Arthur C. Clarke winner and Sunday Times bestseller returns to a world steeped in magic - and the Tyrant Philosophers' campaign to bring reason, logic and 'perfection' to it. Eres Ffenegh - 'the City on the Back of a Crab' - is the next state slated for conquest by the Palleseen, but its citizens won't give up sovereignty easily, and the siege has now dragged into the harsh Eresi winter. The defenders - both locals and Pal renegades - hold an uneasy alliance against the enemy at the gates, while the Pal army is constantly looking over its shoulder for the next self-destructive dictate of their government back home. Within the city, Devil Jack is the apprentice to the notorious conjurer and bawd known as the Widow, a good man driven to bargaining with hell to get back what he's lost. Meanwhile Kiffel ea Leachan is the city's champion, a child of privilege who's just lost everything to the invaders. We follow the ups and downs of both as they try to survive the siege and make their own