Book excerpt: Mother, the queen of darkness, has relentlessly shrouded the world in shadow and chaos. Her plague destines all of the living to die, leaving a chosen few to do her bidding-her undead children, Awoken by a forbidden spell and imbued with the very magic able to kill Mother. Only an Awoken has the power to defeat her and free the living, but all the awoken have succumbed to the queen's call and embraced insanity . . . Except one. The last child needed to complete Mother's family and destroy the living world. The last sane Awoken. The race to find the last sane Awoken had begun. The weight of the world rests on Master Necromancer Dmitry’s success in locating the fated awoken and preparing them to fight. With time running out, Dmitry would do anything to stop mother, even if it meant entering Amaral manor and facing the tyrant dragon lord himself. Together, Dmitry and his team make their way into the dragon's lair before all they know and love perishes in the darkness.