Showing results by narrator "Steven Brand" in All Categories

Here is today's lesson; heroes die. It’s been 15 years since the Orcs were defeated. Fifteen years since a new king rose from the battlefield. Fifteen years since Illian knew the horror of war. Fifteen years of peace are about to end. Something is coming. Shadows gather. Whispers of rebellion have reached the king. Darkness stirs beyond Illian’s borders. Beyond the mountains, Dhenaheim has lost a quiet war. Refugees pour into Illian, bringing suspicion and unrest. For Doran Heavybelly, Dhenaheim's war means facing a personal tragedy that demands his attention...and his axe.

The Great Calamity has returned, destroying all in his wake. Reeling from the destruction of King's Point and the death of his uncle, Elyon Daecar makes at once for Varinar to discern the state of the city. What he finds gives him small cause for hope. Through the spreading darkness, thin shards of light remain. They must act quickly lest they close forever. Saska's time in Aram has run out. With the city safe from the coalition of Lords Krator and Kastor, she sets her sights on her journey north, bidding her dying grandmother farewell. She has no choice now but to embrace her fate.

War rages in the north. As the Varin Knights march to join Tukor in their conflict against Rasalan, Elyon Daecar finds himself embroiled in a world of secrets and lies. Saska has one goal: to assassinate Lord Kastor. Posing as a captured servant girl, she infiltrates the Kastor warcamp to face her demons, but before long finds herself hopelessly out of her depth. Enemies close in, old and new…and history has a habit of repeating itself.

The spectacular conclusion to the New York Times best-selling Raven's Shadow series, which began with the critically acclaimed Blood Song. Empires will fall. Queen Lyrna has survived the bloody siege of Alltor. Now she must rally her troops and take back the capital from the Volarian invaders. But driving her hated enemy out of the Realm will not satisfy her lust for vengeance - she wants to pursue them across the ocean and burn their empire to ashes. To do so she must place her faith in the Seventh Order.

After the fall of the great Vandarian fortress of Dragon's Bane, Elyon Daecar gathers his army in the Lakelands to the north. They have suffered a great defeat. Heroes and friends have fallen. Yet, with the Windblade in his grasp, Elyon will not yield. From east to west and north to south, he will take the fight to the enemy and soar.

The north is at peace, secured by murder and betrayal and the plotting of treacherous kings. As half the northern nobility gather in Ilithor for the wedding of Princess Amilia Lukar and the traitorous King Hadrin, Elyon Daecar finds himself drawn into a plot he never expected. One that may see him soar.

He stands between two worlds, a savior and a destroyer to both. Dragons and aegres will fall. But one can turn the tide. One who stands in the shadow of kings. Such has been seen by the doomed. The weight of ten thousand lives and all the realm besides now sits on Joran's shoulders. So much has already been sacrificed to bring him to the ancient doors of Drakanan, where he might take on the mantle of Dragon Rider and usher in a new age of heroes. But a time of dragons is not all that has been seen…

War is set to ravage Illian. The elves sail from the east. The savage Darkakin rise from the south. Valanis, the dark elf, is finally free of his prison and eager to see his work finished. Only then will he be free of the gods who still haunt him. A new hope rises in The Red Mountains. There, the last remaining dragons have been discovered. Gideon and Galanör, human and elf, will have to work together if they are to convince Adriel, the last of the Dragorn order, to intervene in the coming war.

Born into the troubled kingdom of Albermaine, Alwyn Scribe is raised as an outlaw. Quick of wit and deft with a blade, Alwyn is content with the freedom of the woods and the comradeship of his fellow thieves. But an act of betrayal sets him on a new path - one of blood and vengeance, which eventually leads him to a soldier's life in the king's army. Fighting under the command of Lady Evadine Courlain, a noblewoman beset by visions of a demonic apocalypse, Alwyn must survive war and the deadly intrigues of the nobility if he hopes to claim his vengeance.

It has unravelled across the ages, its web woven throughout millennia of chaos and blood. Now, all that was seen shall come to pass, and there is nothing the heroes of Verda can do to stop it. After years of planning and preparation, Alijah Galfrey is finally ready to change the world. He will break the scales of power across the realm, securing his victory and eternal reign. There is no line he will not cross; no sacrifice he will not make to bring peace to the land.

Vaelin Al Sorna is a living legend. It was his leadership that overthrew empires and his sacrifice that saved the Unified Realm from destruction. Now he lives a quiet life, his days of warfare behind him.Yet whispers have spread across the sea of an army called the Steel Horde, led by a man who thinks himself a god. When Vaelin learns that Sherin, the woman he lost long ago, has fallen into the Horde's grasp, he resolves to confront this powerful new threat.To this end, he travels to the realms of the Merchant Kings - a strange land ruled by honour and intrigue.

The final days of hope have come and gone. The kingdoms of Illian stand on the edge of ruin, threatened by the armies of Valanis. As evil spreads across the land, too few are left to hold the line. A world away, the children of fire and flame may be the only hope for the realm, but the dragons have been defeated before. Now Verda's future hangs in the balance.

Orcs, an ancient fiend thought lost to history, have risen from The Under Realm. Their hunger for total dominance has plunged Illian into war, pushing the survivors to Namdhor, the last refuge of man at the top of the world. For those who stand up to this foe, they do so in darkness. Ash clouds smother the skies, blocking out the sun as the orcs rampage across the land.

The realm burns. Vaelin Al Sorna is tired of war. He's fought countless battles in service to the Realm and Faith. His reward was the loss of his love, the death of his friends and a betrayal by his king. After five years in an Alpiran dungeon, he just wants to go home. Reva intends to welcome Vaelin back with a knife between the ribs. He destroyed her family and ruined her life.

We have fought battles that left more than a hundred corpses on the ground and not a word of it has ever been set down. The Order fights, but often it fights in shadow, without glory or reward. We have no banners. Vaelin Al Sorna is the Sixth Order's newest recruit. Under their brutal training regime, he learns how to forge a blade, survive the wilds and kill a man quickly and quietly - all in the name of protecting the Realm and the Faith. Now his skills will be put to the test.

Alijah's reign sweeps from Erador to Ayda. Those who would stand against the king are few, their numbers cast across too many battlefields. Does hope lie in the east? Can the elves turn the tide and keep The Rebellion alive? The weight of Dhenaheim now rests on Doran's shoulders. Chained and imprisoned, the clans are shattered and spread across the realm. On the island of Qamnaran, they build to the heavens. In the Moonlit Plains, they dig down into the dark. Only the Heavybellys have the mettle to do what must be done.

Turned from the path of the assassin, Asher roams the world no better than a nomad, with naught to offer but his sword and grit. But woe betide the monster that believes his sword and grit will not be enough. In a twisted chance of fate, the brash actions of Doran Heavybelly—a dwarven hunter with a lot to say—forces Asher back into the world of man. And so the ranger is brought into the light, into the gaze of Illian’s greatest crime guilds and onto the lawless island of Dragorn.

Millennia in the dark has left these lost and forgotten monsters hungry for war. The people of Illian can do nothing but rely on their peacekeepers, the Dragorn. Are the dragon riders ready for what has been buried under their feet? Gideon Thorn, Master of the Dragorn, can feel the Third Age coming to an ominous end. With Inara Galfrey and her dragon by his side, they must investigate the return of this ancient evil.

The When Swords Fall Silent anthology showcases the imaginations and talents of more than a dozen of the best modern science-fiction and fantasy authors, with each tale centered around one or more characters burdened with a bloody task they will see to completion no matter the cost. Every story takes you for a vicious ride through a world of shadow and death, each as unique in perspective and execution as the contracts carried out within.

Following the fall of a beloved prince, division brews across the north. Elyon Daecar, freed of the Warrior King’s cells, rides to Dragon’s Bane to defend the border of Vandar against an incoming Agarathi horde. He must become a prince, and a champion, to his people. But will it be enough? Having finally arrived in Aram, Saska finds herself a captive yet again, this time by the sinister Sunlord Elio Krator, the man once betrothed to her mother. When a Tukoran army arrives to siege the great fortress of Eagle’s Perch, Krator marches to defend it, taking Saska with him.