The Princess and the detective return to very different receptions in the city of Alisandre Capital: one performs the royal ritual, while the other must sling a coffee mug. These separate worlds possess a synchrony that grows closer now, woven through the journeys of characters throughout the Pan-Galaxy.
Scion Princess Soleil is contacted by mysterious forces, who give her a hidden history - it's clear things are not all as they seem in the Pan-Galactic court, from Her Vast Eminence Celeste, Magus the 24th, to the Ascendant pair, Charlotte and Vario.
As #1 public enemy Raev Sturlusson creates some stirring emergencies, networks fair and foul weave through the shadows around intergalactic events. Spheres align and collide in surprising turns, from the detective to the ambiguously employed corporate worker, the people behind them and the people behind them. What exactly is it they're all up to? Something big, clearly dangerous, and very scientific.
Catastrophic events involve shipping pilots who always happen to know each other, who have time to volunteer; the semi-interested involvement of Dragonkind; and other non-human sentients, the grandly extra-spectrum expressive Aquarii.
From the strategy room to the lost streets, discover Alisandre and the Pan-Galactic Imperium through people within and without, as it all begins to change.