The precarious equilibrium among the four Londons has reached its breaking point. Once brimming with the red vivacity of magic, darkness casts a shadow over the Maresh Empire, leaving a space for another London to rise. Kell-once assumed to be the last surviving Antari-begins to waver under the pressure of competing loyalties. Lila Bard, once a commonplace-but never common-thief, has survived and flourished through a series of magical trials. But now she must learn to control the magic, before it bleeds her dry. Meanwhile, the disgraced Captain Alucard Emery and the Night Spire crew are attempting a race against time to acquire the impossible, as an ancient enemy returns to claim a crown and a fallen hero is desperate to save a decaying world...

Hector is an 11-year-old boy living near Edinburgh with his great auntie Robbo who is in her eighties. A woman calling herself his step-mother arrives from England and Hector and Auntie Robbo realise that they have to run away. The chase leads all over the north of Scotland, narrowly escaping police and the authorities, adopting three homeless children on the way. Originally refused publication in London because it was deemed critical of the English, Auntie Robbo was first published in the U.S. in 1940. After success in print it was taken on by Constable in 1959 and later was published in India, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark and Germany.