Between Two Fires
In 1348, as the Black Death scours France, a disgraced knight named Thomas roams the ruined countryside as a brigand, hollowed out by his own failures. When he rescues a strange, fearless young girl named Delphine — who insists she can see angels — his aimless survival becomes a perilous pilgrimage.
Delphine believes the plague is only the opening move of a far greater catastrophe: that Lucifer and the fallen angels have launched a second war on Heaven, and that the world of the living has become their battlefield. Guided by her visions, she draws Thomas toward Paris and then Avignon, and the mismatched pair — later joined by a flawed, kind-hearted priest — walk a landscape crawling with demons, cruelty, and miracles as God's own silence hangs over everything.
Christopher Buehlman's Between Two Fires is a harrowing, beautifully written work of medieval horror and dark fantasy — brutal and tender by turns, and steeped in the terror and faith of the fourteenth century.
A disgraced French knight turned brigand, wounded at Crécy and excommunicated, who becomes protector to the girl Delphine on their pilgrimage.
An orphaned girl who says angels speak to her, and who compels Thomas to escort her to Avignon — by turns prophet and frightened child.
The nobleman who stripped Thomas of his lands and standing, and whose enmity follows him across France.
A flawed, kindly priest who joins their pilgrimage.
The pope at Avignon during the plague years, whose seat is the destination of Delphine's pilgrimage.
This is a standalone novel and does not belong to a series or require any prior reading.
Christopher Buehlman is a poet and a performer who has worked as a comedian on the renaissance festival circuit, which informs the distinct, often visceral voice found in his prose.