(In which Janus discovers Maledicte's disappearance.)

From the moment their carriage drew up to Lastrest, the jingle of the horses' harnesses lost under the crunch of hard-rimmed wheels in the oyster-shell drive, Janus Ixion, Earl of Last, anticipated disaster. He sensed it in the air, like a wisp of smoke signaling an unseen fire. Read more

(A scene that ended up on the editing room floor when cutting the novel length down to size.)

Rue nodded once more, drew Janus closer to the desk with the lowering of his voice. "Shut the door, Downey. With yourself on the outside, please."
Janus watched Rue bring a ring out of his pocket, a man's ring, sized large enough to hold the pale moonstone across it. "What do you think of this?" he asked, passing it to Janus. Read more

There was, the young assassin thought, such a thing as being too well informed. Ivor had given her a map of the hidden passages which she had received gratefully, but he had gifted her also with far more palace legend than she wished to know, old deaths and disappearances; at this moment, she feared her fate would be to add to their number. Read more

Pretender

Janus leaned back against the cold stone jamb, numb with shock, listening to the echoes of Psyke's accusation ring off the looming idols and slowly disperse. When Captain Rue failed to act on Psyke's cry, Janus let out a breath, and let his attention filter outward.

The dusty chapel was overfull of people and voices: the hushed back and forth between the king's guards; Psyke's broken weeping, and beneath it all, a tremor--the lingering shiver of the summoning bell, and Aris's last, dying breath. Read more

At the spider-heart of Murne's radiating streets, the King's palace overlooked the city, its three wings jutting out and away from each other in uncomfortable points. The palace had been built in stages, generations apart. Dark granite blocks comprised the oldest part, a warrior's palace with arrow slits instead of windows: the palace of Thomas Redoubt, the Cold King, who had claimed Antyre for its own country, wresting independence from Itarus with the aid of Haith, secretive god of Death and Victory. Read more

Publishers weekly says, "Robins's tapestry of lies, deception and violence is deftly woven but not for the fainthearted." Read more

Controlled by an aristocracy whose depraved whims bow to neither law nor god, the kingdom of Antyre is under siege from the only man who can save it. He is Janus Ixion, the new Earl of Last, a man whose matchless fighting abilities and leadership strike terror in Antyre’s powerful noble houses. Read more