The RiftWar is done. But a fearsome army of trolls and renegade humans, emboldened by the drug of destruction, has risen in strength from the ashes of defeat. There is one, however, who defies the call to battle....

If there were two more impetuous and carefree men in the Kingdom of the Isles, they had yet to be found. Twins Borric and Erland wore that mantle proudly, much to the chagrin of their father, Prince Arutha of Krondor. But their blissful youth has come to an end. Their uncle, the King, has produced no male children. Bypassing himself, Arutha names Borric, the eldest twin by seconds, the Royal Heir. As his brother, Erland will have his own great responsibilities to shoulder.

In a distant land, high among the snow-capped mountains, a peaceful nation is mercilessly put to the sword...yet one will survive. Little more than a boy, Talon of the Silver Hawk must carry on until, someday, he can take vengeance. Leaving the icy fastness of his ancient home, Talon descends into the dangerous land of his adversary. Treading a perilous path, he must survive battlefields, court intrigues, treacherous enemies, backstabbing friends, and beautiful yet deadly women.

A plague of murder has overrun Krondor, the glorious center of the kingdom of Midkemia. Prince Arutha - newly returned from battle with the Morehdel chieftain Delekhan and the renegade magician Makala - is concerned about the rash of unexplained assassinations in his capital city. And so he dispatches his most trusted agent, Squire James - formerly the thief known as Jimmy the Hand - to discover the source of the deadly epidemic.

For centuries, the five greatest kingdoms of North and South Tembria, twin continents on the world of Garn, have coexisted in peace. But the balance of power is destroyed when four of the kingdoms violate an ancient covenant and betray the fifth: Ithrace, the Kingdom of Flames, ruled by Steveren Langene, known as "the Firemane" for his brilliant red hair. As war engulfs the world, Ithrace is destroyed, and the Greater Realms of Tembria are thrust into a dangerous struggle for supremacy.

In the frozen Northlands of Midkemia, Captain Dennis Hartraft’s Marauders have just had a disastrous encounter with their sworn enemy, the Tsurani. Wounded and disheartened, the Mauraders set out for the shelter of a frontier garrison. They don’t know that a Tsurani patrol is sent to support an assault on that same garrison.

Magic and murder engulf the realm of Kelewan. Fierce warlords ignite a bitter blood feud to enslave the empire of Tsuranuanni. While in the opulent Imperial courts, assassins and spy-master plot cunning and devious intrigues against the rightful heir. Now Mara, a young, untested Ruling lady, is called upon to lead her people in a heroic struggle for survival. But first she must rally an army of rebel warriors, form a pact with the alien cho-ja, and marry the son of a hated enemy. Only then can Mara face her most dangerous foe of all - in his own impregnable stronghold.

To the forest on the shore of the Kingdom of the Isles, the orphan Pug came to study with the master magician Kulgan. But though his courage won him a place at court and the heart of a lovely princess, he was ill at ease with the normal ways of wizardry. Yet Pug's strange sort of magic would one day change forever the fates of two worlds. For dark beings from another world had opened a rift in the fabric of spacetime to being again the age-old battle between the forces of Order and Chaos.

The last remnants of an ancient advanced race, the Clan of the Seven Stars, are returning at long last to their lost homeworld, Midkemia—not as friends, but as would-be conquerors. Led by the conjurer Laromendis, they are fleeing the relentless demon hordes that are sweeping through their galaxy and destroying the elves' vast empire planet by planet. Only by escaping to Midkemia and brutally overtaking the war-weary world can the last remnants of a mighty civilization hope to survive.

It would be sheer folly to try to conceal the true nature of Althalus, for his flaws are the stuff of legend. He is, as all men know, a thief, a liar, an occasional murderer, an outrageous braggart, and a man devoid of even the slightest hint of honor. Yet of all the men in the world, it is Althalus, unrepentant rogue and scoundrel, who will become the champion of humanity in its desperate struggle against the forces of an ancient god determined to return the universe to nothingness.