At the Feet of the Sun (Lays of the Hearth-Fire Book 2)

A continuation from where The Hands of the Emperor left off, this book is a sheer delight to read (and re-read!). Follow your idealistic, pragmatic secretary (shh, he's "just" a secretary! Despite all his ambitions! -- they say this while he heads the world government (which btw, he brokered that treaty, too)) Kip Mdang as he fights to free his beloved Radiancy from the chains of an Empire that seems not to have totally died despite the Fall a millenium ago. Alas, that this paragraph is full of spoilers that you prooobably have to have read Hands first to (maybe) catch, but yes, there be spoilers here. This book is a sprawling adventure rooted in duty and love -- it's not necessary to have read all of Goddard's other 9 Worlds books & short stories first, but if you read any of them it will only enrich your experience (and you can read them after if you don't get to them before!). Kip is holding down the fort of the world government as Viceroy so the Last Emperor can find an heir (but not for the Empire). Cliopher, Kip, His Radiancy's Kip, even, is in for a wild ride as he suffers realizations and walks into legends--and yet even legends bear heartache and upset (and later reconciliations). Can he find his favorite poet, trapped in an oubliette in the Palace of Stars, and free him, too, before the tale is done?