The Iron Kingdoms are at war—a war fought with machine guns and magic, knights of valor, and earth-shaking titans of steam and steel. And now that war may hinge entirely on nothing more than a sheaf of papers. An alchemical formula, stolen by an ally they thought they could trust, could cost the brave soldiers of Cygnar everything. Their only hope: a cunning spy, a knight out of her element, and a frighteningly small unit of the best that Cygnar has to offer. Arrayed against them is not only a single, devious enemy, but the combined intelligence apparatus—and possibly the full military might—of the most brutal martial power Cygnar has ever known.

The Iron Kingdoms are at war. On the same day that Cygnar declares war on Khador, two dangerous, off-the-books operations launch themselves behind enemy lines: one of a highly personal (and royally unsanctioned) nature; the other launched to stop the first by any means necessary. While hot war rages in Llael, these forces collide in no-man's-lands far removed from the front. A junior marksman with the feared Widowmaker corps, a nineteen-year- old Khadoran woman named Irina is caught up in these events when the integrity of her own mission collapses. Trapped alone, deep in hostile territory, Irina must rely on her courage, her training, and her wits to navigate both the perils of the wild and the malice of her enemies, while still desperate to accomplish her own mission in the process. If she can survive at all.