The tumultuous eighth chapter in Steven Erikson's epic The Malazan Book of the Fallen - and the story enters its final, climactic stages.

It is said that Hood waits at the end of every plot, every scheme, each grandiose ambition . . .

But this time it is different: this time the Lord of Death is there at the beginning.

Darujhistan swelters and seethes with portents, rumours and whispers. Strangers have arrived, a murderer is abroad, and assassins are targeting the owners of K'rul's Bar. But such events will be dwarfed by what is about to happen - for in the distance can be heard the baying of hounds.

And in far-away Black Coral, the ruling Tiste Andii appear oblivious to the threat posed by the cult of the Redeemer - an honourable, once-mortal man who now seems powerless against the twisted vision of his followers.

So Hood stands at the beginning of a conspiracy that will shake the cosmos, but at its end there waits another: Anomander Rake, Son of Darkness, who has vowed to right an ancient and terrible wrong . . .

'Beautifully melancholic and exhilaratingly epic . . . one of the finest fantasy novels ever written'
GRIMDARK

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