Some Lessons Must Be Learned The Hard Way Since its inception, The Order has been dedicated to the prevention of the misuse and abuse of magic. For seven decades this mandate has guaranteed peace and stability throughout The Nine Kingdoms. But a potential threat to the peace has emerged, and its source is much closer to home than the leadership of The Order may realise. Arrogant, manipulative, confrontational and angry. Undesirable qualities in a person at the best of times, but more so in a young woman born with the power to bring kingdoms to their knees. Kayden Jayta, precocious apprentice of The Order, is all these things and more, yet wholly unwilling to acknowledge and rectify her many troubling traits. Unbeknown to anyone, Kayden's resolute determination to join the ranks of The Order is born of a secret that puts her priorities at odds with the precepts of the organisation; setting her, inexorably, on a collision course with the most powerful institution in The Nine Kingdoms. If Kayden is to be dissuaded from walking the path she has chosen, averting tragic consequences in the process, two unanswered questions must be answered: What is the dark secret guiding Kayden's actions? And, why has a legendary figure within The Order, with a secret of her own, taken undue interest in Kayden's future?

This book is a down-to-earth narrative by a Foreign Service officer who, over a 35-year career, participated in the birth and maturity of a world American foreign policy dealing with World War, Cold War, Mideast turbulence, and Third World development. He shows the Service facing Japanese house arrest, reporting on Axis Eastern Europe, operating in communinized Rumania, and participating in Tehran and Baghdad crises. In Washington he was in charge of Balkan affairs, led a prolonged task force during the crucial Nigerian Civil War, and helped structure our global national security operations. The book is intended for both general foreign affairs readers and courses and seminars in American foreign policy, national security policy, cold war, the Balkans, Mideast, and Africa.

From the former secretary of defense and author of the acclaimed #1 bestselling memoir, Duty, a candid, sweeping examination of power, and how it has been exercised, for good and bad, by American presidents in the post-Cold War world. Since the end of the Cold War, the global perception of the United States has progressively morphed from dominant international leader to disorganized entity. Robert Gates argues that this transformation is the result of the failure of political leaders to understand the complexity of American power, its expansiveness and its limitations. He makes clear that the successful exercise of power is not limited to the ability to coerce or demand submission, but must also encompass diplomacy, strategic communications, development assistance, intelligence, technology, and ideology. With forthright judgments of the performance of past presidents and their senior-most advisers, insightful ­firsthand knowledge, and compelling insider stories, Gates’s candid, sweeping examination of power in all its manifestations argues that U.S. national security in the future will require abiding by the lessons of the past, reimagining our approach, and revitalizing nonmilitary instruments of power essential to success and security.