Eccentric yet brilliant detective Ana Dolabra must prove a man''s innocence to stop a civil war in the third book of the series that began with the award-winning The Tainted Cup. In the canton of Sapirdad, two of the Empire''s most powerful families are moments away from going to war with each other, their hundreds of retainers gathered with swords drawn. If blood is spilled, the whole of the empire may be plunged into starvation and chaos. To deescalate matters, someone must do the impossible: prove that one family''s eldest son is innocent of a gruesome and unforgivable murder, despite the incontrovertible evidence against him. It is with this undertaking that the great detective Ana Dolabra is tasked, her assistant Din at her side - and the two find themselves racing with great speed and little dignity to the scene. As ever, the impossible proves little obstacle for the deadly combination of Ana''s intellect and Din''s keen eye, and mere hours after riding into the dusty town, Ana glimpses the greater pattern behind the crime. A deeper, subtler web of death is being woven in plain sight, by a mastermind with an ancient magical technology at his disposal. But even Ana''s uncanny insight is of little use when each new suspect she uncovers ends up dead--with each new killing calculated to bring tensions between the two rival clans past the boiling point. And as Din pursues their adversary through the canton''s wild ranges, sprawling ranches, and reeking slaughterhouses, he finds his loyalties divided in unexpected ways.

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Robert is the author of the Hugo Award-winning novel The Tainted Cup and its sequel A Drop of Corruption, as well as The Divine Cities trilogy and The Founders Trilogy.

His work has received the Edgar Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the Phillip K. Dick Citation of Excellence, and he has been shortlisted for the World Fantasy, British Fantasy, and Locus Awards.

He lives in Austin with his wife and two sons, one of whom is very large and one of whom is very loud, and he focuses on writing and not maintaining his website.