Publisher's Synopsis
Centuries before the building of the Great Causeway, when the enveloping Ice seemed to be in retreat, the lands of the North and South were on increasingly uneasy terms following their strife-torn foundation. War seemed inevitable. Nevertheless, there was still some trade between them, not least for the matchless creations of the Northern metal-smiths. In one of the smaller Northern towns, a young mastersmith is gaining a reputation as an armourer and weapon-maker, and helped by his two apprentices (one of whom is particularly skilled with the chants and songs essential to the craft), the smith creates what must surely be one of the greatest suits of armour ever made, armour fit for a king. When the armour is stolen by a Southern lord, the smith, accompanied by his apprentices, sets out to recover his life's work. Travelling southward by land and sea, the three stumble across a plot to stage a coup in the South, directed - unbeknown to the plotters - by the sinister powers of the Ice; a plot which is also a threat to the North, spreading anarchy and lawlessness throughout the borderlands. But the coup is only the beginning of the mastersmith's troubles . . .
