After more than three thousand years, a civilization launched into space due to the cataclysmic destruction of the home planet Vinge. The Alliance of Powers is now stretched to its limits. Racial tensions are high as the elitist Fingal, an aquatic race who has dominated most of the core worlds, seek to assert a divine claim of dominancy over the other two races.
Meanwhile, The Drak'or, a race characterized by their grey-black skin, have fled to the outer edges of colonized space, seeking a much simpler way of life. But lack of funding and failed terraforming efforts have caused major setbacks, and without the support of the Federation and the Empire, their Coalition seems doomed to fail.
As tensions near their breaking point, a mysterious new plague spreads through the outer colonies, killing hundreds of millions, with no hope for a cure and all attempts of quarantine failing to contain its spread. The galaxy begins to turn to the Descendants, an ancient religion dedicated to the goddess Vyanna, as a last resort.
Lieutenant Commander James Aiunys, the newest member and tactical officer of the legendary Shade's crew, is on a vital mission to deliver equipment to replace Deep Space Initiative Station 3122's failed life support.
When they are unexpectedly pulled out of hyperspace, and informed that the quarantine zone has been expanded to include the station, the mysterious Drak'or captain, who calls himself the Devil, is undeterred. In a feat that seems more like magic than science, he turns the battle on its head, defeating one of the most powerful warships in the galaxy and leaving it paralyzed in space.
When they arrive, however, the station is not what they had expected. The crew becomes concerned when they discover the station empty, an eerie resemblance to another station they had visited at the bequest of strange women with silver hair and smells of apple blossoms.
The station has been sabotaged, but by who, and for what reason? When the power core fails during their investigation, the Captain is once again forced to do the impossible, leaving James with more questions than answers. With the government collapsing into chaos the crew of the Shade find themselves on the run, caught in the middle of a sinister plot that will change the galaxy forever.
But there are darker shadows than the machinations of mortals lurking in the far corners of civilization. Brought face to face with their own humanity in a conflict older than the concepts of good and evil, they are forced to question everything they understood about themselves, religion, and even the fabric of reality that holds it all together
