Book excerpt: After waging a draining, unsuccessful war on the neighboring kingdom of Zylekkha, Tahlehsohr is a bubbling cauldron of unrest. The Zylekkhans, war weakened, are determined to get their vengeance and claim the life of the king of Tahlehsohr. Unfortunately for them, the murder of a king is no easy sport. Kirash, the centaur king of Zylekkha's right-hand man and a vampire, sits in the center of a precarious web of alliances as he struggles to topple the Tahlehson government: a gang of elven freedom fighters, an idealistic werewolf hoping to start a revolution, a self-centered but powerful magician, and an undead Tahlehson general who has no choice but to help them. Plagued at every turn by Tahlehson spies and bad luck, they're running out of time. And that might just cost them all their lives.