Emperor’s Knife. Mazarkis Williams. 2011.

There is a cancer at the heart of the mighty Cerani Empire: a plague that marks each victim with a fragment of a greater design. And as the geometric patterns cover the skin, so the victims fall under the power of the Pattern Master.

The lost prince Sarmin, the emperor's only surviving brother, lies locked in a hidden room. As the pattern draws closer to the palace he is at last remembered; now he awaits the bride his mother has chosen: Mesema, a Windreader from the northern plains.

She is used to riding free across the grasslands and she finds the Imperial Court stifling - but she soon realises the politicking of the Court is not a game, but deadly earnest.

Eyul, the imperial assassin, is burdened by the atrocities he has committed and his advancing years. As commanded, he bears the emperor's Knife to the desert in search of a cure for the pattern-markings.

As conspiracies boil over into open violence, the enemy moves towards victory. Now only three people stand in his way: a lost prince, a world-weary killer, and a young girl who once saw a path through the waving grasses.