Mage, Book Three: The Hero Denied #12

The penultimate issue of Matt Wagner's Mage: The Hero Denied arrives with a cover that crackles with magical menace — a bald, bearded man bearing the lightning-bolt emblem on his chest strains against a torrent of luminous green orbs swarming across a vivid purple field, his expression a mix of grit and strain. Wagner's linework gives the scene a real sense of physical and mystical pressure, with those glowing spheres pressing in from every direction as the hero fights to keep his footing. A fitting visual for a chapter whose title, borrowed from Shakespeare, promises that hardship has plenty more to teach.