From the author: "In additional news, I just launched my new book, Death Plague. The plague is mentioned in the Klawdia series and is the central plot to which all my books are based on. For something different, I launched the newest prequel within a boxed set called Dominion Rising."

“Women serve men, and you must prove that you can be a man before you may lead.” The Bear tribe have always ruled the Nation of Ruxdor, though with no male heirs to continue the line, Klawdia, the chieftain’s daughter and only child, must compete in a bestial rite of passage against four other tribal boys to retain her family’s sovereignty. The competition is set among the perils of the Death Peak Mountains and pits representatives from Ruxdor's five strongest tribes—Bear, Lion, Wolf, Snake, and Hawgrald—against each other in a race to slaughter their tribe’s animal and return home. Each competitor is overseen by an opposing tribe’s elder to discourage dishonesty. Klawdia is seriously injured by the bear she must slaughter, and a rival both saves her life and sabotages her chance of victory by cheating. When elders start disappearing from the competition, Klawdia must draw on the last of her strength to expose the truth and save her family’s lineage.

"I would take Skelkra's power sooner or later, it didn't matter. I would take everything from him, like he had from me." Unwilling to kill her child, Klawdia flees her home Vilseek, giving up her heirdom and family. Her Father, the leader of the Bears and chieftain of Ruxdor, will never stop hunting her now she has betrayed him. Alone in the depths of the snowtimes, she must find refuge for herself and her child. The injuries attained through the fight with Skelkra, her ex-lover, have made her clumsy and slow. Trapped against the surrounding mountains, she is forced to climb the deadly western summit. Barely alive, she discovers a hidden tribe on the other side of the Dividing Mountains. They hold the key to her safety and knowledge about her country's terrible past.

Fleeing the wrath of Skelkra and carrying his child, Klawdia embarks upon a quest with Margan and Jeykal to rescue Sheyla from the brutal Bones pirates. Their voyage to Pirate’s Landing is fraught with danger, and as Jeykal turns spiteful and Margan exhibits a strange dark side to his Speaker abilities, Klawdia begins to wonder just who she can rely on. Impassable peaks and vicious, bloodthirsty nightmares still separate Klawdia from her freedom to the south, but as jealousy and anger bubble amongst erstwhile friends, she realises the worst dangers might not be ahead, but standing at her side.