This month we will spotlight one of the worlds of Gatemaker and provide a little insight into the history and importance of that world. This is the final spotlight in the Gatemaker press cycle. Starting in September, look forward to short stories and preview information for Book 2 of the Spiralchain: Mindshaper!

Onus is the fourth world in the Spiral of Worlds, and is often represented with the color orange in symbolic representations. Onus is considered the linchpin or hub of the Spiral, as it is from here that the Gatemakers originated, and it is only through the travels of the Order of Gar that knowledge was ever spread between the worlds.

Onus is a world at the height of medieval society, with each of its two vast continents dominated by a collection of city-states that interact together through a loose-knit alliance of leaders known as the Council. The city-states of Onus are each dominated by a single mighty city, named for the ruling bloodline of that city.

Onus also featured, at one time, the great academies of the Arts of Onus, places of learning and study where the mystic orders honed their skills and talents.

For centuries, the people of Onus engaged in trade and travel with the other worlds of the Spiral, in particular Depal, Arctos, Murrod, and Pithysia. Travel to Nur was too perilous, to Core was forbidden, and to Rettik was impossible. When the edict came down that travel between the worlds must end, and that the Orders must go into hiding, society quickly forgot the splendors of its cosmopolitan place in the universe–war overtook everything.

The decades-long war with Hyrak, which started in the less populous parts of the southern continent and then inexorably spread more and more northward towards the seat of Council authority near Rega Holc, changed everything for Onus. The people learned to live without the magic that had been so common in their lives before, and they learned to live in fear of an implacable, unyielding enemy.

But the greatest weapon of Onus had always been the prophecies of the Wyr, the Fatewakers, and those prophecies promise the survival of the world and the return to the glory of lost days. It all begins with the youngest of the Wyr and a fallen Gar, but where it ends even the prophecies do not know.

The Spiral of Worlds is Breaking, and the world of Onus may yet hold the solution.

Onus is one of three worlds featured in Gatemaker, on sale now!