Announcing The Heretics by Joe Abercrombie - Reactor

Return to the raucous world of Joe Abercrombie’s The Devils in the bloody, action-packed sequel, The Heretics—forthcoming May 11, 2027 from Tor Books.

This hardcover edition features four-color illustrated endpapers, illustrated family tree, foil case stamp, and full-page interior illustrations. We’re thrilled to preview an excerpt below!

Traditions and Routines

Hugo leaned on the pitted parapet, watched the water surge beneath, and imagined himself as Margrave of Zeitz.

The famous Bridge of Martyrs with its statues of long dead saints, although rather overwrought artistically… belongs to me. Heinrich’s Tower, rising from the centre of the river, although a draughty eyesore in dire need of a new roof… my property. The walled town to either side, although cloaked by morning mist and in a state of some decay… take a guess at the proprietor.

Then there was the family fortune. It might have dwindled lately, but it was still a fortune. Hugo wasn’t greedy. Wealth meant nothing to him. It’s simply the luxury, status and power it can buy that so intrigues me.

There was only one thing in his way. The stubborn reluctance of his ancient grandfather—the current margrave—to die. And at least seven members of his extended family currently ahead of him in the line of succession, of course.

Still, it’s essential, as Mother was always saying, to picture oneself as one wishes to be. It’s the first step in making it happen.

“No need to kneel,” he was murmuring, practicing his most gracious wave, the one he’d use from the margrave’s chair…when he heard badly oiled wheels approaching. He licked a finger and made sure his forelock was neatly curled, then flicked it for that sense of artless carelessness. It’s essential, among any company, to look one’s best. Dress for the margravate you want! One does it not for the audience, but for oneself.

Which was just as well, as all that emerged from the murk was one ragged man, with one miserable cart, pulled by one tragic donkey. Hoffman the Pedlar. The old grotesque had been wringing a miserable trade in tat and shoddy from the unlucky of Saxony for as long as anyone could remember.

Please don’t stop. Please don’t stop. Please don’t—

Hoffman stopped, displaying some of the worst teeth in Europe. “Hugo!”

Not “Master von Klotz.” Not even “Constable,” but Hugo forced himself to smile back, however queasy it made him. You never know,as Mother was always saying, when someone might prove useful.

“Hoffman,” said Hugo. “How’s business?” If one can dignify the swapping of rags with the term.

“Prussia and Bavaria at daggers drawn, they’ve got everyone nervous.” The pedlar jerked a thumb back down the bridge. “Just come up from Wetterzeube.”

“A delightful burg,” said Hugo, while reflecting on what an utter shithole it was. Even worse than Zeitz, if such a thing’s possible.

“Used to be.” Hoffman leaned close. “But you’ll never guess what’s afflicted the place in a year o’ trying!”

And won’t care in a century of it. Hugo sighed. “You’re likely right.”

“Guess, go on!”

The temptation to take Hoffman by the shoulders and heave him over the parapet was powerful indeed. But twenty-seven years as a junior member of the von Klotz family had cured Hugo of the desire to act on every murderous urge. Or I’d be steeped in blood to my eyebrows.

“I don’t know. Witches?”

Hoffman looked crestfallen. “Aye, it is witches. How’d you know?”

“Well, one often hears it said, by persons of suggestible temperament”—by which Hugo meant fucking fools—“that Saxony is riddled with them.”

“True.”

“Bad harvest? Witches. Stillborn child? Witches. Broken gutter? Guess who’s to blame? There were rumours of witches in Eisenberg last winter, and in Wethau the winter before.”

“True,” conceded Hoffman.

“The magistrate there fancied himself an Inquisitor and set off quite the panic.”

“He did.”

“How many heretics did he catch again?”

Hoffman cleared his throat with a noisy gargling. And the saints dread to imagine what might be in there. “That’d be none. But there was a victim this time! A corpse was fished from the river! Carved.” Hoffman tapped the centre of his pox-scarred forehead, dropping his voice as though a whole cabal might be listening in. “With a circle of runes. The local priest said it had the look of Black Art!”

Hugo sighed. “To the hammer everything looks like a nail.”

“Four witches was tried and found guilty!”

“Saints be praised, we’re delivered,” droned Hugo. Beggar women dragged from the forest to pave some magistrate’s path to a better appointment…

“They was burned on the pyre!” Hoffman appeared delighted at the prospect. “I got there the day after. Just ash by then.”

“Well, that’s what a witch-burning leaves you with. Anyway, mustn’t hold you up.” And Hugo gave a cheery salute, as if the old swindler was already on the move. “Commerce never sleeps, eh?”

“Never.” Hoffman gurgled up an unlovely laugh, and hauled his unlovely donkey and unlovely chattels onwards. “Always more money to be made.”

“Don’t run into any witches!” Hugo called after him, adding under his breath, “You fucking dunce…” Hoffman waved without looking around, guiding his cart through the tunnel that pierced Heinrich’s Tower, an array of bedraggled ribbons pinned to the back fluttering in the breeze. He was soon lost in the mist on the eastern span of the bridge. For the briefest moment, Hugo felt, of all things, a twinge of jealousy. This old gargoyle can roll his wretched cart out of town and on to fresh pastures. I’m stuck here.

Hugo turned back to the parapet and propped his elbows in their accustomed places. Am I actually starting to wear two dips in the stone? Or was he only wearing the dips left by the elbows of his predecessors a little deeper? Zeitz was a place of rich traditions. And wearying routines. “Witches,” he murmured, shaking his head. “Give me strength—”

“Hugo!” The call echoed faintly from below. “Hugo, you bastard!”

So cousin Konrad was awake.

Hugo trotted down the steps to the jail, fingers sliding down the handrail polished by the palms of former constables, jolting off the end of the missing section then back onto the handrail again. How many more times will I do the selfsame thing? He didn’t much care for the answer. Zeitz was a place of rich traditions. And wearying routines.

“Hugo?” Only one of the half-dozen cells was occupied, his cousin’s furious face pressed to the rust-eaten bars. “Hugo, you pig-fucker!”

“And a lovely morning to you too, cousin,” said Hugo. Konrad was the most insufferable member of his direct family. Considering how insufferable the others are, quite an achievement. Likely the only achievement Konrad would have to look back on from his deathbed. Which, we can only hope, he will soon be tucked up in.

For now, sad to say, the worthless bastard still drew breath. “What the shit am I doing in here?” he sneered.

“You were drunk again.” Hugo heaved out his weighty key ring, buffed to a dull gleam by the fingertips of his predecessors. How many more times will I do the selfsame thing?

“So?”

“You were pissing off the bridge again,” said Hugo. A place of rich traditions.

“And?”

“There were complaints of unwanted advances. Again.” And wearying routines.

“So what the fuck?”

“Your father was very clear that I should clamp down on drunkenness.” Not to mention rigid hierarchy.

“The little people, you dumb shit, not me. My father’s going to hear about this. He is going to hear about this.”

Hugo would’ve liked nothing better than to go back upstairs and leave Konrad raging, but that would’ve been petty. Small people cannot afford to act small, Mother was always telling him. He finally found the right key and offered it up to the lock. “I’m Constable of the Bridge, Konrad,” he said, well aware he sounded a pompous arse. “It’s my job to keep the peace on the bridge. This is my tower—”

Konrad gave an explosive snort, sending a few flecks of spit down the front of Hugo’s jacket. “Your tower? You pompous arse! You’re just squatting in it, and only ’cause no one else wants it. In the summer you live in the big solar and play at being lord of the manor, then in autumn you can’t afford to heat it so you creep into one of the little rooms under the roof and catch leaks in your piss bucket all winter long. Tell me I’m wrong!”

Perhaps it was because he was so entirely right that Hugo felt so thoroughly nettled. This upside-down excuse for a family, in which ambition is mocked, indolence is celebrated, and actually doing something is a cause for scorn. He found he’d taken a step forward, glowering down into his cousin’s face, hands on his hips. One near the mace he wore as a badge of office, its gilding nearly worn off by years dangling from various constables’ belts, the other near his dagger.

Konrad’s eyes flickered to the weapons, as if he’d realised for just an instant what thin ice he stood on. But when Hugo forbore from stabbing him or bashing his head in, his smarmy smile soon came back. With more smarm than ever. “You’ll have to apologise for this.”

“Let me see you out.” Hugo forced a smile as he turned away. If you can’t win, at least lose smiling.

“My father will make you apologise,” gloated Konrad, following him up the steps. “In front of the whole family.”

“Not for the first time.” Nor, likely, the last. The disdain of the disgusting. The contempt of the contemptible. The latest in an endless procession of humiliations—

“Or maybe your mother will have to say sorry for you?”

Hugo floated over it. He let it pass. When it came to letting things pass, he was the master.

“…if you can drag her out of that pit of hers—”

“Fuck you!” snarled Hugo, spinning around and giving Konrad a shove.

He lurched back, missed the step behind him with his fishing foot. He clutched for the handrail—but that was the missing section.

His head hit the steps behind with a crunch.

He rolled, bounced, flopped down, and sprawled at the bottom on his face.

There was silence.

Hugo stood frozen, waiting for Konrad to pick himself up.

But he did no such thing.

One foot was still on the bottom step, turned sideways, trouser leg rucked up below his knee, a length of pale, hairy calf showing.

“Konrad?” wheedled Hugo.

No response. He eased down the steps, almost tiptoeing for some reason, thumbs and forefingers pressed daintily together, like a burglar crossing someone’s bedroom.

“Konrad?” he called again.

Still nothing. He squatted by his cousin’s head. There was no blood.

“Konrad!” he bellowed.

He caught Konrad under the shoulder and heaved him over. He had one eye open, one eye closed, and there was something distinctly not right about the way his head flopped bonelessly to one side.

“Oh.” Hugo put the back of his hand to his mouth. “Oh shit.”

He was no physician. Much to Mother’s constant disappointment. But he was reasonably sure his cousin was dead.

Hugo clasped his hands against the back of his head, fingers tangled in his hair. Oh shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit—

Which was when the idea struck him.

He bolted up the steps three at a time, stuck his head through the doorway, and glanced out onto the bridge. The mist was thinning, the buildings at each end taking shape, the damp on the steep slate roofs gleaming in the morning sun.

But the place was deserted. For once my luck is in.

He bolted the door and bounded back down, making sure to avoid that fateful missing handrail. He squatted beside Konrad, slid out his dagger, and got to work.

It was a lot harder than you’d think. The skin on Konrad’s forehead kept wobbling around, Hugo hadn’t bothered to sharpen his dagger in months, and his efforts quickly produced a quite shocking amount of blood. He was running with sweat when he finally finished but, sponging the wounds clean with one of the tails of Konrad’s shirt, he was actually rather pleased with the results.

A ring of arcane-looking symbols chiselled into Konrad’s forehead. Witch’s work, if ever there was any.

The one window was rusted solid but he finally managed to lever the bolt back, plant one boot on the wall, and heave the grate shrieking open. The White Elster was running high after the recent rains, a mass of foamy driftwood clogged about the base of Heinrich’s Tower.

Hugo stepped back to consider Konrad’s corpse. Then the narrow window. Then the question on which his escaping the noose very likely now turned. Will one fit through the other? But to drag the bastard up the steps and over the side of the bridge, as the mist burned off and the chances of traffic grew ever higher… He pictured himself cheerily greeting a passer-by, forelock stuck to his fixed grin with sweat as he struggled to roll his cousin’s corpse over the parapet. Safe to say, far from ideal.

Hugo bent and, for the first time in his life, gave his cousin a tight embrace. Konrad wasn’t a big man. But, sweet Saviour, the weight! Hugo groaned as he worked the bastard’s shoulders onto the window sill, carved forehead leaving a bloody smear on the stone. He tried to shift his grip, fumbled Konrad’s belt and they went down together like a pair of drunks after a day-long bender.

“God damn it,” snarled Hugo, slithering from under Konrad’s corpse. He had to stop himself giving the bastard a kick, which really would’ve shown no class. Always show class, his mother would say, not for the audience, but for oneself.

Still, a corpse proved to be a hard thing to dispose of classily. He caught Konrad under the rib cage from behind and heaved him up, every muscle trembling. He would’ve gasped out a prayer, but had no idea who the patron saint of disposing of your dead cousin might be. Hugo wriggled Konrad forward, shoving with his hips. The dead man’s head finally flopped through the window, but his shoulders stuck in the embrasure. Hugo grunted and growled as he shoved at his cousin’s backside with all his strength—

Knock, knock.

Hugo froze, the breath stopped dead in his throat.

Knock, knock, knock. Again, even louder.”

“God damn it…” he mouthed, in sweaty disbelief. I can go weeks without one visitor but now someone comes calling?

At the top of the steps, he saw the door’s handle turn.

“Konrad? Konrad, are you down there?” God, it was Wolfgang, one of Konrad’s older, meaner, and considerably more dangerous brothers. For an instant, Hugo wondered how he’d try to explain this, if the old bolt failed and the door flew open. Wolfgang! Just pelvic thrusting your brother’s carcass into the river. Care to lend a hand… ?

“Hugo? Are you in there, Hugo, you cock and balls?” The door rattled once more and Hugo winced, sweat tickling his scalp… but then it was still.

He returned to the task with a vengeance, starting to work Konrad’s shoulders through the frame. Every time he shoved, he made the ugliest groan, like a sheep giving birth. He paused to wipe his forehead and was baffled to find the groan continued.

To his disbelieving horror, he saw Konrad’s leg weakly kick.

“God damn it,” whispered Hugo. The bastard’s still alive! Should he drag him back in? And what? Apologise? Sorry about pushing you down the stairs, Konrad. Apologies for cutting runes into your forehead, Konrad. Please don’t mention this to your father, Konrad.

Hugo set his jaw. The selfish bastard ruined my morning, I flatly refuse to let him ruin my life!

“Fuck you, Konrad!” he snarled, spraying spit. “Fuck you and your whole fucking family!” Immediate family, obviously. “Get out of the fucking—”

With a ripping of cloth Konrad’s shoulders tore through the window and the rest of him slithered after. Hugo had been pushing so hard he almost followed him, catching his shoulder painfully on the frame.

He watched Konrad bounce from the sloping masonry at the base of the tower and splash into the water with a conspicuous fountain of spray. He bumped against the stone for a moment, his big flouncy shirt ballooning around him, but soon enough he rolled, took on water, and with a last few bubbles, sank from sight.

Hugo ducked inside. Heaved the window squealing shut. Dropped down, back against the wall, almost holding his breath. The mist was nearly cleared now, the rising sun shining brightly. Could that possibly have gone unnoticed? He had to remind himself of the utter obliviousness of the vast majority of humanity. A beacon of hope to cling to in dark times, indeed.

He mopped down the blood on floor and windowsill. He checked Konrad’s cell, and emptied the piss-bucket down the drain. He glanced about the jail from the bottom of the stairway, and was satisfied the place looked no more shambolic than usual.

He took a moment to compose himself. It is essential, among any company, to look one’s best. He reached for the latch, then paused. I’m not a criminal. I’m not a murderer. I’m Hugo von Klotz, the future Margrave of Zeitz! Should he ease open the door and peer out like a nervy conspirator? No. He shouldered through and strolled down the tower’s passageway as he always did, stepping into the sun on the southern stretch of the bridge with his habitual grin.

Which showed great forethought, as someone was at that very moment coming the other way, from the direction of the market. A milkmaid, a quantity of sweaty blonde curls spilling from under her cap, a yoke with two full buckets over her shoulders.

Hugo licked a finger and made sure his forelock was neatly flicked. Traditions and routines, traditions and routines.

“Shaping up to be a lovely morning!” he called, and she gave him a shy smile back. Quite the pretty thing, in a pudding-y sort of way. Hugo watched her pass, appreciating how a few stray bits of straw moved on the seat of her dress. A lovely, entirely ordinary morning, with no corpses in the river at all.

Hugo’s elbows found those familiar little dips in the parapet, and he tipped his face towards the sun. I’ll visit the joiner later about getting that handrail fixed. His heart had been pounding, but now it was settling, and he was starting to actually feel rather good about himself. After all. It’s not as if I never killed one of my cousins before…

Joe Abercrombie was born in Lancaster, England, studied psychology at Manchester University, and worked as an editor of documentaries and live music before his first book, The Blade Itself, was published in 2006. Two further installments of the First Law trilogy, Before They Are Hanged and Last Argument of Kings, followed, along with three standalone books set in the same world: Best Served Cold, The Heroes, and Red Country. He has also written the Shattered Sea trilogy for young adults, the Age of Madness trilogy for old adults, and Sharp Ends, a collection of short stories. He lives in Bath, England, with his wife and three children. The Devils is his thirteenth novel.