The world of Santhenar lies in thrall to the maimed God-Emperor. Its people live in fear, watched unceasingly by their tyrant’s sorcerous quicksilver tears.

Yet, hidden in that cruelly abused land, there remains one glimmer of hope: the Emperor’s son Nish, incarcerated for a decade in his father’s grimmest dungeon. A beaten people see Nish as the Deliverer, who will cast down his father and end their suffering.

But Nish is faced with a harsh choice. If he joins his corrupt father, Nish will have enormous wealthand power, though at a terrible price – his soul. If he resists that temptation he has only two alternatives – to face a further ten years in prison, or join a doomed resistance movement…