The Fortress in the Frost
The campaign moves north into colder, harsher territory — war fought by secrets, legends and the things beyond the maps.
About this book
One one-eyed officer. A company of dragon-brown gutter-scum. And an Empire that won't stop until the world is paved in iron. The breathtaking conclusion to the Triple Realm duology.
Taliesin has a simple plan: kidnap the runaway Princess Ariane, return her to her sister's throne, and retire rich. But in the shifting grasslands of Sombor, plans don't just fail — they ignite. The expansionist Empire of the Tree has arrived, led by the “genius” First Elector Forn, bringing “kettle-blacks” — massive steam-driven iron fortresses — and legions of genetically twisted beastmen.
As Sombor's legendary wheeled city-wagons are crushed under the Imperial tread, Taliesin and his band — the dandy duellist Gunnar, the vengeful highlander Connaire Mor — are forced into a desperate retreat through the Frost, a region at the boundary of nightmares where the laws of physics begin to fray. They are guided by a mysterious patchwork-cloaked tinker and pursued by an assassin who has literally returned from the grave.
At the heart of an ancient ebony ziggurat lies a power that could redefine existence itself — and as the secrets of the Sunken Empire surface, Taliesin realises he is no longer fighting a war for gold, but caught in a duel between gods.
The pulse-pounding conclusion to the duology — bigger in scale, stranger in its cosmic horror, and the book where the Sunken Empire's secrets finally surface.
- you want Abercrombie's grit mixed with China Miéville's high-concept imagination;
- you like mobile cities, Greek fire and fallen titans;
- you read Book One and want the stakes raised to the cosmic.