What if you held the fate of the world in your hands, but you had no idea? When a mysterious woman helps Cary Walker escape from a team of kidnappers, he is thrown into a world of ancient secrets, reincarnation, grave robbers and oaths from beyond the borders of time. With the help of Ally Profett, a member of a secret society known as the Namayan, Cary embarks on a journey to recover the last remaining threads of his unraveling sanity, and to stay alive. Ally and Cary flee to Washington, D.C., then to Tampa's Ybor City, and finally they return to Cary's home in the Black Mountains of North Carolina. Can the pair keep one perilous step ahead of the cold, efficient killers hunting them? Long ago, before time was time, when the Black Mountains were but children, a young woman pledged a sacred vow of protection. Now that promise has come due. Who will step forward to keep it?