Human life has outgrown Earth, and the survey team of the ES Valgard is searching nearby star systems for new worlds to colonize. No team has found one where human life could survive...until now. The scans from orbit as well as the probes launched to its surface tell Andy and Cory that the bonus for finding such a world is almost theirs. But when they set their feet on the ground they discover what the scans and the probes could not tell them, that this ancient world is already inhabited, and that magic rules. Or does it? Trapped by creatures whose true shape they cannot see, manipulated toward an end they do not understand, the two must find a way to escape a world where chaos is given form, where it breathes but does not live and has no soul.