The Iron Dirge

The Grave of Empires

by Sam Sykes

A standalone epic fantasy novella starring Sal the Cacophony, who Pierce Brown called a "protagonist for the ages," from Sam Sykes' widely acclaimed Seven Blades in Black and Ten Arrows of Iron.

Sal the Cacophony does not make friends. When you have a magic gun, a trusty blade and rogue mages to hunt, you don’t need them. Sal the Cacophony makes enemies. And when her hunt leads to a town on the edge of nowhere, she finds them in spades: an unassuming mage with a secret, a vengeful bandit queen with ideals and steel to spare, and a colossal, centuries-old beast who has decided now is the best time to migrate.

Sal the Cacophony could be their savior. But as everyone eventually learns, Sal’s “salvation” is usually worse.

Genres: Fantasy, Short Stories, Adult

166 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 8, 2020

About the author

Sam Sykes is the author of Tome Of The Undergates, a vast and sprawling story of adventure, demons, madness and carnage. Suspected by many to be at least tangentially related to most causes of human suffering, Sam Sykes is also a force to be reckoned with beyond literature.

At 25, Sykes is one of the younger authors to have arrived on the stage of literary fantasy. Tome Of The Undergates is his first book, published in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Holland, and Canada. He currently resides in the United States and is probably watching you read this right now.

Reviews

[Vigasia]

But it was a good story.

Perfect novella for fans of Sal the Cacophony. We meet another of her targets and some other people I hope we may have a chance to see in the future (I am especially interested in Virian's fate). I loved it!

[Donna Bull]

Another gem from Sam. Sometimes I don't know how he can manage to pack so much angst and emotion into so few pages. Back in the Scar with Sal, this time in Paarl's Hollow, going after Rogo the Dervish. Of course nothing is ever simple, so throw in a Compass Beast, the Children of the Dead and a villain who maybe isn't as villainous as you thought. So much depth to Rogo, and Sal as always, is pulled in so many directions emotionally. In all the amazing action and chaos there are so many quiet, intense moments. All the implications of why we do what we do and is the pain and consequences worth it by what is wrought from your actions. Many feels.

"That person we try to leave our swords behind for finds our names, our scars, and suddenly they realize that the person they thought we were isn't who we are. They realize we have a body count a mile long behind us and then they wonder-even if they try their hardest not to-what strange quirk of fate was it that kept them from becoming just another corpse left in a vagrant's wake."

[Boulder Boulderson]

Fun short story about a woman with a gun, a bad attitude and an enemy. Haven't read the main series but really should as it seems like it would be lots of fun.

[Bill]

I hope Sal finishes her list, and we all get to enjoy her chaotic journey until its completion.

[Kristina]

I just freaking love Sal.

[Alyssa Kim]

3.5 stars

Names go only as far as people's memories. And atrocities are more common than dirt out in the scar. But stories? Stories are what reputations are made of. Stories eat. Stories grow. And they move. They flutter on fearful words between fearful lips. They cling to people's backs and whisper in their ears. They ooze, up the body and into the heart, until they're as much a part of you as your own blood.

I miss Sal and her personality so much. And this book follows her journey to cross another person off the list. Rogo the Dervish. I do love Sal, but I wasn't in love with this novel. I'm not saying the plot was bad- the same writing was the same as usual- I just wasn't super intrigued. But maybe that's because it was too short.

Opera is clean. Opera is neat. Opera is satisfying. The actors come out, tell you their problems, you watch them figure things out and eventually it ends. Sometimes the hero dies, sometimes they don't. Sometimes love is the answer, sometimes it isn't. But every opera eventually ends.

People don't.

People are messy. People contradict themselves. People lie for good reasons, tell truths for bad reasons, and even if you do everything right and say all the right words and speak to the right people, it can all come crumbling down. All it takes is the wrong word at the right moment for the worst reason.

Opera isn't there to make you feel like you're boring. Opera is there to show you what life would be like if everyone did what they said they'd do.

It's all lies-pretty lies, important lies, necessary lies-but if you learn only one truth from this story, let it be this.

People don't end when you put them in the ground.

But we don't tell stories to remember the past. Sometimes not even to forget the past. Sometimes we tell stories to survive. And sometimes surviving is all we get.

[Elena Hect]

I think Dirge suffered slightly for being read after I'd finished the main trilogy - a lot of Sal's monologues in this are rehashed in Ten Arrows or Three Axes, which meant that rereading them here cheapened their impact in the comparatively shorter novella.

Sal's pain and doubt get focused on in this novella a lot more than they do in the rest of the Grave of Empires books, because this isn't a frame narrative like the main novels. It's still our beloved trainwreck protagonist relating the story, telling something that already happened; The Iron Dirge subsists without the additional structure of her telling some poor second party. Sal's not crafting a spin, not making herself an unreliable narrator, and Dirge is rawer for it. We see more of her internal monologue without filters for the interrogator, for the medic, for Liette; this killing doesn't fix anything. But it's all Sal knows how to do.

[Jay]

Though Sam Sykes is a garbage person, he does write a good story. This novella follows Sal checking yet another name off of her list and is actually rather good (versus 10 Arrows of Iron, which tries to recapture the lightning from his first novel). I rather enjoyed this one, as it gives a bit more detail on Sal and puts her in a few morally questionable positions, especially since Sal has been rather single-minded about her pursuit of vengeance. Definitely worth a read, and before you read 10 Arrows of Iron.

[Kevin K]

Another absolute banger!

Sal the Cacophony stirs up some trouble looking for one of the people on her list. It's a great little story that fleshes out The Scar all with Syke's particular style of action.

If you enjoy stories about Sal you'll dig this.

[jessica]

I love Sal. This going to ignite my re-read something fierce.

[Andy Connell]

Nice little side story. Only real complaint was the narration for the Rogo chapters seemed to switch from Omniscient to Sal's recollections but it would change almost mid paragraph.