Narrowly surviving assassination and capture, Octavia Leander, a powerful magical healer, is on the run with handsome Alonzo Garrett, the Clockwork Dagger who forfeited his career with the Queens secret society of spies and killers and possibly his life to save her. Now, they are on a dangerous quest to fnd safety and answers: Why is Octavia so powerfulWhy does she seem to be undergoing a transformation unlike any witnessed for hundreds of years?The truth may rest with the source of her mysterious healing power the Lady's Tree. But the tree lies somewhere in an inhospitable territory known as the Waste. Eons ago, this land was made barren by an evil spell, until a few hardy souls dared to return over the last century. For years, the Waste has waged a bloody battle against the royal court to win its independence and they need Octavia's powers to succeed.Joined by unlikely allies, including a menagerie of gremlin companions, she must evade killers on a dangerous journey through a world on the brink of deadly civil war.