Vlad stalks the rain slicked ramparts of Schoarra, a city sharply divided between magical opulence and rotting slums, where he endures the sneers of nobles who see him only as the "Mongrel Knight," a desperate brute who clawed his way into House Vayezid. Unknown to them, he is the Star-Embracing Swordmaster, a lethal guardian whose celestial blade silences the Dragons monsters the world deems myths but which he knows are waking. While he stifles the starlight in his veins to perform his mundane, chafing duty as a glorified nursemaid to the sickly Lord Josef Vayezid, the fragile peace of his double life fractures when he glimpses Jemina, a ghost from his starving childhood, slipping through the shadows to threaten the secrets he buried long ago.