Whoa...!
I just read the first two ~150pp tomes, and was thoroughly blown away by how much better this series was than I was expecting.
For the record, the artist "Crom" is an Englishman, and the writer, I must admit... evidently American. Still, I think the sidebar addresses this kind of situation fairly well!
Right then, our main characters begin as "Bianca," and her forge-master "Thonir," who unknown to her happens to be her own uncle. He's of a parallel race to man, who have a special ability for forging, creating artifacts out of gems & special ores, and even harnessing magic to some extent. But he's decided to shield young Bianca from almost all of that, plus much of their family history, thinking it temporarily for the best.
Here's a sketch-sheet of these two:
https://i.imgur.com/8TauJOV.jpeg
(true confessions: she vaguely reminds me of the wonderful "Nimona" character)
Now, one of Bianca's favorite getaways from laborious forge-work is in visiting the ruins of Feather Hill, which was completely decimated by the regional wizard-lich for refusing to ally with him, formerly.
Here's the moment Bianca first discovers the "Birdking's" decrepit remains:
https://i.imgur.com/N503TMh.jpeg
I don't want to give too much way here, but the Birdking is not nearly as 'finished' as he looks right there, which might remind some American fans of Walt Simonson's cool "Undead Thor" series.
But actually, these tomes mostly remind me on the whole of two other classics: Jeff's Smith's Bone and the absolutely ingenious (but tragically shortened) Ogre Gods.
Oh, and here's one last little sketch I liked, vaguely Mayan-style or something?
https://i.imgur.com/uZTM7fo.jpeg
Anyway, here's 16 more pages from the first book to look at:
https://www.bedetheque.com/serie-87921-BD-Birdking.html
