Arch Wizard

The Story Thus Far

Rod Everlar, a successful author of Cold War action thrillers and fantasy novels set in his imagined world of Falconfar, is astonished one night when Taeauna-one of a race of good winged warrior women he created for his fantasy books-literally falls out of his dreams, onto his bed.

Badly wounded and beset by sinister black-armored warriors known as Dark Helms (created by a computer game manufacturer who purchased the rights to his world), Taeauna pleads with Rod to aid her-and Falconfar.

Rod discovers that the world he thought was created only in his imagination is all too real-and that its people believe he, Rod Everlar, is its Lord Archwizard or Dark Lord, the most powerful of the "Dooms," powerful wizards who can literally change Falconfar with their magic.

Plunged bewilderingly into a Falconfar that is familiar but also dangerously different from his imaginings, Rod finds himself swept into an ongoing civil war in the kingdom of Galath, where one of the Dooms, the wizard Arlaghaun, is goading the King of Galath into establishing absolute tyranny over the Galathan nobles.

For years, the three Dooms-the wizards Arlaghaun, Malraun, and Narmarkoun-have fought each other, in an uneasily balanced struggle wherein none of them could achieve supremacy. Rod's arrival shatters that balance, just as Arlaghaun is on the verge of seizing control over Galath.

There are signs that a long-dead wizard of matchless might, Lorontar-the only Lord Archwizard ever known in Falconfar before Rod-is stirring, somehow still alive (or perhaps not), and seeking to control the living.

At the end of Dark Lord, the first novel of Falconfar, the wizard Arlaghaun is slain in the fortress of Ult Tower. The wizard Malraun appears, snatches Taeauna, and magically whisks her away as his captive, leaving Rod Everlar (laden with magical items from Ult Tower he's snatched up but doesn't understand) raging helplessly, wanting to rescue her but not knowing how.

For what happens next, read on…