Balin's World

A prince who spent a difficult period as a frog sets out to confront the ogress who enchanted him. Along the way he is joined by a girl who wanted to become a witch. She discovered after meeting one she is meant to become much more than that. They are joined by the world's oldest magician, a knight who is much less and much more than he appears to be, a man who makes things that have never been made before, a one-eyed former soldier who can see the future, and a talking bird who sometimes makes sense. The ogress senses trouble is coming but she is not terribly worried. She has both magic and a band of pirates on her side.

Spells fly as wizards clash in a forest where even trees possess magic. A wandering witch, rudely interrupted in her efforts to make a home for herself in the woods, joins the fray. So does a wood nymph, determined to defend her threatened friends: the trees. In the middle of it all, a shapeshifter lurks. Its motives are unclear but it leaves destruction in its trail. It all begins at a country inn where bad things have happened and the witch, wizard and wood nymph first meet. Their efforts to restore order are complicated by uncomfortable encounters in such places as a magic library that might not have any doors and a mine where a magician is trying to transmute a base metal into.