A recognized master fantasist, Tanith Lee has won multiple awards for her craft, including the British Fantasy Award, the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement, and the Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime Achievement in Horror. The fourth installment in Lee’s breathtaking series, Tales from the Flat Earth, Delirium’s Mistress returns to a shadowy and mythic world where demons battle for dominion, and the fate of mankind is shaped by the whims of capricious and volatile beings. Beneath the mortal realm of the Flat Earth, demons lurk. But Azhriaz—daughter of the mortal priestess Dunizel and the demon known as Night’s Master, Azhrarn—bridges these two worlds, a being of both light and darkness. Raised on an isolated isle in the demons’ realm of Underearth, guarded and hidden away from demon and mortal alike, Azhriaz was meant to sleep forever, never knowing the world outside her dreams. But other forces in the Underearth are moving to wake Azhriaz. Prince Chuz, the demon known as Delusion’s Master, has made an enemy of Azhrarn, after his betrayal cost Dunizel her life. Chuz seeks out Azhriaz’s island, drawn by her latent power and entranced by her beauty. To release Azhriaz from her eternal slumber, Chuz must create the grandest illusion he has ever rendered. If he succeeds, Azhriaz will be reborn as Delirium’s Mistress, a sorcerous of extraordinary power. Perhaps even more powerful than Azhrarn himself.... Delirium's Mistress in the fourth book in the Flat Earth sereies. Praise for Delirium’s Mistress : “[ Delirium’s Mistress ] contains all of Lee’s inimitable, rich inventiveness and language , and is unlikely to disappoint her fans.”— Booklist “Here still is all the rich poetry, voluptuousness, and wicked lemon-sweet humor that this great British authoress is known and appreciated for.” — British Fantasy Society Bulletin “Tanith Lee has a private window into another world. That’s the only possible explanation for the inventiveness of [Tales from the Flat Earth]… all told with a degree of wit and humor rarely attempted in fantasy fiction, and even more rarely achieved.” — S.F. Chronicle “The prose in Delirium’s Mistress is as luxuriant as ever , imparting some of the qualities of a fever dream.”— Fantasy Review “These tales embody a unique blend of magical imagery, metaphysical vision, and psychological insight into the hinterland of the human (and not-so-human) soul.”— Phoenix “ Sensuous, decadent , Beckford-like fantasies, these tales focus on the Arabian Nights-style adventures of various Lords of Darkness, mages, poets, witch-queens, and priestesses.” — Book World Tanith Lee is one of the leading fantasy authors working today. She has written over 50 novels and short story collections, among them the bestselling Flat Earth Series. She has won the World Fantasy Award numerous times as well as the August Derleth Award. Chapter 1 It was dusk, and for a while the young man seated on the high roof gazed up into the great sloping dome of sky. Then he read aloud from his book: “Blue as the dark blue eyes of my beloved, the twilight fills all heaven. The stars put on their silver dresses and they are fair, but none as fair as she.” His companions lay on their elbows and looked at him, quizzically. He shut the book and said, “Love, too, is simple madness.” At which they made wild gestures of dismissal. “Love does not exist. ‘Love’ is the name women, and their wretched old fathers, put on the trap of a ring.” “Love is lust. Why make songs about an itch?” The first young man smiled. He was unusually handsome, pale, very fair, with beautiful eyes the color of low-burning lampshine. In repose, there was a sweetness to him. With sweet melancholy, he sighed. “Ah, poor thing,” they said. “What troubles him this evening, our Oloru?” Oloru said, “An answer, which has no question.” “A riddle!” cried the other young men. They grinned and shouted: “Make us laugh, Oloru.” And all at once the eyes of Oloru glittered like the eyes of a night-hunting fox. He sprang to his feet, curled over, next dropped in a ball, next lifted his whole body straight in the air, supporting himself by one hand, palm down, on the roof. Then he began, on this one hand, to hop about, crying out all the while in a raucous irritated voice: “Oh, how tiresome this is. You would think by now the gods could have invented a better way for a man to travel.” The companions, duly diverted, laughed, applauded, and called the entertainer names. Oloru went on hopping, though one of his fine silk gloves was by now probably quite ruined. He hopped to the western parapet, and here his slim upside-down body wavered, so the stars seemed juggled between his feet. “Behold,” said Oloru, “here the sun fell over.” And he toppled sideways through blue dusk and stars, and right across the parapet, and vanished. The remaining young men on the tavern roof leapt to their feet with yells of horror, upsetting wine jars and other parap