To save the future of their homeland, a young herald and petty thief must face off against a boy consumed by dark magicIllmoor's capital has a problem: rats. And lots of them. Desperate for a solution, the chairman of the Dullitch Council seeks the help of Illmoor's roving mercenaries, hoping to find someone who can tame the ever-swelling tide of rodents. Jimmy Quickstint, the chairman's grandson and junior thief in training, returns to Dullitch with the hulking Groan Teethgrit and his angry dwarf sidekick, Gordo Goldeaxe. Together, they are Dullitch's best hope to eradicate the rats—until Diek Wustapha arrives.Diek, still just a boy, has been possessed by a magical power that gives him the uncanny ability to control not just animals, but also people. He gets rid of the rats in town, but the relief in Dullitch is short lived. The city refuses to pay Diek, and he does not take the insult lightly. He is determined to strike back at Dullitch by kidnapping all of the...

In the third book of the Illmoor Chronicles, three competitive mercenaries embark on a perilous quest to compete for a princess's hand in marriage—but stumble instead into a dark and murderous plotGroan is a hulking mountain of muscle. Gape is his similarly large but slightly smarter half-brother. Gordo is Groan's partner, a dwarf who is absolutely deadly with an axe. Together, they have roved the lands of Illmoor, often thieving and occasionally lending a helping hand to the kingdom's ragged towns. But Groan and Gordo have ended up on the rulers' bad side too often, and now the king of Phlegm has enlisted the help of Duke Modeset to eradicate them. The royals create a grand tournament whose prize is the princess—a competition the warriors cannot resist—and then usher the men off on a series of deadly missions that they could not possibly survive. The hazardous adventure sends them around the kingdom, battling foes of all shapes and sizes, until the final...

In the fourth book of the Illmoor Chronicles, a peculiar assortment of investigators must solve a mystery: Who kidnapped the viscount of Dullitch?Viscount Curfew, the ruler of Dullitch, has gone missing. In the middle of the night, with his entire palace guard inexplicably asleep, the viscount disappeared from his bedroom—a skillful kidnapping that will require help from the sharpest minds in Dullitch if the city is ever to see its leader again.Enoch Dwellings is as wily as he is arrogant. One of the capital city's best detectives, he is called upon to root out the perpetrators. But Jareth Obegarde, a half-vampire and rival sleuth, refuses to let the case go without a fight. Grappling for an advantage, Dwellings turns to Jimmy Quickstint, a gravedigger and former thief; Parsnip Daily, a professional tracker with a short-term memory problem; and even Lusa Mardris, Jareth's newly discovered daughter. Pursuit of the kidnappers leads Enoch and his crew on a wild journey...

In the second book of the Illmoor Chronicles, a motley crew of Dullitch residents must defend their city against an evil, shadowy group intent on awakening a long-dormant godYowler was the god of stone, capable of turning people into rocks with little more than a glance. He has been gone for years, but one dangerous, centuries-old brotherhood in Dullitch plans to change that. The Yowlers—a dark and terrible cult—will see Dullitch turned to stone if it is the last thing they do. The only ones who could thwart the Yowlers' deadly plans are a ragged band of Illmoor natives, as peculiar as they are unlikely heroes.There is Jimmy Quickstint, a one-time thief who helped save the town in The Ratastrophe Catastrophe; Duke Modeset, the maligned and bumbling former leader of Dullitch; and Jareth Obegarde, a mysterious and quick-witted half-vampire (on his mother's side). Together, it will be up to them to stem the latest plague of evil rising in Dullitch, lest their...