Mistress of the Catacombs

Chapter One
 
 
The spy, a stocky shipping agent named Hordred, looked at Garric and Liane with haunted eyes as he whispered what he knew of the planned secession of several western islands. His restless gaze flicked about the room with the randomness of a squirrel surprised on the ground.
“There’s priests in it too,” Hordred said. “They call themselves Moon Wisdom and have ceremonies in the Temple of Our Lady of the Moon in Donelle. It’s not just prayers and temple tithes, though. This is…”
He swallowed. Liane had found Hordred through associates of her late father, a far-travelled merchant before his wizardry first ruined, then killed him. In the normal course of things the agent must have been a man well able to take care of himself. A falling block might as easily have been the cause of his broken nose as a rival’s cudgel, but the scar on his right forearm had to have been left by a knife. Mere physical threats wouldn’t have frightened Hordred into his present state.
“I think there’s something real,” he said. He stared at his own hard-clasped hand ... read full excerpt from Mistress of the Catacombs ebook