Orpen has always been an outsider in Phoenix City - the only outsider admitted to the ranks of the banshees. As one of them, she protects the city from the skrake, the ravening creatures that have laid waste to the country outside the city walls.

Unrest is building in the city - a deadly sickness costs ever more lives, while the fighting women are increasingly wearing of enforcing the Management's patriarchal rule. Rumour has it that banshees have started seeking their own justice in the city. Orpen must decide ­- can she help to save the society that she found, or must they try to build a new one?