The Tongue-Reader of Saltreach

About this book

In the salt town of Saltreach, nobody argues with salt. A grain of oath-salt on the tongue, one question, and a liar's tongue turns black before the whole Assize. Black tongues hang on the seventh morning. Hollis Wake read tongues for eleven years before he walked away and took up mending packsaddles. Now the Wychwarden has been found drowned at the foot of the Sour Well stairs, his apprentice Wenna Harrow has failed her salting, and she has named Hollis to speak for her. He read her mother's tongue nineteen years ago and watched her hang. He knows something about the salt that the Assize does not. With six days, one oath to call, and a town that trusts salt over reason, Hollis must find out what really happened in the well-house before the rope finds Wenna.