Six months after helping win a bloody revolution, mercenaries Victoria Belltower and Samantha Redwyne find themselves working freelance on the road. But old ties are hard to break. They receive a letter from their former employer with dire news: Punkin—friend, thief, and strange young woman—is missing. Cryptic clues lead Victoria and Samantha to the bustling desert city of Al-Haumarune, where they learn there is more to Punkin's past life than she ever let on. The city has unsettling secrets, with stories of disappearing people, knives in the shadows, and a sinister group gathering power behind the scenes. There's a darkness in the City of a Thousand Cults, and if Victoria wants to find her missing friend, she'll have to embrace it—and face the darkness in the mirror as well. She Courts Darkness is the second novel in the Bartram's Maw series, following the events of She Topples Giants.