Storms break. The anvil falls. The world succumbs to the iron fist of Shoel, dark lord of the underworld. Ayla must find him before his henchmen find her. She and the wolves race across the foothills of the Barian mountains toward the black shale highlands in search of the demon whose armies butchered her family and sold her into slavery. Battered by every trap set in her path, she presses onward in an unforgiving land. She understands full-well that her doom lurks inside the shadowed halls of the dark lord's fortress, for she has never once wielded a sword and the devil awaiting her is a hardened warrior who knows her deep secrets. Still, if courage can be gained, then with the help of her friends she'll find it grounded in the truth. Yet Ayla cannot deny the voices in her head that keep telling her to run away.