Pepin Merripen learns that the two countries that had promised to protect the dragons, his dragons, have withdrawn their forces. Furious at this betrayal, he goes to Karsaba to take council with Mere Odain's young Queen. Although his father is willing to let Pepin resolve this situation, he soon finds out that Pepin has disappeared. Treyas follows his son's trail, but it ends where magic begins.

Increasingly worried, Treyas attempts to follow the magical trail and ends up in Northern Karsaba. It soon becomes apparent that he has more to deal with than a disgruntled runaway youth. A powerful magiker claiming to be Pepin's birth mother has summoned him, and she will stop at nothing to see his control over the dragons become her own. With Pepin at her command, and thereby his dragons, she intends to rule not only Karsaba, but any land she chooses. It is up to Treyas and his friends to make sure that doesn't happen. But will Treyas lose his son to the powerful pull of the dragons?