A great step-up from the previous book, I can now understand why this was recommended to me. It was good! It's a travel story in reverse. In the previous book, Prince Jalan and Snorri fought their way north. But Snorri now has Loki's key, a key that will open any lock, and the various factions that play this game play their pawns in such a manner that they want Snorri to bring that key south. He however wants to use the key to unlock the gates to the death world, in order to see his family again.

Jalan, still our first person narrator, on the other hand, just wants to go back home. He wants to return to his life as spoiled noble, wenching and gambling. Jalan and Snorri get new travel companions, including a witch called Kara and a young boy named Hennan. They travel through the post-apocalyptic wasteland of Osheim and eventually split ways when they get to Jalan's hometown Vermillion.

But Jalan has changed. Through a spell of Kara's, he's getting flashbacks of his youth, remembering things he had forced himself to forget, like the murder of his mother that he witnessed. One of the agents of the Dead King is involved, and the looming figure of the Lady in Blue, the one who is really warring with the Red Queen. Jalan is not just a ne'er do well now, he wants revenge.

He's also still all anti-hero. Disloyal, craven, pissing his pants when confronted with danger.

I don't know, this was just all around an improvement. Kara was interesting, I really enjoyed Jalan's growth and all the backstory machinations of the Red Queen, the glimpses of the past. I also enjoyed the continued hints of the technology was lost, with the clockwork guards in the banking town of Umberhide, and the Wheel of Osheim. This is good stuff.