Sancia Grado is a thief and a damn good one. And her latest target a heavily guarded warehouse on Tevanne’s docks is nothing her unique abilities can’t handle. But unbeknownst to her Sancia’s been sent to steal an artifact of unimaginable power an object that could revolutionize the magical technology known as scriving. The Merchant Houses who control this magic--the art of using coded commands to imbue everyday objects with sentience--have already used it to transform Tevanne into a vast remorseless capitalist machine. But if they can unlock the artifact’s secrets they will rewrite the world itself to suit their aims. Now someone in those Houses wants Sancia dead and the artifact for themselves. And in the city of Tevanne there’s nobody with the power to stop them. To have a chance at surviving—and at stopping the deadly transformation that’s under way—Sancia will have to marshal unlikely allies learn to harness the artifact’s power for herself and undergo her own transformation one that will turn her into something she could never have imagined.
