The Changer's Key — Kent Davis

The Riddle in Ruby trilogy takes readers on a rip-roaring adventure through an alternate version of colonial America, where magic and science meet, and where one young thief carries a secret everyone wants. In this second volume, Ruby Teach has become the enemy's prisoner. She bargained with her freedom to protect her friends -- but her friends aren't about to abandon her, either. That's not what friends do.

Ruby's blood holds a secret, one that could turn the tides of the looming war for whomever unlocks it first. Ruby's father, former pirate Captain Teach, and her friends -- a motley crew made up of a young aristocrat, a servant, and an apprentice alchemist -- must race against time to locate the hidden fortress where she's being held. But the one person who could help them is Ruby's mysterious and powerful mother, and no one has seen her since Ruby's birth.

Kent Davis sweeps our heroes through cities and the deepest wilderness with imagination, humor, and magic that fans of Jonathan Stroud and Terry Pratchett will devour.