Satrap Garadul has declared himself king and is planning to lay waste to Rekton there is an army camped not far away. He comes upon a green wight, Gaspar Elos, bound and trying to escape. Kip Delauria is scrounging for shards of luxin on a battlefield of the False Prism’s War outside Rekton. If the Prism refuses death, he or she is likewise hunted down by the elite squadron assigned to protecting the empire: the Blackguard. Every seven years, or on a multiple of seven years, the Prism also gives up his or her life, and the ruling council installs a new Prism.

Only the Prism can draft with limitless power, and he or she alone can balance all the colors in the satrapies to prevent luxin from overwhelming the lands and creating chaos.

Drafters who have broken the halo are called wights, and they descend into madness if they are not Freed those who run from the ritual Freeing are hunted to their deaths. In exchange, they agree that once they exhaust their ability to safely use magic-signaled when the halos of their irises are broken by the colors they draft-they will be killed by the emperor, the Prism, in a ceremony on the most holy day of the year: Sun Day. Trained at the empire’s capital, the Chromeria, drafters lead lives of privilege, with politicians and powerful families vying for their services. The process is known as drafting, and each drafted color has unique physical and metaphysical properties and innumerable uses, from construction to warfare. In the empire of the Seven Satrapies, some people are born with the ability to transform light into luxin: a physical, tangible substance that exists in one of nine colors.

The burning white by brent weeks