Lord Brother

Ryel Mirai, Steppes warrior, Lord Adept of the great wysard-citadel Markul and blood-kin to the ruling house of great Destimar, continues his search for the lost spell capable of re-joining body to soul. But as he seeks to learn the way to bring Edris, his beloved instructor in the Art, back to life again, he has a rival in his quest: Michael Essern, high-blooded, proud, and greatest of Markul’s rival city Elecambron. A student of the ways and means of death, not life, Lord Michael has sworn allegiance to the daimon Dagar, who seeks to return to the World re-embodied in Ryel’s form using the same lost Art.

In the quest begun in Wysard, Ryel left Markul, returned to his tribal homeland, and from there was drawn to the city Almancar, a place of temptation and peril, where he freed the Sovrena Diara from the tormenting spells of Dagar. In Lord Brother, the daimon, knowing Ryel’s love for family and friends, makes cruel use of those bonds to draw the young wysard deeper and deeper into danger, closer and closer to Dagar’s triumph and the World’s unending torment. Ryel is inexorably compelled Northward, and becomes dangerously involved with Michael’s brother the Count Palatine Yvain, likewise a Red Essern in whose blood runs daimon-bane, and Commander of the Sword Brotherhood, a cult sworn to the Goddess of War. Yvain Essern is the keeper of secrets crucial to the wysard's quest, but the price Ryel must pay for them is higher than he ever dreamed.

When fast-closing circles of fate bring him to the sea’s edge, the wysard finds answers to many mysteries; but war ravages Almancar, now embroiled in a reign of terror. Far off in Markul’s tower of the dead, Edris’ body awaits its rai—its imperishable life-essence—that will be re-instilled by the joining-spell; but can that spell be found? And if found, put in the right hands? And once there, be made to succeed? Or will the victory go to Michael—Ryel’s cruel rival, and Lord Brother?