With danger mounting, Kenneth and Thorn travel to Elesborough to recruit allies for their cause. A friendly place, Elesborough is the first city to have a talentless governor since the war ended, and for his part in this, Thorn is seen as a hero. But all is not well in the talentless-governed town, even though they are able to recruit spies for a dangerous mission. Thorn and Kenneth are glad that inequality between mages and talentless is lessening in Elesborough, but the two groups still prefer to remain separate, threatening their dream of cooperation. And what’s worse, their enemy—the conspiracy of mages who seek to re-ignite the war and bring down the government—may have new targets—the Enforcers themselves.