Here’s the second in Lustbader’s current series, the Saga of the Pearl.

In the last episode, the Dar-al-Salat, the savior of Kundala, was saved
from death by a dangerous ritual performed by Giyan the Ramahan
sorceress. The ritual was successful, but since then Giyan has been
afflicted by a horrible skin condition on her hands and forearms. In this
book we discover that through an error in the ritual she made an opening
through which the archdaemon Horologgia has been able to begin escaping
from the Abyss. Worse, the archdaemon intends to take over Giyan’s
body–and, ultimately, all of her sorcerous powers. The Dar-al-Salat
must find the Veil of Thousand Tears, a relic of the creation of the
planet Kundala, to save Giyan from daemonic possession–for without Giyan
the Dar-al-Salat won’t be able to free the planet from the scourge of the
V’orrn.

It’s yet another fine piece of storytelling, even if the premise and the
execution are sometimes a little goofy. The characters develop in
interesting ways, and we find out more about the V’orrn, and in
particular about the Gyrgon. The V’orrn have a caste-based society, and
the Gyrgon–a caste of genetically-engineered cyborgs–are the top caste.
They are greatly feared by the other castes, and are rarely seen in
public, ruling primarily through the Regent, the leader of the Bashkir,
or merchant, class. Little is known about the Gyrgon, but we get to
learn quite a bit more here, and much that was obscure in the previous
book is made clear.

Perhaps the most satisfying thing is that both this book and its
predecessor have been properly structured; each book really is a
complete novel by itself. All too often in multi-volume fantasy sagas
it’s all one long story chopped arbitrarily into volumes. Instead, each
of these books has its own particular conflict which it tracks from
beginning to end. Nicely done.