"In morning light/my heart's delight/is slinking in/and inking skin." Firefly, one of the river people, lives by this ancient song. She yearns to be an inker and tattoo giants, just like her mother. But one morning a rogue giant kidnaps her mother and takes her up to the plateau, a dangerous place for all river people. Firefly attempts to rescue her mother, putting her own life in peril. To add to her problems, the dam that keeps her world safe...