Decimus Rex has been wounded - badly! Gladius goes in search of help, but when he returns, Decimus has disappeared. There's no other thing for it, the friends have to return to the Winter Palace and try to find and rescue Decimus. But there is more than one surprise in store...

Author Biography

David Lee Stone (born 1978) is an English fantasy author best known for his series of books The Illmoor Chronicles. His books have been published in many countries and in several different languages. His publishers include Disney (US), Sony (Japan), Buena Vista (Italy) and Hodder Headline (UK). David started writing at the age of 10 and was submitting manuscripts to publishers by the time he was 13. His first ever appearance in print was in the letters section of the science fiction comic 2000 AD in April 1993, and his first short story "The Dulwich Assassins" was published in Xenos magazine during April 1997. David soon began to write short stories, review columns and articles for many different magazines. Between 1997 and 2002, his work appeared in Interzone, SFX, Games Workshop's Citadel Journal, The Edge and many others. "The Dulwich Assassins" was reprinted in Knights of Madness, a fantasy anthology edited by Peter Haining that also contained stories by Terry Pratchett and Tom Sharpe. In 2002, David's agent sold the first three books of his Illmoor Chronicles to UK publishing giant Hodder Headline. The series, which David had started creating in note-form when he was just 12 years old, went on to sell to Disney in the US, Sony in Japan and also in China, Russia, Japan, France, Italy, Brazil, Greece, Norway, Netherlands and Thailand. In addition to writing novels, David has performed at the Hay and Edinburgh Book Festivals. He has also worked in Bulgaria for the British Council, reading his works and talking about story-creation with teenagers in Sofia. He was a Guest of Honour for Disney Hyperion at the 2004 Book Expo America in Chicago, USA. To date, David has also written (as David Grimstone), the Gladiator Boy and Undead Ed series for Hodder Children's Books. David currently lives in the town of Ramsgate, Kent. He is married with two children, and makes increasingly crazy videos on his 'David Grimstone' youtube channel.