Dragonstar

Dragonstar
Barbara Hambly

The thundering conclusion to Barbara Hambly’s landmark quartet, The Winterlands, Dragonstar is a riot of magic, demons and dragons that will stay with you long after you turn the final page. Condemned to die for consorting with demons, dragonslayer Lord John Aversin sits in a dank prison cell and calculates the odds of escape, all the while smelling the smoke of the executioners’ pyres. Far away in Winterlands, Jenny Waynest pays a heavy price for turning away from dragonkind and choosing to be human. She mourns the loss of her husband, Lord John even as she turns to face the dangers that engulf her family. But it is the season of the Dragon Star, and hope shines brightest in the dark. As a pitched battle between demons and humanity rages, Jenny and John will be given one last chance to understand all that has happened to them and why, who their true enemies and allies are, and most of all, who they were always meant to be. The thundering conclusion to Barbara Hambly’s landmark quartet, The Winterlands, Dragonstar is a riot of magic, demons and dragons that will stay with you long after you turn the final page.

DRAGONSTAR

BOOK FOUR OF THE WINTERLANDS QUARTET

Barbara Hambly

Copyright (#uf0dedd6a-6ae6-581a-97f5-2a069c2c2e0b)

HarperVoyager

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

First published by Del Rey 2002

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

Copyright © Barbara Hambly 2002

Map © Shelly Shapiro

Cover illustration © Nakonechnyi Jaroslav

Cover design by Andrew Davis © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

Barbara Hambly asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008374242

Ebook Edition © October 2019 ISBN: 9780008374259

Version: 2019-10-14

Dedication (#uf0dedd6a-6ae6-581a-97f5-2a069c2c2e0b)

For Lester and Judy-Lynn

with love

Contents

Cover (#u63a26e9a-cbc5-53cb-9d6d-ef5696af1703)

Title Page (#u63ba72ee-c664-5557-ae37-98115a962e55)

Copyright

Dedication

Maps

What Passed Before (#u47e710a6-7824-58b5-aec3-f4ee32dc939f)

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen