Music magic would be more useful if Kelly weren't tone-deaf. As it is, she barely qualifies as having magic at all. But she's learned to make some use of her magic: she can hear the rhythms of things. Footsteps, heartbeats-the in-and-out rush of the tides. Ocean tides, that is, not the Tides that drowned the South. That magical disaster wiped out most everything east of Texas and south of Virginia. The world lost millions of people; Kelly lost nearly her entire family. But it's three years over, and now it's time to try to move on. Or so she thinks. But something's wrong with the rhythms of local lake. Something magically wrong. And while environmentalists are hailing the return of otters to the lake as a victory, she can't shake the feeling those aren't normal otters. Her brother and her handsome neighbor Derik, another Carolina orphan, refuse to let her investigate alone. Derik, from a family with a military legacy, swears he'll keep her brother-her only surviving relative-out of danger. Only, Derik's got this thing about letting people make their own choices, and with everyone else he loves lost to the Tides, Kelly doesn't think her brother will choose to stay safe. Not even when the investigation leads into the heart of magic itself. Trying to save everyone who was lost? It may just cost her everyone she has left.