About the Book
In a terraced city at the heart of the world, humans are mere
underlings of the arrogant Rat-Lords. Men and women are confined to
certain districts of the city, while the Rats are restricted to others
by their own masters, the Decans. Incarnate in living rock, the
thirty-six Lords of Heaven and Hell impose their divine will over Rats
and humans alike through gargoyle acolytes, who in their hundreds of
thousands wait to swoop down and devour any who oppose the god-daemons.
And opposition is growing…
For generations uncounted,
human slaves were forced to build the mountainous Fane, but now the
long-held dream of raising their own lost Temple has spurred the
builders to revolt. Forbidden the knowledge to build for themselves,
they plot to uncover the Masonic wisdom that has been lost for
millennia — secrets that will free them from their rulers once and for
all. But they need access to parts of the city denied them, and so they
strike a deal with the Rat-Priest Plessiez, who has a grand scheme of
his own.
Into this conspiracy step Prince Lucas of
Candover, a student at the University of Crime, and no man's slave;
Zari, a young Kadayan woman who is destined to become the living Memory
of all that follows; and the White Crow, a woman whose powers are far
greater than anyone suspects.
