Will Hawthorne is in trouble. He had been looking forward to his 18th birthday because that meant he'd finally be a professional actor, but Will has a knack for screwing things up royally. He winds up on the run from the authorities and into the arms of a party of principled adventurers who represent everything Will doesn't believe in-principle, self-sacrifice, maybe even magic-but they seem to be his best chance of staying alive and free for a few more days. But when his new "friends" take a job investigating a band of ruthless and mysterious horsemen who have been devastating a land far from all Will has known, he encounters an altogether different level of danger. Soon it is not clear which is more likely to get him killed, the party's nobility, the enemy's merciless efficiency, or his own special talent for fiasco. Can Will get used to this world of vanishing adversaries and magic swords? He will have to if he's going to survive it. And to wind up rich and in the good graces of the beautiful Renthrette, he's going to have to do rather more than that... "Fast paced and beautifully written" R.A. Salvatore A "clever page-turner" Publishers Weekly (Starred review)