The Sword and the Road to Redemption: Out 11th September

Lynda Thrift Books

Sep 7

2 min read

The next chapter in the Sword saga arrives on 11th September, and this time the stakes reach further back than ever before.

Alexandria, the ninth century

Manu has spent four years studying in Alexandria. Four glorious years under a tutor who has given him everything he knows. Now his time is up and Baghdad is calling him home.

Before he leaves, his tutor has one final gift for him. Not a book, not a parting lecture, but a trek. A journey that will carry Manu home while letting him see for himself the things he has spent four years learning about. Theory tested against the road.

They set off. On the first night, as they make camp, a scorpion finds the tutor in the dark.

He does not survive it.

An empty road and a very long shadow

Manu is alone, grieving, and a very long way from Baghdad.

Far in the future, where the Sword resides, alarm bells begin to ring.

Because this is not simply a young man who has lost his teacher. This is the boy who grows into the Keeper of the Sword. If Manu never completes this expedition, the Sword never meets him. If the Sword never meets him, there is no Keeper. And without a Keeper, history slips its rails and the Universe goes with it.

The Sword cannot let the road end here.

One option left

There is only one move available. The Sword calls on its apprentice Keeper.

The mission is simple to state and close to impossible to carry out. Get Manu across the desert. Get him home. Protect a boy who has no idea who he is going to become, in a century that is not yours, without breaking the very timeline you were sent to save.

It is a journey like no other.

What to expect

If you have followed the saga this far, you already know the Sword does not do anything by halves. This one leans hard into the ninth century world Manu is travelling through, and into the impossible position the apprentice Keeper has been handed. There is grief in it, and a fair amount of dust and heat, and the particular tension of watching someone protect a future that has not happened yet.

If you are new to the series, this works as a way in. You will meet the Sword, you will meet Manu, and you will understand exactly why the two of them matter to each other before the last page.