Five Odd Honors — Jane M. Lindskold

BREAKING THE WALL.

Having entered the Halls of the Dead and returned five of their ancestors to life, the Thirteen Orphans and their allies' open the ninth gate into the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice. . . and discover that the Lands have transformed into an apparently uninhabited world where fire burns blue and the ground changes form under one's feet. Even the magic of the place seems diminished.

Stunned by the changes to their homeland, Righteous Drum and his daughter, Honey Dream, are forced into a closer alliance with Pearl Bright and the rest of the Thirteen Orphans. Their path through the unknown perils that lie beyond the ninth gate will not be without pain or sacrifice.

On Earth, Pearl Bright is attacked -- is this treachery by our world's magical traditions or has one of the Orphans betrayed her? Brenda Morris, a magician in training, learns of the Orphans' dangers when it is nearly too late -- but she has new, if reluctant, allies among the sidhe, who fear that the changes in the Lands foreshadow what will soon happen in their own realm.

Five Odd Honors is a story of betrayal and redemption, of bravery in the face of terror, and of loyalty and hatred that reach beyond the grave.