While the story got off to a bit of a slow start for me - there was a lot of background information to include in a shorter novel - about 100 pages in the story began to get really interesting. However, I'm not sure how the author could have given that information (all fairly important) without taking the extra pages to do so.

With intrigue on top of intrigue it can be difficult to tell friend from foe from random person on the street. But this is the situation Thomas finds himself in as he journeys (with a very unexpected group of people) to the city of Magnus, intent on conquering it to rule as his own.

Having studied and developed quite an ingenious plan to take the city, he now just needs to get there in one piece and make sure he trusted the right people. The intrigue was very exciting and I was constantly trying to guess, right along with Thomas, who was truly good and who was out to stop him.

The ending was quite a surprise to me and set the stage for the second book very nicely.