Blood and Pearls — Mark E. Rogers

Far to the north, ringed by thunderheads and bathed in unnatural heat, lies Khymir, city of inexhaustible wealth and suppurating squalor, of sorcery and unbridled decadence, where the streets teem with hordes of cut-throats, and demon-sendings rule the night. Enter Jagutai Jen-Shian, bastard son of the Great Khan Sartac. Sent to ensure the signing of a vital treaty, he's his father's deadliest henchman, a small, steely warrior whose fearsome Urguz bow is more than a match for any spell. Opposing him is the demented High Priest of Tchernobog, Serrator Dessicatorius, who, believing that moisture is the principle of evil, dreams of a new and much drier Khymir. But Dessicatorius's insanity is too much for his heterodox second-in-command, Mancdaman Zancharthus, an engagingly ruthless pragmatist who enlists Jagutai in a plot to overthrow his master. Things are further complicated by the regal and beautiful Torrisanna, a temple prostitute with lethal designs of her own, and her her slinky handmaiden Lilitu, who'll stop at nothing to seduce Jagutai, or at least make him as miserable as possible... Supercharged with sex and bone-crunching action, Blood and Pearls is like nothing you've ever read, a hilarious, hallucinatory jolt of high-speed sword-and-sorcery.