City of Desolation: The Balance of Love and Despair (The Fate of the Stone) Book

Solving The Secret of the Alchemist led Jake, Helen and her father Gerald de Havilland to the discovery of The Stone of Sorrow and a spellbinding and shocking climax in the Underground Palace in Istanbul. Now, blasted into beyond by those terrifying events, they find themselves each alone in a strange land with no clear memory of what has gone before. Two oddly familiar figures ask Jake to take a package to Helen - a simple enough task if only he could find her: but Helen, tired of the dull straight road, has turned aside into a dark wood. Meanwhile, there is revolution in the air, and Gerald de Havilland's instinct for the main chance tells him that now is the moment he could have all he ever dreamed of - if only he backs the right side. But nothing is as it seems in the Kingdom of Illusion: Jake's task becomes an epic quest to save Helen - but does she really want to be saved? And is Gerald de Havilland controlling events, or merely a pawn in others' hands, to be sacrificed when no longer of use? As the fabric of reality begins to unravel and amazing events unfold, each must travel his own path: yet all roads lead, it seems, to the City of Desolation, where the end-game is the cosmic struggle between Good and Evil.