Sponsored by a rich patron, Jez attends the Carceri Academy, the mystical school where many of the country's elite go to study. Though his patron forbids him to learn it, Jez finds he has an aptitude for battle magic. When a sleeping sickness sweeps the land, Jez begins experiencing strange visions of the creation of the world. He investigates them and discovers a trail of dark magic that indicates his patron may not be as benevolent as he originally believed, and Jez himself may be much older than anyone suspects.

When Jezreel is summoned to King Haziel's court, he's not overly worried. After defeating a powerful demon lord, what threat could a royal court pose? Little does he know there is more going on than even the king suspects and not every threat can be dealt with as a easily as a demon lord.

After his experiences battling the demons Marrowit and Maries, Jez is convinced he can handle anything. All that changes when he receives a visit from Sariel himself, lord of all the Shadowguard. The seven pharim lords are among the most powerful beings in all of creation, and one of them is missing. No pharim permitted to interfere in the business of another, but that restriction doesn't apply to Jez. He and is friends must discover what could've happened to one of the most powerful beings in the universe.

Sharim is gone, driven into the abyss, from which there is, supposedly, no return. Jez isn’t sure it will last though, and after months of study, he discovers the truth he’d always suspected. There is a way for Sharim to escape, and though the demon made flesh doesn’t know the way yet, he knows where to find that information. To stop him, Jez and his friends must go to a place mortalkind was never meant to walk and travel to where even pharim fear to tread.

The fabled Library of Zandra is now in the hands of the mages of the Carceri Academy. As they uncover its secrets Sharim beings to move, marching his demonic forces south and destroying everything in their path. Jez must use his full power, both as a mage and as the Baron of Korand, to oppose him, but even all of his strength and authority may not be enough to stop Sharim's demonic army from conquering the land and claiming the Carceri Academy itself.

Brought together by the threat posed by Sharim, outcasts and rebels flock to Jez’s cause, but ancient grudges are not so easily buried, and some of Jez’s own allies hate each other almost as much as they fear Sharim. Can Jez reconcile a feud that has lasted since the beginning of time or will old hatreds tear them apart and deliver the world right into Sharim’s hands?

Sharim’s forces have taken Rumar Keep. His demonic army grows by the hour as he continues to summon reinforcements from the abyss. Soon, Sharim will have gathered enough demons to sweep over the entire world. Even all the forces that have gathered under Jez’s command may not be enough to stop an army led by one of the most powerful demons to ever walk the earth.