"Heed my last word, Destroyer. You will never be free of us. No matter in what realm we exist at the end of this day, you will not escape the destiny we designed for you. You are our instrument. Our Fourth. Every human soul - mundane or Dar'Nethi - will curse the day you first drew breath."

Fear of the Lords' curse was only one reason Gerick never intended to return to Avonar. Five years after the end of the war, the Dar'Nethi still revile the young Fourth Lord and are happy to believe him dead. And in his own realm of the Bounded, he can forget the past and refuse the unsavory temptations of sorcery. But when tragic family business takes Gerick back to his father's world, he is asked to investigate a woman from the desert - the charismatic D'Sanya, D'Arnath's own daughter so she claims, held captive for a thousand years. Tangled in bonds of love, family, memory, and guilt, Gerick sets out to unravel the mysteries of ancient kings, ancient evil, and the dreadful truth of his own destiny.