In Upper Hetzia, pockmarked with grim relics of long-ago Sortilegious Wars, lives a people consumed with a fear of magic. Those suspected of forbidden practices die in the bloody cleansings of its infamous White Tribunal - among them the father of young Tradain LiMarchborg. Now the vengeful Tradain, in a demonic pact, pawns his soul to borrow powers whose inexorable dwindling is measured in the luminous sands of a magical hourglass.<BR>Subtly disguised as a foreigner, Tradain embarks on the ruination of his father's false accusers. But in the capital city of Lis Folaze, studded with the blanched banners and stark symbols of the White Tribunal's encroaching power, his path soon crosses that of beautiful Glennian LiTarngrav. Glennian's mission, so opposite to his own, will lock them inextricably together in a vortex of love and retribution, death and enchantment that could redeem a nation ... or thrust them both - as Tradain's hourglass sands run out - into eternal torment.