Bennett, Robert Jackson

Investigator Cyril Hayes struggles to learn what is going on when eleven union factory workers in Evesden, a so-called city of the future in 1911 built by the much-revered McNaughton Corporation, are found dead in a trolley car only minutes after they boarded.

Sancia Grado is a thief, and a damn good one. And her latest target, a heavily guarded warehouse on Tevanne's docks, is nothing her unique abilities can't handle. But unbeknownst to her, Sancia's been sent to steal an artifact of unimaginable power, an object that could revolutionize the magical technology known as scriving. The Merchant Houses who control this magic--the art of using coded commands to imbue everyday objects with sentience--have already used it to transform Tevanne into a vast, remorseless capitalist machine.

"Revenge. It's something Sigrud je Harkvaldsson is very, very good at. Maybe the only thing. So when he learns that his oldest friend and ally, former Prime Minister Shara Komayd, has been assassinated, he knows exactly what to do--and that no mortal force can stop him from meting out the suffering Shara's killers deserve. Yet as Sigrud pursues his quarry with his customary terrifying efficiency, he begins to fear that this battle is an unwinnable one. Because discovering the truth behind Shara's death will require him to take up arms in a secret, decades-long war, face down an angry young god, and unravel the last mysteries of Bulikov, the city of miracles itself. And--perhaps most daunting of all--finally face the truth about his own cursed existence."--Back cover.

The city of Bulikov once had the power of the gods that it used to conquer, enslave, and brutalized millions, until its divine protectors were killed, now Shara Thivani is sent to this broken city undercover to catch a murderer, but as she is pursuing the killer she starts to suspect that the city is not as broken as it seems and maybe the beings that once ruled this city are not dead.

General Turyin Mulaghesh has been pressed into service one more time in the city of Voortyashtan, a city in ruins with sectarian violence and bloody uprisings due to its god now being dead.