Simon Cannick, with the dubious assistance of possible extraterrestrial influence, seems to have largely recovered from his temporary death, his peculiar and continual lapses into dreamspace notwithstanding. However, fate, like the neider, is hydra-formed. Douglas Jefferson is willing to play dirty in the long game of inheritance and the longer game of resentment; Simon's half-sister, Marianne, and her unruly female descendants arrive at St. Madoc...