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The Element of Fire
by Martha Wells
Introduction
The Element of Fire was my first novel, written around 1990, when I was 26. It was published in hardcover in 1993 and paperback in 1994, by Tor Books. It was published in Italy in 1995, Russia in 1997, Poland in 1998, in France, by l'Atalante, in 2002, and will be published in Spanish by Bibliopolis. It was a finalist for the 1993 Compton Crook/Stephen Tall Award and a runner-up for the 1994 Crawford Award. And it's almost impossible to find in the US, so I'm posting it here.
It was the first Ile-Rien book, before I knew there were going to be any other Ile-Rien books. Since then Vienne, altered by time, war, and general rough usage, has been a setting for The Death of the Necromancer (nominated for the Nebula Award in 1998 and also becoming impossible to find in the US) and The Wizard Hunters, The Ships of Air, and The Gate of Gods, available in paperback from HarperCollins. Kade Carrion also appears in the short story "The Potter's Daughter" in the anthology Elemental, edited by Steve Savile and Alethea Kontis, published in 2006 by Tor Books.
The text posted here does not match the original US edition; I've edited it to make the prose a little smoother and more in line with my current style, but haven't made any substantial changes to plot, storyline, characterization, or anything else.
The Element of Fire
by Martha Wells
And New Philosophy calls all in doubt,
The Element of fire is quite put out;
The Sun is lost, and th'earth, and no man's wit
Can well direct him where to looke