King of Scars

King of Scars is a fantasy novel by the Israeli-American writer Leigh Bardugo, published in 2019 by Imprint. It is the first half of a duology and a continuation of her Grishaverse, which began with the Shadow and Bone trilogy and continued with Six of Crows.

Ravka is the country at the centre of the series, and after its civil war it is left with empty coffers, a much reduced army and unfriendly neighbours. Nikolai Lantsov, who had the reputation of being able to manage the impossible, is now the king trying to rebuild it, and he has been left with something the Darkling put inside him that he cannot control. The novel is told in the third person from three directions at once: Nikolai and Zoya Nazyalensky in Ravka, and Nina Zenik, who is in Ketterdam and who is smuggling Grisha out of the country that hunts them. Bardugo moves between the three, so the political problem, the supernatural one and the work of rescue are told alongside each other.

The duology concludes with Rule of Wolves, and both books pick up characters from the earlier two series rather than starting a new cast.