci that dotted his back in winglike arcs in failed attempts to restore the full might of his magic.

Once . . . he cut the thought off ruefully and reached for his traveling clothes. Once these clothes were clean and fresh. They were rank from the multiple visits to and from Port Ammond, but he could get a change of clothes when he got there. A bath, too. He’d almost given in to the temptation to bring

a cleaning wardrobe, but doing so had felt too extravagant. “We’ll go with your strategy.”

“It’s risky. Even with the elemental lords and ladies siding with you, the people could still riot. Even if Hasimak is with us, he will never turn on his own people. If the citizens revolt . . . he has always been loyal to the crown. Longer than the crown has existed, actually, and there are far more non-magic-using Eldrennai than there have ever been. Aern have proved how much trouble opponents without magic can be. The plan is—”

“Not as risky as you think it is.” Rivvek heard footsteps outside his tent flap. Two steps took him close enough to throw them open. He smiled when doing so revealed Brigadier Bhaeshal, his personal Aeromancer.

“Just happened to be in the area, Bash?” Rivvek teased.

“Finally used to your new schedule.” She smiled. Dressed as Rivvek was in a traveling tunic, trousers, and boots, Bhaeshal would have made Hasi-mak’s nose wrinkle in dismay at her lack of formal robes, but they weren’t really all that sensible for long flights. “Lord Artificer.” She nodded to Sargus, the light from the candle reflected in the masklike band of steel that was her elemental foci. She looked back at him with those pale white crystalline eyes, and he returned her gaze warmly.

“Lady Aeromancer,” Sargus nodded back.

“Will you both be coming?”

“Perhaps I ought to stay and . . .” Sargus trailed off.

“Look after my father?” Rivvek smiled. “I wish there were something you could do to change his fate, but there isn’t. I need you with me . . . to stop Hasimak from taking the throne.”

“Please don’t even jest about that.” Sargus got up.

Rivvek tried not to let it worry him. Yes, Hasimak was the oldest living Eldrennai, but it was hard to imagine how he could be a threat to . . . well, to the Aern if it came down to it. No, Rivvek was forced to ask kholster Rae’en for assistance. It would be sad to see Hasimak go, but if that was the required sac­rifice to save as many of Rivvek’s people, as many of the Eldrennai, as he could. Rivvek intended to make that sacrifice and any others the gods demanded.

“Don’t forget the book.” He gestured, and Sargus picked the heavy tome up off of the camp table.

“My prince . . .” Sargus put a hand on Rivvek’s shoulder and seemed momentarily surprised by the scars beneath his tunic, still hot to the touch even through the fabric. “Maybe she won’t kill him.”

“Kings die. A good king dies for his people when it is required.” Riv-vek’s voice cracked as he whispered the words. Believing them didn’t take

dismiss their sting in the slightest. “You just promise me we’ll make his sacrifice mean something.”

They flew before dawn, sunrise catching up with them halfway to Port Ammond. The rising light lent the flowing myr grass a fiery aspect. Rivvek, carried by Bhaeshal’s Aeromancy, caught himself staring down at it and remembering another departure one hundred and thirteen years before.

*

He’d been scarless then, a haughty elemental lord with command of all four elements as was his birthright. A Flamewing, like his mother, when he worked magic wings of fire sprouted from his back. A glory to behold. It had been like armor, that pride, and Kholster had cracked it.

The Aern himself, First of One Hundred, stood in the last light of the third day of the Grand Conjunction, bone-steel mail—uledinium, his people had called it, but Rivvek would never dare to refer to it as that again—denim trousers belted at the waist with knotted bone-steel chain. Even those clunky boots had seemed grand to the prince. A Vael princess named Kari (not-yet-queen), her head petals cascading over Kholster’s shoulder as she leaned against him, watched Rivvek with sad, wide eyes.

“You are right,” Rivvek said hoarsely. “What you say is true. My father told me I should believe your version of any history you chose to share with me and, hard as it is, I do. But, Kholster, what would you have me do? How can I fix this? My people. My ancestors. There is no excuse for what they did to you. No excuse for my father’s order at As You Please. No excuse for the mistreatment of the Vael. Not for any of it. I came here ready to hate you. Maybe I did hate you at first, but now . . .”

“There is nothing you can do, Oathbreaker prince,” Kholster said, his voice gentle. “But I, or my representative, will return again in one hundred years for the next Conjunction if for no other reason than that you have heard and believed. You have my oath on it.”

Rivvek opened his mouth to object.

“Unasked for,” Kholster laughed. “I know.”

“I will find a way,” Rivvek answered. “I will find a way, not to make things right, but as right as they can be.”

Kholster laughed again. “Good hunting then, but I fear your quarry is long dead, if it ever existed.”

“Princess Kari,” Rivvek shook his head. “Is there anything I can offer the Vael other than my apology?”

“The Vael have no Litany to recite against you, Prince Rivvek.” Kari

smiled pityingly at him. “You are guilty of nothing in my—or our—eyes.

Keep it that way and we ask nothing more. If Kholster agrees, you are even

welcome in The Parliament of Ages.”

Kholster nodded his assent.

“Such,” Rivvek answered, “is my intent.”

“No promise?” Kholster asked.

“I swear that it is my intent, but I cannot read what the future may hold

. . . and accidents happen.”

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