Lords of Kaigande

Riyan Mitali has a solid inventory of her problems: a failed thesis, spending six months being eaten alive by bugs in the name of research and being the laughing stock of the university. Unfortunately, her old friend Mendel, who happens to be Crown Prince of Langara, has one more problem to he wants to add to the pile - a marriage proposal.

Her elder brother Tieryn - a captain in Langara's Royal River Guard - has a similar tally. Haunted by memories of the friend he couldn't save, his return to duty has saddled him with a bumbling new recruit who can barely keep her strong telepathic abilties under control.

Meanwhile, tensions are heating up in the city. Eighty years ago, a revolution toppled Langara's ruling class of magicians, and a new social order rose up. Non-magicians could hold new positions of wealth and power, and the magicians were strictly regulated, required to be tested and licensed, and restricted from many positions in a bid for equality.

But times have changed, resentments have reformed in other ways and the bloodlines for magicianship, once so carefully guarded, have diluted among the population. New laws have been proposed, bidding a new equality. Stripping status, gender and background from consideration - will it open new doors, or close them? And what of those who wish to return to the old way, when the magicians ruled with an iron fist?