Mistislaus was a wizard. He was old, absentminded, and his potions and spells barely brought in enough money to put food on his table. In short, he was the last person who could be expected to raise a little girl—in the normal run of things. But since the Dark Elves had overrun Fairholm—slaughtering any who resisted—nothing ran in a normal course. Like it or not, Mistislaus found himself saddled with a baby. He called her Skyla. And Skyla, he soon learned, was a witch . . . Little Skyla grew up knowing that she was no ordinary orphan—she was heir to the proud name and magic of the true rules of Fairholm. And so she dared to dream. She learned from old Mistislaus, and she roamed the moors, learning the languages of animals. She molded tiny figures of mud and spittle, and she brought them to life. And she dreamed of avenging the parents she had never known and of claiming the fabled lost treasure the Dark Elves could not find . . .

"MASTER, I HAVE FAILED..." Illmuri, the apprentice wizard, gale his report. The Skylding clan had been destroyed, their treasure lost forever. Only Skyla, the witch-girl was left alive—at the mercy of her own rampant magic and a clan of vengeful enemies. The Dark Elves had triumphed. "THERE IS ANOTHER WAY..." Old Eyjarr took the discouraging news calmly. Hadn't he seen defeat before, in other lives, in strand after strand of the Web of Life? But he knew that if he could thwart the curse of the Dark Elves even once, that infernal curse would finally disappear from all the strand, for all time. The trick. Eyjarr assured his astonished pupil, would be to learn from their mistakes—and to search again for the one, improbable strand where a couple of clever wizards could cheat an implacable fate... Skyla, the witch-girl, and her companion, the wild boy Jafnar, must use their wit and magic as they battle the scheming Dark Elves. By the author of The Clan of the Warlord.

When Jutta's mother sent her to tiny, windswept Bardhol to stay with their ancient female relations, she hinted slyly that those crafty crones might be hiding a fortune. But all Jutta found was boredom, toil—and cats, spoiled pets demanding constant attention. Their only neighbors were antiquated, mad, or resting—permanently—in the graveyard at the foot of the hill. Jutta's grandmothers warned her away from the graveyard, but the cats went, and Jutta followed. What she found there would change her life forever.