Query - King's Mark (revised)

Click here to read the original query.

Hi all! Someone suggested I try the query from one of my other POV characters. Since it's an epic fantasy, I just happen to have 3 of equal weight to choose from. Here's a completely different query for the same book. Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

Chay isn’t blind; he’s just pretending to be. Some street flies fake disabilities to earn sympathy and extra coin, but that’s not why Chay took up the blindfold. He did it to hide the birthmarks that identify him as the lowliest scum in the city – a Marked, servant to the absent King. If he slips up and someone realizes what he is, he’ll be starved, tortured, and killed as a traitor.

Chay will do anything to protect his family of guttersnipes, from taking a beating to blackmailing a member of the Broken Court, the city’s underground society. His super-human intuition usually warns him of trouble before it arrives and keeps him one step ahead of his enemies, but it can’t protect him from his own bad choices.

When Chay picks a fight with a rival in order to protect a new find, it escalates and triggers the deeper magic lying dormant within him. Although he struggles to remain free, Chay knows it’s only a matter of time before he’s caught – but he doesn’t expect to be betrayed by one of his own in return for food and safety for the rest of the ring.

Luckily for Chay, his captor is a rebel leader who has no interest in dealing with the authorities. Instead, he wants to use Chay’s newfound powers as a rallying point for his insurgency.

Chay finds he has talent and passion for stirring up trouble. He sets out to make a better world, because though he’s angry with his traitorous friend, he’s furious with society itself. But the government is the least of his worries – another enemy hides in plain sight, and the rebellion is playing right into her hands.

KING’S MARK, complete at 90,000 words, is a stand-alone epic fantasy with room for a sequel. Additional material is available upon request.

Thank you for your time and consideration (and thanks again everybody here at PQS)