"hear my words, Alawi, and write them in your books...for a time of great trials is upon you." Fleeing false charges of treason, Makiria and Volar lead a ragtag band of outcasts north to the Wood Coast of the Èrin Forest in search of a safe passage. There, they stumble upon Tome and Ketri, simple Terrans caught in the first fires of the coming conflict. When their homes are destroyed and their families cruelly murdered, the two teens are rescued by the Aeons, to Ketri and Tome, living gods as distant and unfathomable as the stars in the sky.