Being empress has been anything but easy for Nevia Bylilly, who left the only life she knew as a primitive clanswoman from the northern mountains of Zenoch to immerse herself in the industrial imperial capital of Velspire. She thought her love for the young, charismatic emperor, Darius II, would be enough to sustain her, yet she didn't foresee what her life would become: shackled by her jewels and a crown, her voice silenced by customs of a patriarchal society that even Darius dares not challenge. Nevia's will is tested further when she is approached by an outlawed seer, who informs her that she must make an impossible choice to deliver the entire continent from its path of death. At first it seems absurd, until the empire faces an energy crisis that sends her husband away on a forbidden voyage in pursuit of a material that is so rare, so precious, that Darius would do anything to obtain it. Even kill. At the cost of everything she holds dear, Nevia flees the empire to unveil her husband's deadly secret and, in turn, chooses a war she tried so hard to prevent-against her country, and her heart.