Tor
September 2025
On Sale: September 2, 2025
128 pages ISBN: 125083578X EAN: 9781250835789 Kindle: B0DQJ3S6XX Trade Paperback / e-Book Add to Wish List
In K. J. Parker's new whip-smart dark fantasy, a group of scholars must do the impossible for a ruthless king. The cost of refusal, of course, is death.
History isn't truth, it's propaganda.
Seeking war with his neighbor, the tyrannical ruler of Aelia convenes several of his kingdom's professors for a chat. First Citizen Gyges only just invaded Aelia a few years back and, naturally, his public image can’t take the hit of another unjustified assault.
His totally sane solution? Simple, really. These scholars must construct a fake ancient city from scratch to verify Gyges’s apocryphal claims.
Now these academics must put their heads together to make history. Because if they don't, they'll lose their heads altogether.
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