Can the youngest son of a noble house save his family from a plot generations in the making? Crispin Marlowe grew up in his brothers shadow, but Hadrian is gone, and his grandmother the Duchess of Delosis dying. Answering her summons, Crispin takes off on what should be a routine flight to the ducal palace from the castle at Devils Rest. But he is flying into a trap. There are whispers of treachery among the duchess's many daughters, rumors of hidden knives in the planets court if he can even make it there. With no one coming to save him and only his sister, Sabine, and a few injured guardsmen to protect him, House Marlowe's least famous son must make his heroic stand, and contend not only the foes arrayed against his house, but with the cultists who dwell in the mountains above his family's ancestral home.