Revanche Cycle (#1-4) – Craig Schaefer Free Audiobook

Written by Craig Schaefer

A world away from Daniel Faust and Harmony Black — though perhaps not as far as you might think — awaits the intrigue and danger of The Revanche Cycle. As Pope Benignus lies in his deathbed and an empire awaits his successor, a madman puts his apocalyptic plan for revenge into motion. His web of conspiracy will snare an unlikely gathering of souls, from a barmaid and her lover, to a pair of low-rent bounty hunters, to the pope’s iron-willed daughter, their roads converging in a broken, war-ravaged land.

This is a realm of intrigue, betrayal, and all-consuming corruption. A realm where politics can be as deadly as poison — and more often than not, the two go hand-in-hand.

01 – Winter’s Reach

Pope Benignus is dying, and the man who takes his throne will hold the reins of an empire. Conspiracies swirl like shadows around Livia, the pope’s daughter, who refuses to be anyone’s pawn: chasing the whispers of a deadly coup, she vows to expose the truth and save her church from disaster. Livia has secrets of her own, though, and one wrong move could cost her life and her soul.

Felix is the scion of a dying merchant house, a man with just one chance to save his family and the woman he loves. His last hope lies in the snowbound hell of Winter’s Reach, a former prison colony turned “free city” under a brutal tyrant’s reign.

Livia and Felix have never crossed paths, but they’ve both been snared in a far greater web than they can imagine. They — along with a pair of veteran bounty hunters, an exiled politician, and a sadistic coven of witches — are cogs in one man’s apocalyptic plan for revenge. A plan which, if it succeeds, will leave an entire nation in flames.

02- The Instruments of Control

Livia Serafini must die.

To the Church she is a heretic, tried in absentia and sentenced to burn. To her brother Carlo, she stands as a threat to his corrupt rule and a symbol of resistance. To her new “allies” in the east, she is a pawn to be played and sacrificed as they see fit. They don’t hear the whispers that follow her in the streets: whispers of hope, and the name of a long-dead saint.

When Livia rises up to fight, she will not rise alone.

Across the ocean, Felix struggles for control of his family’s fate against the crime lord Basilio Grimaldi. Basilio is wealthy, ruthless, and the master of a hundred killers. All Felix has are his wits and his courage. It won’t be enough. To break free, and to save the lives of everyone he loves, he’ll have to face the darkness that followed him home from Winter’s Reach.

And as the Owl’s horrific vengeance unfolds, her coven teeters on the brink of civil war. All the dominoes are in place now, lined up from the frozen north to the swamps and ruins of a dead empire, and set to tumble at one man’s command. When they do, a world will fall with them.

03 – Terms of Surrender

Felix Rossini is a man with a thousand enemies. Framed for murder, hunted by Mirenze’s protectors as well as the criminal underworld, he struggles to survive and fight back against the conspiracy that has marked him for death. A conspiracy of another kind is brewing across the ocean, as the corrupt aristocracy draws Livia Serafini’s oldest friends into a plot to destroy her. If she can’t find a way to overcome the occult infection spreading through her veins, they may not have to.

And in the shadows, the Owl prepares to wage bloody war against the most dangerous foe of all — her own coven — as she leads her disciples in a quest to recover a deadly relic. It’s a showdown that will end where it all began: in the frozen hell of Winter’s Reach, under a rain of fire.

From a rebel uprising in the west, to a broken crusade in the east, the dominoes fall one by one. Where they land will determine the fate of an empire.

04- Queen of the Night

It all ends here.

It ends as Livia Serafini returns to her homeland with an army at her back, an exiled refugee turned ruthless conqueror, bringing war and witchcraft to any who dare stand in her way. It ends as Renata Nicchi and her ragged band of hunters and outlaws infiltrate a city under siege, making a last, desperate bid to save her lover from the jaws of the criminal underworld and be reunited at last.

And as the Owl and her coven work to unravel the mystery of Wisdom’s Grave, a doom from the past threatens to consume them all. It ends here, in the final chapter of the Revanche Cycle, under the spreading shadow of darkness. In a land where poison is king, only one can become the queen of the night.