All his life, Sixth of the Dusk has been a
traditional trapper of Aviar - the supernatural birds his people bond with - until the fateful night he propels his people into a race to modernize before they can be conquered.
But it's a race they're losing. So when a chance comes to sail into the mysterious emberdark beyond a mystical portal, Dusk sets off to find his people's salvation with only a canoe, his birds, and all the grit and canniness of a Patji trapper.
Elsewhere in the emberdark is a young dragon chained in human form: Starling of the starship Dynamic. She and her ragtag crew of exiles are deep in debt and on the brink of losing their freedom when she finds an ancient map to a lost portal between the emberdark and the physical realm.
Dusk and Starling might just be the solution to each other's crises, but they must both still navigate perilous bargains, poisonous politics, and the destructive echo of a dead god...