Theodora McAllister

The Royal Basin of Kveldskar is preparing to commission the crown's twin steam dreadnoughts, but an unseen rot is eating through their iron double bottoms. Deep trench polyps, introduced during deep-sea ballast intake, have seeded themselves inside the sealed keel spaces, gorging on industrial tallow and boiler grease while weeping acid that turns forged plates into porous sponge. When night shifts begin vanishing into the flooded compartmental voids, lead hull inspector Halldor, culvert engineer Brynhild, and veteran drydock master Gestsk must squeeze into three-foot-high iron coffins to purge the creatures. Opening the caissons risks releasing the abyssal brood into the empire’s capital harbor, but closing the drainage pumps will let the rising autumn tide capsize the dreadnoughts in their cradles. Forced to wield pneumatic rivet guns and corrosive lime-steam lines that threaten to dissolve the warships from within, three working-class mechanics must hold the line against an escalating abyssal swarm before the shipyard collapses into the black surf.

As master costume cutter, prompter, and secret logistics fixer aboard the converted privateer frigate Kócsag, Borbála Gyöngyössy already has her hands full keeping thirty prima donnas from mutinying on the high seas. But when the company's insufferable leading tenor takes a stage blunderbuss blast to the chest during the third act—loaded with genuine iron grape-shot instead of dried lavender—Borbála's quiet afternoon dissolves in black powder. With the frigate's draconian first mate locking the troupe belowdecks and threatening to maroon them on a desert spit within forty-eight hours unless the killer is produced, Borbála must treat shredded silk, sabotaged rigging, and backstage rivalries as forensic evidence. Armed with her tailor's shears and an encyclopedic knowledge of theatrical vanity, she sets out to unmask a murderer who treats manslaughter as high art.