Rathka is a grief-hardened orphan leading a band of runaways-turned-thieves in an ancient desert oasis. For years, she has suppressed nightmares of her mother's murder in order to take care of her adopted siblings, but the invasion of a murderous mage and his army threatens to undo the life she has built for herself.
The Band is the only family that Dar knows. As Rathka's Second, he takes himself with tempering her fiery nature. However, as war on their small corner of the world becomes unavoidable, he starts to fear that none of them will make it out unbroken, let alone alive.