Book One of The Long Ledger

What Is Owed

Name: What Is Owed
Author: Chris Kwasny

by Chris Kwasny · Barking Goat Press

Four coppers, his father's axe, and a job that closed when the Baron went missing and the forest started killing men.

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The ledger so far

OWED

PAID

Owed
Passage across the sea to Urdas.
Paid
Six days splitting galley wood, and the news that he was not made for the sea.
Owed
Work in the timber country of the Emerald Forest.
Paid
The cut is closed. The only work left is going into the forest after the people it takes.
Owed
Ten silver each, to bring a woman out of the spiders' wood.
Paid
She came out alive. The Baron of Ashlem did not.
Owed
Not yet
Paid
Seventy-five gold and a ten-sided ring, for carrying a locked box down a hill.

What it is about

Haldyr Rovan reached Ashlem with four coppers, his father's axe, and a fortnight too late: the timber cut had closed when their Baron went missing and the forest started killing men.

So he took the next job on offer. Ten silver each to go into the Emerald Forest after a woman who went in for mushrooms two days ago and did not come out. Four strangers signed up with him.

They brought her out alive. They also found the Baron of Ashlem, a week dead at the back of a cave, wrapped in silk, with three wounds under his ribs that no spider made.

Now the town is frightened, and a frightened town wants somebody.

Haldyr has left every place he ever stood in before anyone could ask him to stay. This time, leaving is going to cost him, and somebody is keeping count.

For readers who like their fantasy grim and honest, in a world that feels lived in.

How it begins

“The arrow came back to his cheek and stopped there.”

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Where it stands

Drafted
Copyedited
Cover
Finished
Proofs
In shops

Finished 29 September 2026. Proofs next.

Coming in paperback and ebook, with an audiobook planned. The release date goes to the list first.

Chris Kwasny ran the table this story was played at, for five years. About the author →

Pass it on

“It's about a man who always leaves for a reason: first his home, then a town that wants somebody to blame, and last a road that costs more than it should.”

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The mailing list hears first: the early chapters, the cover, a date, and now and then a place from the road that did not fit in the book. Leave any time.