Welcome to the Free Countries, a familiar world of soldiers and swords, belles and balls, manners, civility, and reverence for Earth. A totalitarian slavocracy led by the brutal Despot of Ozane now threatens the Free Country way of life. Only the martial skills of the Free Countries have, till now, deterred an invasion by the much larger armies of the Despot’s empire. It’s a stalemate, but now Gilbert, an Earthwarden, reports a terrifying new power emerging in Ozane. Could this new force break the impasse? Can the Free Countries identify and assess it in time? Edric Manxson, a Bulwark cavalry officer, has an ancestor, Sir Vendell Manx, who wielded a strange power. Has Edric inherited this trait? Could he be the one destined to oppose the new threat? Meanwhile, Earth transported Gilbert back a thousand years, where he must battle a beautiful and powerful priestess of Sol, who seeks to seduce him and steal his Earthpower…