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Chapters (61)
  1. Publisher’s Notice
  2. Map of Crache
  3. Dedication
  4. PART ONE THREE SIDES OF A COIN
  5. THE MOURNING AFTER
  6. THE KNIGHT BEFORE
  7. WHERE ONLY STONE STEPS ASCEND
  8. A THOUSAND FACES AND NONE
  9. BLOOD COINS AND BLOOD COIN HUNTERS
  10. FALLING STARS
  11. CITIES BUILT IN BOXES
  12. STEEL FIELDS OF RUST AND ROT
  13. RESOLVE IS THE FORGED BLADE THAT CANNOT BE QUENCHED
  14. THE DEAD WHO REVEL IN LIFE
  15. SHAHEEN
  16. THE FIRST WEAPON WAS A STORY TOLD BY LIARS
  17. HOME STUDIES
  18. REQUITAL IS THE REVENGE OF THE WELL-READ
  19. BURIED ON THE BATTLEFIELD
  20. ON AND OFF
  21. SAVAGERY PAYS A CALL
  22. WHEN GHOSTS SPEAK YOUR REAL NAME
  23. PART TWO UNRAVELING THE EDGES
  24. THE BLACK EAGLE
  25. THE MESSENGER
  26. A PEBBLE IN A MAZE
  27. THIRTY TONGUES AND NOT A WORD SPOKEN
  28. TEARS MADE OF FIRE
  29. LATE-NIGHT CALLERS
  30. THE MATING CALL OF THE CRACHIAN WIND DRAGON
  31. ONLY FIRE AND ICE GROW IN CHARNEL HOUSE GARDENS
  32. SCATTERING THE ASHES
  33. THE JEOPARDY ROOM
  34. HEAVEN’S HOSTESS IS HELL’S HANDMAIDEN
  35. THE BONES OF THE WORLD
  36. THE GOD RUNG
  37. KNIVES SPEAK LOUDEST IN THE DARK
  38. THE INTEREST PAID IN BLOOD
  39. RIDDLES SHAPED IN STONE
  40. THE CALLING HOUR
  41. WE BURIED OUR STORIES IN THE EARTH
  42. PART THREE REVELATIONS OF THE THROAT
  43. FORMLESS, SHAPELESS, IT CAN FLOW OR IT CAN CRASH
  44. THE SPARROW GENERAL
  45. THOUGH IT BE HARSH, COME BACK TO THE LIGHT
  46. THE NEW DEVOURING THE OLD
  47. A PLOT OF CORPSES
  48. THE BLACK TURTLE
  49. MARCHING TO A HEADLESS DRUM
  50. SEEK NOT THE EAVES AT MIDNIGHT
  51. REUNION
  52. SLEEP, AND HIS BROTHER DEATH
  53. MISSIO INTERRUPTUS
  54. BORN ON THE BATTLEFIELD
  55. IN THE HOUSE OF THE IGNOBLE
  56. THE ONES WE KEEP CLOSE
  57. DAWN IS THE MOMENT YOU WAKE
  58. THE GRAY AFTER THE STORM
  59. FINAL SELECTION
  60. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  61. ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lexi nods with more clarity. “And this naturally creates dangerous waters for you to tread, should you agree to aid us.”

“I’m more concerned about you, Te-Gen,” he says, and it sounds sincere.

“I believe we’ve proven we can handle Aegins,” Lexi reminds him.

“Quite,” Taru adds.

Daian can’t help but grin at the pair of them.

“All right,” he pronounces. “I’ll do what I can. I make no promises, save I’ll seek and report the truth.”

Lexi accepts that. “And what should we do?”

“You two return to the Gen Circus, to your towers,” he instructs them. “If the Protectorate Ministry has it in mind to watch you, then you will be watched, no matter what you do or where you go. It’s best you put them to sleep. Give them nothing of interest to observe or report.”

Taru is dubious. “Then how will you contact us?”

“I’ll figure that part out later,” Daian assures them. “Let’s just hope I can uncover something worth reporting.”

“Where will you start?” Lexi asks.

“With what we have,” he says. “Two dead bodies, marked with blue tattoos.”

TEARS MADE OF FIRE

“HOW ARE WE GOING TO make it back?” Brio asks her in the dark. “We’re in the vanguard of the Sicclunan front. There’s a hundred miles of Skrain, Savages, and blood coin hunters behind us. It will be nearly impossible to make it to the border of the Tenth City, let alone all the way back to the Capitol.”

“We’ll have to wait for that leg to heal. You’re useless on the run with it. But we’re not going anywhere tonight. Go to sleep.”

The tent is scarcely big enough to sleep both of them on the cold, hard ground, but Brio is grateful for even the thinnest barrier between them and the cold. One of the many fervent whispers around the camp is that the Sicclunan nights are getting unseasonably colder every year, and the days unseasonably hot. No explanation has been offered for either that Brio has gleaned, but he’s felt the truth of it in his time among the Savages on the front.

He lies facing Evie, only the scarcest contours of her face visible to him in the dark, but it’s enough. He remembers her face as well as his own mother’s. Ashana was one of many children his and Lexi’s parents took in from the Bottoms, like Taru, out of sympathy or necessity or because they saw something unique in a particular person. Ashana was the only one, however, their parents ever sent away. They had plans for Brio and Lexi, and those plans involved marriage and continuing Gen Stalbraid.