Rod Duncan

Tattoos are the only law on the Island of the Free, and there can never be a king. Every clan agrees on that. But a returning exile has smuggled something across the water that could destroy the old ways. Elias wants revenge on the men who severed his oaths and made him an outlaw....

Elizabeth Barnabus lives a double life - as herself and as her brother, the private detective. She is trying to solve the mystery of a disappearing aristocrat and a hoard of arcane machines. In her way stand the rogues, freaks, and self-proclaimed alchemists of a travelling circus....

The year is 2012. The nations of the world are bound together in an alliance of collective security, overseen by the International Patent Office and its ruthless stranglehold on technology....