Elias Thorne is a Munsell—an auditor of the human soul. In the gleaming, sterile metropolis of Aethelburg, his job is to quantify emotions, ensuring that the populace remains within the safe, beige boundaries of the Concord. Here, peace is manufactured, stability is enforced, and the chaotic spectrum of human feeling is suppressed to prevent the wars that once destroyed the world. Elias is a master of the system, living a life of numb, regulated contentment.
Until he discovers Nocturne.
It appears as an anomaly in the data—a hue of profound, aching violet that defies classification. It is a color that shouldn't exist, vibrating with a sorrow so pure it threatens to shatter the city’s glass foundations. When Elias traces the signal to the forgotten, rotting Underlayers of the city, he unearths a secret the Concord has killed to the city’s tranquility is fueled by the tortured soul of a single woman.
She is Elara. The wife Elias was forced to forget.
As his memories return in a violent, colorful flood, Elias is forced to choose between the safety of his hollow existence and a dangerous rebellion. To save the woman he loves, he must become the very thing he hunted—a contagion of feeling.