Gregory Roarke–former bounty hunter, former Trailblazer, current agent for the ultra-secret Icarus Group–has received a new assignment: locate a suspected but as-yet undiscovered teleportation portal on the backwater colony world of Alainn. The rival Patth are also searching for the device & have considerably more resources at their disposal. Fortunately, Roarke has Selene and her incredibly sensitive Kadolian sense of smell. On paper, it should be a straightforward enough job. But that was before there was a murder in the small town of Bilswift and another one and the discovery that the Patth are already on the scene and have narrowed the search to a heavily forested area in the hills and mountains east of town. Most disturbing of all is the discovery that one of Selene’s people, a Kadolian teenaged boy named Tirano, is working at one of Bilswift’s fish markets. A boy who may have lost his parents before his proper socialization was completed. A boy who may be connected to both the murders and the Patth. A boy who may be the potentially dangerous wild card that the Kadolians call changelings.
