The Lost Puzzler (Tarakan Chronicles, 1) [Kless, Eyal]

More than a hundred years have passed since the Catastrophe brought humanity to the brink of extinction. Those who survived are changed. The Wildeners have reverted to the old beliefs--but with new Gods--while others place their faith in the technology that once powered their lost civilization. In the mysterious City of Towers, the center of the destroyed Tarakan empire, a lowly scribe of the Guild of Historians is charged with a dangerous assignment. He must venture into the wilds beyond the glass and steel towers to discover the fate of a child who mysteriously disappeared more than a decade before. Born of a rare breed of marked people, this child, Rafik--known as "the Key"--was one of a special few with the power to restore this lost civilization to glory once again. In a world riven by fear and violence, where tattooed mutants, manic truckers, warring guilds, and greedy mercenaries battle for survival, Rafik may have single-handedly destroyed humanity's only chance for salvation--unless the scribe can figure out what happened to him.