The city of Caphedra long stood as a center of commerce and a seat of conquest, until the murder of its king sends the land spiraling into a dangerous war of succession. Now, the army of a prince and his vindictive Lord Marshal has returned to confront the power-hungry zealots of a cloistered queen and the ancient forces that are propelling her toward the throne. Denn Wellum was a second son born to a family of Caphedra’s merchant elite, who when no longer able to suffer the cruel intentions of his imperious father, self-exiled himself into the cavalry and traded the burdens of his birth for a chance to prove himself, following a life under arms. It was never his wish to return.
Livet Karr also believes the worst of her life is behind her. Cast off as an infant and raised by her found family in the catacombs of Lanstad, she learned how to survive both by natural, and very unnatural means. But those skills eventually condemned her clandestine Kindred and she was left hopeless and broken, a sole survivor, desperate to escape to where she might never be reminded of all whom she lost or the debts she owes them.
Olen Kierk grew up among the toughest families west of the Darrow. Cursed with only a blood feud as his birthright, he willingly turned his back on his home and found a new path in the king’s army. With the comradery of his friends and fellow soldiers-the Black Eels of Westriver-he served more than twenty years under King Ramis before everything changed. Now he must confront the legacy of violence that left his family extinct, for what else can he hope to return to if his soldiering days are over?
Suddenly drawn into the middle of this call to arms, these three friends must navigate the combined perils of duty, devotion, and duplicity to take up reluctant roles in the inevitable war. Can a nobleman’s scheme to champion a tormented princess provide another path? What answers to her mysterious affliction may be heard in the ghastly voices beneath Caphedra’s central temple? Against an adversary that fears no enemy, will they stand or run?
Crown of Caphedra is the first novel-length offering of epic fantasy by Ian Robert Ross and marks a foundation for his upcoming work expanding upon the Kingdom of Caphedra and the Path of the Four Pillars.
