The Seven Metropolitan areas Rebellion continues to be crushed. Sha’ik is usually lifeless. One last rebel drive continues to be, holed up in the town of Y’Ghatan and under the fanatical order of Leoman from the Flails. The prospect of laying siege to this historic fortress makes the battle-weary Malazan Fourteenth Army uneasy. For it was here which the Empire’s greatest champ, Dassem Ultor, was slain and a tide of Malazan blood spilled. A place of foreboding, its smell is usually of loss of life. But elsewhere, brokers of a far greater issue about The Bonehunters have made their opening goes. The Crippled God has been granted a place in the pantheon; a schism threatens and sides must be selected. Whatever each god decides, the bottom rules have changed irrevocably, terrifyingly, as well as the initial blood spilled will be in the mortal globe. A world when a web host of characters, familiar and fresh, including Heboric Ghost Hands; the possessed Apsalar; Cutter, once a thief today a killer; the warrior Karsa Orlong; and both historic wanderers Icarium and Mappo, each searching for such a fate as they may fashion with their personal hands, led by their very own will. Only if the gods would leave them alone. However now that kitchen knives have already been unsheathed, the gods are disinclined to be kind. There will be war, battle in the heavens. And the award? Nothing less than existence itself .