They came, they ate, they conquered...
Humans call them "demons" for lack of a better word, but what are they, really? Are they minions of Hell as the name implies, a new apex predator of some kind, or something more worrisome still - creatures possessed of intelligence and purpose?
One young Adept woman thinks she knows what they are, but she needs proof before others will rally to meet the threat, so she goes in search of their point of entry into the world.
The Adept find their Magical skills of limited use against the demons, while the Ordinary - those lacking magical abilities - try to devise Technology that can counter the newcomers' power. It may require Magic and Technology together, but the Adept eschew Technology while the Ordinary distrust Magic. The two must find a way to set aside longstanding differences and combine their resources, or face extinction. That may prove a greater challenge than the demons themselves.
This fantasy series follows the exploits of three generations of humans as they struggle to come to terms with a formidable foe, and seek to reclaim their world. The fictional world is populated by multiple human cultures of different races and beliefs, who fundamentally misunderstand each other and their mutual enemy, and who have very different concepts of what to do. Forced by circumstance to collaborate, the humans must overcome these challenges to forestall the end of their world.
Book I: Demon Incursion
His uncle Timo thinks it's high time Anton grew up and started pulling his weight around the farm, but Anton prefers to live a fantasy life of sword fighting and adventure in exotic lands, far from the mundane world of potatoes and corn, where the legendary Adept wield the power of Magic and larger-than-life heroes battle bloodthirsty monsters. Trusting and naive, Anton listens raptly to the tales told by travelers at the inn in Greenvale, and believes all he hears.
Anton reads every word he can find regarding the ancient Adept and knows their lore well although he lacks their gifts. And he dabbles in Technology, although his inventions never seem to work quite the way he imagines they will. The townsfolk see him not as a talented inventor, a curious historian, or a spellbinding storyteller. They see him as lazy, or a fool, or both, and nothing but a burden to his hardworking uncle.
Such may have been the course of his life save for the arrival of a mysterious young woman very different from anyone Anton had met before. Who was she, and what was her connection with reported attacks by creatures matching the description of the mythical Demons of old? And what fate awaited humankind, when the Demons failed to live down to their reputation as mindless brutes, but proved to be something rather more formidable?
Book II: Demon Dominion
The portal is open and the Demons are back. They're looking for meat and profit, and the sociopathic Adept master who leads them is looking for revenge and power. The great Adept of the past are gone and their lore forgotten. The secrets of the Demon trap are lost. The world has not recovered from the Demons' last visit, and there is no effective resistance.
People tell Brön his parents were great heroes who saved the world from the Demons before he was born, but he only wishes they were still alive and he were with them. Instead, he's been trying to stay one step ahead of the Demons ever since he was ten, and witnessed them kill everyone he knew.
Everywhere he goes, Brön finds people have accommodated themselves to the demand for human meat in one way or another, and always in a way that degrades and corrupts them. People are forgetting their own past and their own identity, and growing resigned to their fate.
And then he meets a strange girl from a faraway place who can read the inscription on his father's sword and who speaks of a Prophecy of hope - a Prophecy that names him. But who are her folk and how is it possible he could figure in their Prophecy? In the course of discovering the answer, Brön travels farther than he can imagine and learns more about the Demons than he wants to know.
Book III: Demon Rebellion
When the wormhole's endpoint suddenly shifts, the event throws everyone's plans into disarray. Both the Bshaak operation and the human resistance are disrupted. The Bshaak boss, Kalr, manipulates matters to her own benefit, and gains status and power on the home world. With her new-found influence, she reestablishes the meat operation with the full support of the Bshaak authorities. The humans are tightly controlled and farmed.
Nyala and Brön join other renegade humans at a hidden location where they plan and prepare for war against the Bshaak. They seek to fulfill the Prophecy, a Tuk legend that foretells the descendants of Vlagga of the Tuk and Jan of Greenvale are destined to win back the human world from the occupiers.
But the powerful Adept Arun and his son Tell, who is more powerful still, have other plans for the despised Ordinary. Can the resistance overcome both the Magical ones and the Bshaak?
