THE BATTLE OF EVERNIGHT

Final installment in the trilogy (The Lady of the Sorrows, 2002, etc.) set against a British/Irish myth/folklore backdrop. The war between the immortals High King Angavar and Prince Morragan continues; they and their retinues can’t return to the Fair Realm until they discover the location of the last remaining gate. Following yet another confusing change of name, Tahquil (a.k.a. Ashalind, Rohain, etc.) has recovered her memory; she does know the location of the gate—she hid inside it while a thousand years passed—and hopes to stop the war by sending the antagonists home. Somehow, though, she can't quite recall the gate's exact location. Still, with her companions, young Caitri and the maid Viviana, she must search—while Morragan's agents search for her. A couple hundred pages’ worth of travelogue later, Morragan grabs Caitri and Viviana, and Tahquil, too, when she goes to rescue them from Morragan's enchanted castle in Evernight. But Morragan can't force his way past the barrier in her mind, and he's too much of a gentleman to torture her. Tahquil realizes, though, that Angavar, whose armies press ever closer, is not only her beloved, Thorn, but King-Emperor James, the supposedly mortal ruler of Erith! There will be a showdown between Angavar and Morragan, and Tahquil will find . . . not what she hopes or expects.

Beneath the padding, overblown prose, and interminable description, a genuinely moving tragedy sometimes glimmers through. Would that Dart-Thornton had simply let her characters find their way. Still, fans of the previous shouldn't be disappointed.