The Chronicles of Elantra

Seven years ago Kaylin fled the crime-riddled streets of Nightshade, knowing that something was after her. Children were being murdered— and all had the same odd markings that mysteriously appeared on her own skin….Since then, she's learned to read, she's learned to fight and she's become one of the vaunted Hawks who patrol and police the City of Elantra. Alongside the winged Aerians and the immortal Barrani, she's made a place for herself, far from the mean streets of her birth.

In Elantra, a job well done is rewarded with a more dangerous task. So after defeating a dark evil, Kaylin Neya goes before the Barrani High Court, where a misspoken word brings sure death. Kaylin's never been known for her grace or manners, but the High Lord's heir is suspiciously ill, and Kaylin's healing magic is the only shot at saving him - if she can dodge the traps laid for her.

Still avoiding magic whenever possible, Private Kaylin Neya relished investigating a run-of-the-mill theft. Until she found out the mysterious stolen box had been taken from Elani Street, where the mages and charlatans mingled, and it was sometimes hard to tell the difference between the two. And since the box was ancient, without a keyhole, and held tremendous darkness inside, Kaylin knew unknown forces were again playing with her destiny....and her life.

Kaylin returned from the West March in one piece. Now that piece is fraying. She's not at home in the Imperial Palace - and she never intends to be. All she wants is normal garden-variety criminals and a place of her own. Of course, normal in her new life involves a dragon as a roommate, but she can handle that. Kaylin can't as easily handle the new residents to the city she polices, because one of them is Nightshade's younger brother. On a night when she should be talking to landlords in perfectly normal buildings, she's called to the fief - by Teela.

In the aftermath of a vicious battle between darkness and light, the city of Elantra has emerged victorious. But Shadows continue to haunt every corner of its streets.... Elantra stands strong, but countless numbers of Hawks, the city's staunchest protectors, were lost in the brutal attack. Humans, Barrani, Aerians, Leontines - none of the races emerged unscathed from the defense of the city. Homes were lost, families were scattered - and the outcast Barrani Lord Nightshade is missing from his castle in the fiefs.

Private Kaylin Neya already has Dragons and Barrani as roommates. Adding one injured, flightless Aerian to her household should be trivial. Sure, the Aerian is Sergeant Moran dar Carafel, but Kaylin's own sergeant is a Leontine, the definition of growly and fanged. She can handle one Aerian. But when a walk to the Halls of Law becomes a street-shattering magical assassination attempt on the sergeant, Kaylin discovers that it's not the guest who's going to be the problem.

Private Kaylin Neya thought her home couldn't possibly get more crowded. But when one of her housemates, Annarion, decides to undertake the Barrani Test of Name, his friends refuse to let him face his task alone - and Kaylin's sentient home, Helen, is the only structure capable of shielding the rest of Elantra from the magnitude of their power. Annarion and Mandoran almost caused the destruction of the High Halls once already. Add nine of their closest friends, and the danger is astronomically higher.

Kaylin wasn’t sent to the West March to start a war. Her mission to bring back nine Barrani might do just that, though. She traveled with a Dragon, and her presence is perceived as an act of aggression in the extremely hostile world of Barrani-Dragon politics. Internal Barrani politics are no less deadly, and Kaylin has managed - barely - to help the rescued Barrani evade both death and captivity at the hands of the Consort.

The fiefs that exist at the heart of the city of Elantra are home to sentient Towers that guard the world against the incursion of Shadow. But between the fiefs exists the gray world of the border zone. In it, geography changes between one passage across a border and the next. The rules of magic are different there - and yet somehow familiar to Kaylin Neya.

After the near-destruction of the High Halls, Corporal Kaylin Neya is looking forward to resuming her patrol. But once more an empty Tower stands in Elantra, and Kaylin's companions won't let an advantage slip by. They see the Tower as a base to fight Shadow; the Dragon Bellusdeo, as a protection for the cohort; Sedarias, as a potential hoard. And others are interested as well. Kaylin knows when she's in over her head. Claiming a Tower is not the future she wants. And the Tower has strict requirements—ones that daunt even the Dragons and the Barrani.

When Corporal Kaylin Neya is assigned front desk duty—a task hated by every Hawk—the only thing she can look forward to besides an endless stream of complaints is visits from a dotty old woman, because she always brings baked goods along with information passed on by her friends, who happen to be ghosts no one else can see. But then the old woman’s invisible friends have news about Severn Handred: his unusual weapon has caught their attention. Concerned, Kaylin accompanies the woman home because she has a few questions to ask these so-called ghosts.

At the end of three long wars, Bellusdeo is the last of her kind, the sole surviving female Dragon in the City of Elantra. When she appears one evening on the doorstep of her former roommate, Corporal Kaylin Neya, her demeanor is dreadful—more so than what’s expected of the Dragons’ notoriously tempestuous temperament.