HIGH STAKES ADVENTURE AS TWO FRIENDS FIGHT THEIR WAY ACROSS A STRANGE WORLD IN A FAR-FLUNG FUTURE Sometimes, the real enemies are the friends we make along the way. An encounter with an old friend becomes tragically fatal, and Indrajit and Fix set out on a high-stakes, high-adrenaline quest across the ancient city of Kish to bring their friend back to life. At each step, the complications and the enemies alike pile up. The mysterious necromancers, the Vin Dalu priests, bind the heroes on an errand that sends them shuttling from one thieves' guild to the next, pitting Indrajit and Fix against the deadly House of Knives and embroiling them in a plot by the giant, wasplike Kattak to take dire revenge on Kish and all its great houses. Can the heroes save their friend? Can Indrajit and Fix survive? Will Kish itself fall?

Sarah Calhoun is the fifteen-year-old daughter of the Elector Andrew Calhoun, one of Appalachee's military heroes and one of the electors who gets to decide who will next ascend as the Emperor of the New World. None of that matters to Sarah. She has a nat

THE EVENTS OF EARTH'S PAST MAY HOLD THE KEY TO EARTH'S FUTURE SALVATION Marty Cohen was a gifted linguist and student of ancient military strategy who stepped away from academic Egyptology and opened a woodworking shop. Away from the bitter politics and petty rivalries, he's happy to take care of his people, play the occasional war game, and try to make a good life. Then mysterious visions begin to rob him of sleep. Soon after they start, he gets summoned back to Egypt: an off-the-grid dig funded by an eccentric financier has discovered texts that may be the earliest Egypt has produced, and they'll pay Marty silly amounts of cash just to fly out and take one little look. Marty turned his back on the academia game, but he's a small business owner who has to make payroll during a recession, and he can't say no to the money. But the texts open doors to more visions and to an astonishing journey: the ragtag team of archaeologists finds itself in protohistoric North Africa, a drying land dominated by monsters, where humanity is badly in need of champions. And behind the war against the monster overlords lies a greater struggle: Marty and his team have been chosen to be champions of all Earth and to run a gauntlet on humanity's behalf. Failure will mean extinction.

Indrajit and Fix are the founding partners of the Protagonists, a jobber company in Kish. Since the seven great families of Kish farm out all tasks they and the city need doing, a jobber might one day unblock a well, the next man a tollgate for the fair,

Hiram and his son Michael are dowsing a well in Eastern Utah when they hear a cry of help from the ghost of a small boy, torn to pieces by wild animals. Before they can even begin to look into that tragedy, however, a prosperous local rancher is murdered

Marty Cohen was a gifted linguist and student of ancient military strategy who stepped away from academic Egyptology and opened a woodworking shop. Away from the bitter politics and petty rivalries, he's happy to take care of his people, play the occasion

Sarah Calhoun has taken her father's throne and ascended into her goddess's presence in Unfallen Eden as her father never did. And Sarah Calhoun is dying.