To Protect the Protectorate… Tristan Durant, once a refugee from Llael and now a priest and warcaster of the Protectorate of Menoth, struggles with his faith and his role. When a dark vision of the future warns of a rising threat to the theocracy, he returns with Hierarch Severius to the homeland for an epic confrontation against the godless enemy, the skorne. And when the Protectorate is thrown into turmoil by internal political machinations, Tristan Durant must choose a side to prevent the skorne from enslaving the faithful, and his choice will determine his fate—or have it determined for him.