Riyria

Two men take a job. Royce Melborn can pick any lock and end any life without troubling his pulse; Hadrian Blackwater is the finest blade in the kingdom and would rather sheathe it. Together they are Riyria, a two-man outfit that steals what won't be missed and occasionally what will, and their trade keeps dragging them into matters far above a thief's pay grade. This is Elan: squabbling kingdoms, a church that still mourns a fallen empire, elves in the deep woods, and an heir no one is supposed to find. The world is Michael J. Sullivan's, told in two threads. The Riyria Revelations gathers six novels into three volumes, Theft of Swords, Rise of Empire, and Heir of Novron, a single rising arc that opens as a framed-for-regicide caper and widens into the fate of a continent. The Riyria Chronicles are the lighter standalone prequels, among them The Crown Tower, The Rose and the Thorn, The Death of Dulgath, and The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter, filling in how a cynic and an idealist learned to work with, and mostly not kill, each other. This is fantasy that strikes the old chords on purpose and with warmth: heists, prophecy, and a friendship carried on banter, plotted tight and paced to turn pages. Begin with Theft of Swords for the intended unfolding, or The Crown Tower to ride along from the day the partnership began. Sullivan builds both doors to open.