The Salt Traces (Collection)
by Nathan Burrage
Style: Fantasy / Historic
Reviewed by Kathy L. Brown
An epic story of a secret society’s struggles to protect the last word artifact of energy
The 2-volume Salt Traces collection brings collectively detailed and thorough historic analysis with an imaginative supernatural fantasy story. The story is formidable, involving two plotlines that finally interweave.
In 1099, the French knight Godefroi de Bouillon leads the Christian Crusader forces to take Jerusalem from its Arabic residents. However his actual mission is a secret one: to search out and get better a mystic artifact known as “the keystone,” mentioned to be hidden within the metropolis. His group of specifically chosen and spiritually gifted companions are unexpectedly aided by their Muslim counterparts, who’ve been the artifact’s guardian till that time. And the artifact wants guardians as a result of a chaotic power goals to seize the keystone for its personal function, a objective inconsistent with human life as we all know it.
Godefroi’s get together finally solves the riddles and puzzles and overcome the bodily and emotional challenges that shield the keystone. Though the Christians prevail at nice private value, an unlooked for consequence leaves them questioning their choices. They will solely hope {that a} future technology will put issues proper. The Knights Templar are shaped to protect this artifact by way of the ages.
Simply over 200 years later, the second plotline takes up the decision of the story. The Templars are shedding their royal favor and political energy. Newly sworn knight Bertrand de Châtillon-sur-Seine finds himself fleeing the king’s forces along with his senior Templars as they guard a mysterious feminine traveler, Salome. She holds distinctive, intimate data of the highly effective artifact recovered by Godefroi. When the Templar get together is worn out, Bertrand takes up the mantle to be Salome’s protector, her “shroud.” Reluctantly, maybe, but additionally longing for journey. “He didn’t doubt that man, whoever he was, sought them at this very second. And but…hadn’t he at all times dreamed of emulating the mighty deeds of his ancestors?” Quickly Bertrand and his servant journey with Salome to Britain in hopes of discovering her final refuge.
The protagonists of each timepoints face mundane and supernatural enemies and challenges. Stakes are excessive for the characters as folks and for the world. Feminine characters are understandably few however memorable. Most spectacular is Justine, a noblewoman struggling to keep up some measure of independence in a male-dominated tradition. She is the one non-magical girl within the story and shines as a wise, robust survivor.
The books take a third-person perspective with the narrative transferring easily among the many characters. Each books alternate passages from the 2 completely different timepoint plotlines, 1099 and 1307. The story is advised in two volumes, The Hidden Keystone and The Last Shroud, breaking at a handy level, however not precisely resolving tales, subplots, or character arcs in first e book.
The worldbuilding is richly detailed and immersive, conveying convincing particulars concerning the setting, attitudes, and horrors of warfare in these historic time intervals. For instance, we first meet Godefroi on the Mount of Olives in July 1099. “Warmth shimmered above the bleached, stony floor. Godefroi de Bouillon, Duke of Decrease Lorraine, paused in his march up the steep slope…Sweat soaked his linen undergarments and the padded tunic beneath his hauberk. His blond head, uncovered as a mark of humility, felt prefer it was slowly boiling.”
Whereas epic in scope, the story focuses on the human expertise of its characters, each nobles and low-born people. My approach into the story was by way of Remi, Bertrand’s servant. He asks the questions and expresses the ideas that shall be within the reader’s thoughts.
The magical secrets and techniques of the story require a lot clarification, however the narrative normally manages to parcel out the Kabbalah lore and historic information in a fascinating, conversational method. We study simply what we have to know when we have to understand it to comply with the plot.
This collection efficiently portrays the actual human struggles and sacrifices required to make sure that larger good prevails. Readers who get pleasure from historic fantasy in a DaVinci Code vein will get pleasure from these books.
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