Death’s Law

Michael Scott 1989 Buy from Amazon.com

Death’s Law is the third in the Tales of the Bard trilogy, following Magician’s Law and Demon’s Law. Kutor has been installed on the throne, Churon is the new God of the Dead, and Paedur is about to be sent off on another quest. Refugees from the cataclysm are flooding the Capital, Karfondel, and Geillard is plotting to come and take back his throne.

Paedur arrives in the middle of a pitched battle at Castle Nevin, one of the Bastions of the Frontier. The Chopts have attacked the castle and Paedur shows up just in time to dispatch them. He learns that they have become more audacious recently, and that Nevin himself believes that they may have taken the town of Thusal.

When Paedur leaves he discovers that Katani has followed him to the North and they journey to the monastery of Ectoriage. The monks and students have been decimated and the libraries burned. They find a sole survivor (of course), a boy named Gire who witnessed the Chopt attack and describes seeing the figure of Mannam, gloating that the slaughter would draw the Bard.

This novel is set in the midst of winter, in the far north lands and the landscape is filled with snow, ice and desolation. There is a feeling of time passing desperately quickly and the events of previous novels are drawing to a head.

It is only at the end of the story I realised there was no romance in these novels. It wasn’t something that was conspicuously missing, but it’s a rare fantasy novel that doesn’t have some love story in it somewhere. The way that Paedur and Katani’s complex relationship is dealt with was very clever, of course one would like to see them end up together, but at the same time living happily ever after wouldn’t work stylistically.

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