Book excerpt: The Magd are defeated, and the alliance is broken. Rakvir returns to Kerkrand to govern as Duyar and finds problems adjusting, especially when Arhilka nearly dies in childbirth. A unique solar eclipse causes many Thlaxacans to believe that the world has been re-born to the age of "Angry Thlac" who wants all "Otherworlders" to be driven from their lands. The "Nameless Ones" begin a campaign of assassinating "Otherworld" rulers, intending that reprisals will foment rebellion. By chance, Rakvir recognises the man sent to kill the Zgar and gets him to take him to the leader of the "Nameless Ones", fearing that the only thing that will persuade them to stop is by walking through fire again. The fifth volume in the epic "Through Fire", "Thlaxaca: the Blood Sun" is set in a distant planet, not too dissimilar from our own. Richard Hernaman Allen, a former Commissioner of HM Customs & Excise, wrote "Through Fire" over a period of thirty years.