The fifth of Modesitt's Corean Chronicles continues the story, begun in Alector's Choice (2005), of the Alector, Colonel Dainyl, and Captain Mykel, a gifted Corean human. Corus has been designed to become the new home of a technologically advanced species from a distant world who live by draining the biological life force from a planet and then moving to another. The preparations for transfer from world to world are the responsibility of the Alectors, who are psychically talented and have access to the superior weapons of the home planet. The time for a transfer is approaching, but the intrigues among the Alectors, launched in Alector's Choice, have now become outright battles. At the highest level, the colonel and, further down the hierarchy, the captain must unravel the intrigues if they and those for whom they are responsible are to survive. For maximum enjoyment, read immediately after Alector's Choice.