The Curse of Roc-Thalian

The third book in the Magistricide series.
Following the terrors and travails of their all-too-recent adventures, the young mage Kelrob Kael-Pellin returns to his ancestral home in the Rolling Lands accompanied by Jacobson, a guildless and world-wearied sellsword. There, they are unexpectedly plunged into familial intrigue: Kelrob, having fallen ill on the road, is forcibly separated from Jacobson by his guilt-maddened father, Amon Kael-Pellin. As the mage struggles to recover from his deathly illness, the clan Kael-Pellin goes to war with itself, plunging the future of the family's noble lineage in doubt. To further complicate matters, strange reports arrive from the far-northerly, reviled Demesne Roc-Thalian, where Jacobson has been sent into exile...reports of whole herds of cattle slaughtered, drained completely of blood. Too, there are accounts of a dead man walking, of some unspeakable reanimate evil stalking the night...all too soon, Kelrob and Jacobson find themselves enmeshed in a web of dark magic and sinister intentions. Blasted by fate, haunted by arcane visions, they must plunge together into the hungering darkness, risking both life and soul as they strive to untangle the ghastly riddle of the Curse of Roc-Thalian...M

"To merely call it Grimdark would be to fail to capture its strange, unsettling subtleties...it is assuredly both dark and grim. What it conjured for me was less Abercrombie and more Moorcock...this is deftly, tautly written Weird Fantasy, with the most intriguing magic system since Steven Erickson." - Phil Breach, author of The Arte Mephitic, co-author of North.