Dave Duncan handful of men.
About a stableboy turned king of a small fishing village who was once a sorcerer and a god. There is a new evil sorcerer who threatens to enslave all the magic users and take over the world. King rap has to tour the world to enlist other free magic users in an opposing army versus the evil guy. His family wife son and daughter run into mishaps and try to help the king to enlist other sorcerers. His wife is friends with the imperor (Shandie) and the imperor is missing. The imps wife is threatened by one of the courier employees who wants to woo her. She thinks her husband is dead. The princess is friends with a magic pixie. The prince falls in with a ugly mofo named Thewsome who is a Viking. The queen is held captive by a Arabic king who wants to get in her pants.
The king falls in with a dude who is 5 guys stuck in one body.
In Raps house in the attic there is a mirror. You can say a code word and teleport to the Imp capital through the mirror.
The capital is like Ottawa or Washington DC it is where all the politicians live.
When Zinixo took over the capital there were two main characters. The imperor's like cousin and his wife. The real imperor and the imperor's wife were missing. So they hired the cousin and some other girl to be taking place of the imperor instead. The imperor could be dancing and making speeches. In actuality the cousin would be a gibbering mess and his hair messed up and unwashed. They had kept up the act for half a year or a year while Zinixo looked for Rap.
Rap's wife fell in with an arabic guy (like a sheik or a king) who lives in the desert. He would rape her any time he felt like it. I think rap's wife is named Inosolan. The sheik had an advisor who was a sorcerer who would take care of the sheik. The advisor said, if the sheik was a big asshole and disobeyed the advisor would take all his sorcerers one day and leave.
The magic system is that there are a total of 5 magic words you can get. If you get one word you're gifted and you are good at a particular skill. If you have 4 words you are a sorcerer. If someone tells you a word then you get it. Usually you get words from dying old people in the hospital. If you have 5 words you are a god. Nobody can hold 5 words for long. The 5 words would break your body apart and you would die in a blinding flash like the sun.
Each word of power comes from the name of a magic creature. Some words are more powerful than others if you broadcast the word to a crowd everyone gets some but then its pretty much worthless. The less people know a word the more powerful it hypothetically can be.
Years ago Master Rap (the king) used to be a very powerful sorcerer. There was a dispute with some bad guys and Rap closed the border with the faeries where the words come from. Now the bad guy (the warden's uncle) has become very powerful and there are no more new words we can get from the faerie kingdom. People blame Rap for this.
The faerie land is where you can find free magic in case something like Zinixo happened. Rap severed the link between the two planes and tossed away the key so nobody could take the faerie magic and take advantage of them. Now Rap regrets doing it.
People still think Rap is very powerful, but in fact he told all 5 of his words to his wife. His wife was so happy she yelled out all the words. Now he only has one very small word, or a pigeon sized sorcerer. The other 3 words died. So when the warden's uncle rose to power, other sorcerers thought that King Rap would show up and save them all.
There are a total of 4 wardens (powerful sorcerers) the warden of the east governs the imperor's realm.
The warden of the south is an elf who lives in a sky tree
The warden of the north is a witch named Grunth
The warden of the west is a coal miner. A troll or something. His uncle is named Zinixo (also the name of a donkey)
Every magic user has a magic signature. When you go into the virtual realm other sorcerers can see you. The more solid your image the stronger you are. So when Zinixo searches for you it looks like two big eyeballs in the sky.
Rap had been powerful at one time. He pretty much punched himself and raised a shield and removed all his own powers. Now he has no power and can't even remove his own shield. someone had took off his shield and then his wife got shared his power.
You can slave a magic user called voltaries. Of course you want to enlist other sorcerers because they are powerful.
once you get a voltary they are your slave and you can tell them to do anything you want because they love you.
You even can tell them to blow themself up and they will do it.
The warden of the west (troll miner guy) had a wife who was his voltary (she was a sailor or captain).
Rap's daughter got raped or something and she was very shy. She met a pixie girl somewhere and the pixie treated the daughter like a pet. The college of pixies killed the pixie girl's goodman (husband) and baby. The pixie girl has a very strong talent for magic. If you gave the pixie girl a word you can determine how well she would use it.
There was a gang of 4 or 5 guys. One day they decided to rob some guy's house. They didn't know that the guy was a really powerful sorcerer. In revenge the sorcerer took the leader of the gang (Thinal) and split his words of power amongst all 5 guys. One was a lover, the other a thief, the other a fighter etc. Thinal was all 5 things but when the sorcerer was done Thinal was only a thief. One of the guys was an artist. The other a politician.
The warden of the south was an elf.
Raps wife Inosolan fell in with a sheik, a king who lived in the desert. The sheik would rape Ino any time he felt like it. The sheik had an advisor who was a sorcerer. The advisor threatened the sheik that one day if the sheik was too big of an asshole the advisor would pack up all his sorcerers and leave.
Raps son fell in with a viking gang. His best friend was a cripple named Thewsome. Thewsome's brother was the leader of a viking gang. Little did we know that Thewsome was actually a very powerful sorcerer. In the viking world sorcerers had no respect. You can make yourself look like anything you want when you're a powerful sorcerer. The warden of the east was a handsome young centurion. But in fact East was an old guy.
Warden of the east had went onto the virtual space of sorcerers to proclaim Rap's mission to enlist all the sorcerers to defy Zinixo. Zinixo and his team blasted East and killed him. Whoever proclaimed Raps' mission would die or be hunted by Zinixo's team
Rap's daughter is named Kadie. Somehow she found a friendly pixie who took her under her wing. The pixie girl was pregnant with her goodman's kid. It was tested that the pixie had very high talent for magic. Then, the pixie's memory was wiped. The goodman was killed, the cabin in the woods destroyed the pixie's kid in her womb was aborted.
Everyone thought that pixies were extinct. The leader of the college of pixies moved the pixie land into an alternative plane of existence and hid the pixie land so that every time you thought of pixie land (Thume) you change the topic.
Rap actually got Thume tattooed to his arm. Everyone joked that he was Master Thume and made fun of him. He did that so that nobody could change the topic on him. He thought that there was something in Thume worth mentioning. He was right. Thume was the last hope for the survival of free sorcerers.
Rap's son went to the viking gathering that was held once a year. The son's friend Thewsome had entered a cave or an enclosed space. Every time another sorcerer came into the hut the sorcerer would get slammed and joined Thewsome.
The two who refused to join were blasted by a thunderbolt. One guy had been brought back to life.
Thewsome's brother was the leader of the ship guys. Thewsome and Rap's son were rowing a boat with these other guys.
the son was in charge of the water bottle. if a rower needed water he would gulp and the son would go over and give him water. If he gave water too late then the rower would miss a step and get punished by Thewsome's brother. The brother piloted the boat close to the rocks on purpose. He had a suspicion that Rap's son could predict the future. He could predict like 10 seconds ahead of time. Thewsome worked with the son to increase the range of the timing. Every time the boat would get close to the rocks the son would say shit.. move! and the pilot would move the boat to the other side away from danger.
At the end of the 4th book Rap had enlisted all these sorcerers and they were in a ship. The bad guy kept on punching the ship and every time the captain would move the ship and the bad guy would miss.