He had crossed half a continent, venturing into the heartland of his enemies to wage a secret war of liberation!

It almost seemed that the worst lay behind them. Hanuvar and his small band of allies had faced down warriors and horrors and sinister magics to free hundreds of their people from slavery. The emperor was dead, and his successor had so little interest in finding Hanuvar, he'd ordered his sorcerous revenants to cease their search and turn their sinister talents to other targets.

But as Hanuvar shifted his efforts south, where hundreds of his people still labored under the Dervan yoke, other forces were advancing agendas of their own. Determined to prove Hanuvar still lived, the revenant legate secretly sought him with dark sorceries. A band of gladiators had rebelled and now wandered free, threatening the innocent and calling down the wrath of the legions. And upon the slopes of an ancient volcano, an ageless warrior mage worked to unleash a spell that would doom them all . . .