The King's BloodMagic is returning. Or so say the old prophesies cobbled from wandering soothsayers, women huffing broken gas lines, and the back of comic tomes. The Evil Empire of Avar and its perfectly sane, in no way crazy Emperor risks others' life and limb to stop it from coming to pass. Ciara, a black servant into her sixteenth year, finds herself on a quest across the countryside to get the second son and only hope of the severed Ostero line onto his throne.