History Literature / TheBlackCompany

The completed series currently consists of ten books, divided into three smaller collections:

** ''Port of Shadows'' (2018)

** ''The Silver Spike'' (1989) (side story that takes place roughly at the same time as ''Shadow Games''. Wraps up events in the North.)

* Not yet published:

** ''A Pitiless Rain''

Not to be confused with ''VideoGame/BattlefieldBadCompany''.

In 2004, Creator/GreenRonin published an RPG book based on the series for the UsefulNotes/D20System as part of the Mythic Vistas series.

* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: Croaker freely admits in ''The Black Company'' that "the gods know the Black Company are no cherubim. But there ''are'' limits." This is right before Raven puts arrows into two friendlies (part of the Lady's regular army) for gang-raping a nine-year-old girl. Later in the same book the company itself commits the mass rape of female prisoners after a surprise raid on an enemy camp caught the local AmazonBrigade off guard.
* Really700YearsOld: Lady and Soulcatcher both look to be in their early twenties, if not a little younger--but they were both sealed into the Barrow Lands 400 years before the story even started.

* FiveManBand: After the shakeups in the villainous lineup in the ''Books of the North'' and ''Books of the South'', one emerges in the ''Books of Glittering Stone''.
** BigBad - Longshadow
** TheDragon - [[spoiler:Mogaba]]
** TheEvilGenius - [[spoiler:The Howler]]
** TheBrute - [[spoiler:Narayan Singh]]
** TheDarkChick - The Daughter of Night

** This is the common response to Lady's [[KillEmAll solution to Taglios' problem of being paralyzed by three religions' worth of antagonistic priests.]]

* KillEmAll: Though only at a few key points in the series.

* AluminiumChristmasTrees: "Tonk" is a very real card game, a DeepSouth variant of five-card rummy with a somewhat different scoring system, that still maintains some popularity in black communities there.

* EvilTowerOfOminousness: The Black Castle in Juniper and nobody quite knows where it came from or what's inside. Legend holds that it started as a black stone found next to a dead man and it killed the first who touch it. It's been growing over the centuries, and nobody's quite sure why. [[spoiler:It's a magical construct sent out by the Dominator, and it's built up with the bodies of the dead. It's fueling the illegal body trade in Juniper by buying up the dead, and the living for the particularly ruthless. If it reaches "critical mass", it'll act as a gateway which could let him out]].

** The Limper takes this UpToEleven. While initially exhibiting a slight handicap [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin as his name suggests,]] he keeps sustaining greater and greater injury without really slowing down. It's mentioned in the course of ''The Silver Spike'' that he is likely the single most powerful being in the North--despite being a severed head mounted onto an artificial body.

** Stormshadow takes this UpToEleven. She goes by Stormshadow in the South, which is itself a cover for [[spoiler:Stormbringer,]] a ''different'' nickname she was known by in the North [[spoiler:when she was one of the Ten Who Were Taken]].

* UpToEleven: Pretty much everything about the Limper. He is portrayed as the most vicious, most unstoppable, most driven, and most selfish of the Taken, as well as demonstrating the most raw sorcerous might. In ''Water Sleeps,'' he is referred to as malevolence personified.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: Justified and played with in the early books. Some named character appear in one or two chapters and then are never mentioned again, not even when it becomes obvious [[RedShirt they have died]]. Some important characters whose name comes up later are suggested to have been there since the beginning.

* AdultFear: ''Bleak Seasons'' deals with much deeper, more personal tragedy than most other books in the series. Where the previous books were about combating various {{Evil Sorcerer}}s through strength and guile, ''Bleak Seasons'' deals with a handful of Company mainstays struggling against famine, disease, and treachery from their [[FallenHero traitorous commander]].

* SerialEscalation: The first book has the Company pitted against well-equipped rebels. By the third, the Company is facing down TheEmpire and then forced into an EnemyMine scenario with the same against The Dominator, the BiggerBad of the series thus far. By the end of the fourth book, the Company is building a national army to clash against another national army. By the end of the series, the Company is engaged in a three-way battle with the world's most powerful sorcerer (who has both of the aforementioned nation's militaries at her side, if somewhat reluctantly) and a PhysicalGod.

* {{Interquel}}: ''Port of Shadows'' takes place after the battle of Charm but before the Company deserts the Lady's empire, approximately between ''The Black Company'' and ''Shadows Linger.'' It was published 18 years after the books it resides between.

* {{Asexuality}}: As a result of [[RapeAsBackstory being raped by his uncles in his youth]], Sleepy has no interest in sex. There are rumors that Sleepy may have slept with close friend Willow Swan, but Sleepy adamantly denies them (though Croaker thinks that it may have happened only once or twice, judging by Sleepy's reaction to [[spoiler:news of Swan's death]]).