Elsuon: The Stonecutter's Son

"There is in the East, beyond the trick-spirits of the Sea of Pleats, a most-strange country. One that all who hear of it agree has lost and gained more than any kingdom in any place since the world first fell to the riot of those Old Disloyals."

And so opens Elsuon.

Two-hundred years after a powerful sorceress, an undying queen, and a light-taming saint established a quivering truce in the Eastern Fortunes, a talented architect and his son Allesson enter the mysterious Land of Suzulon.

In the capital, a defiant Archduke prepares for war.

As an centuries-old truce comes to an end, the seven great families of Nymiria contend for the Archduke’s daughter who, being of age before the law, must take a lord.

If she marries, it is one war; if she doesn’t, it is another.

Other dangers are gathering: witches working black miracles; saint-killing separatists arming themselves near the Perch of the Gorgons; barbarians on the march from from the Sky Anvils; the fell creatures amassing in the Valley of the Moonseeds; a foreign banking cartel lead by a savior turned dark; and the arrival of an alluring traveler from beyond the Keel of Stars.

The final omen: a strange mountain that has slowly turned for nine thousand years has suddenly stopped, angering the lightning-spraying, whale-hunting dragons who have ruled it for centuries.

All this and more gamble for the soul of Nymiria and the young life of a stonecutter’s son, Allesson.

Or, as destiny regards him—

Elsuon.