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In this masterful sword-and-sorcery epic, "Duncan has created strong and moving characters . . . and a world as rich and layered as our own" (Iceberg Ink).   For fifteen years, the truce has held. Swordsmen of the Tryst of Casr have kept the peace and extended the rule of law over half the world, but now sorcerers have started killing swordsmen again, and swordsmen traitors are aiding them. Shonsu--who was Wallie Smith before he became a swordsman of the seventh rank and liege lord of the Tryst--must once more gird on the seventh sword of Chioxin, and this time he rides out to fight the war that he hoped would never come. As he leads his army forth, its two most junior members are Vixini, son of Shonsu, and Addis, son of Nnanji, who has an oath of vengeance to fulfill. Their failure or success will determine the fate of the world for the next thousand years.