The Mother. A titanic organism, humanity's home and ravenous god. Housing sprouts like fungus from flesh, wrapped in membranes, supported by cartilage. No stone. No metal.

Within her pulsing bowels, Khulekani is no ordinary healer. He saves lives and ends them with equal nonchalance. He selects the condemned to feed the Mother, purges humanity of impurity. Knowledge is his only purpose.

And when the last heir of a dying clan forces him to choose between saving a bloodline or execution, Khulekani will prove that no one—not nobles, not healers, not even his own family—can stand between him and his goals.

Because there's something worse than risking death: being useful.

The Mother feeds the child. The child feeds the Mother

For readers of Joe Abercrombie, Mark Lawrence, Pierce Brown and N.K. Jemisin.