In "The Element of Fire," scientific magic and fairy magic collide headlong in the threatened kingdom of Ile-Rien, where the Captain of the Queen's Guard fights a perilous battle standing between opposing forces seeking to topple the kingdom's weak king;and in "The Death of the Necromancer," bent on avenging the execution of his godfather by a duplicitous count, master criminal Nicholas is diverted by a series of eerie events that forces him to confront...