Tobias Buckell sold “The Executioness” to Subterranean‘s Bill Schafer, via Eddie Schneider at JABberwocky. “The Executioness” will be published as a 104-page stand-alone novella in January, with an introduction by Paolo Bacigalupi, and dust jacket and interior illustrations by J.K. Drummond.
Subterranean already reports brisk pre-order sales of the $45 limited edition (limited to 300 signed, numbered, leatherbound copies). It will also be available as a $20 trade hardcover edition (see this page).
Subterranean offers this description of the story:
Magic has a price.
In Khaim, that price is your head if you’re found using it. For the use of magic comes with a side effect: it creates bramble. The bramble is a creeping, choking menace that has covered majestic ancient cities, and felled civilizations. In order to prevent the spread of the bramble, many lose their heads to the cloaked executioners of Khaim.
Tana is one of these executioners, taking the job over from her ailing father in secret, desperate to keep her family from starvation. But now her family has been captured by raiders, and taken to a foreign city.
So Khaim’s only female executioner begins a quest to bring her family back together. A bloody quest that will change lives, cities, and even an entire land, forever. A quest that will create the legend of The Executioness.