The first story, The City in Shadows, after the initial three took Peregrine and Blade to a new part of the world – the deserts. I like deserts, and stories and settings that take place in them, like Dune and Dark Sun. I also visit them a fair bit in my stories, but this is the first time I took Peregrine and Blade into them.

There was, once again, some DNA that came from other stories; you might be able to pick which Conan stories inspired it, in parts.

But this story sends the duo off on mercenary work for the first time, though one that didn’t quite work out, and also continued to expand more on the history of the setting, and of the world in general.