Colonizing the galaxy's near reaches, the myriad, mutated children of Earth are loosely governed by Imperium Terrestriana's hierarchy, an elite, long-lived neohuman minority that proactively fosters Convention, a body of interstellar civil law featuring Code Duello; under its precepts, trillions of eligible patricians and plebes wield their swords in order to settle all public and private disputes. Imperial explorers discover parsecs-distant Dan, a raw, idyllic world seemingly ripe for colonization, where enigmatic, telepathic indigenes exhibiting superior intellect come and go like shadows, yet lack habitations or any apparent infrastructure. The telepathic Danii abhor violence, and are horrified when sequestered duelists begin to vanish, and repeatedly explain how mysterious "Higher Ones," appalled by the wanton destruction of life wrought by victorious duelists, have taken miscreant smallswordsmen into their gentle care. The unseen Higher Ones make their acute displeasure known to the colonists through precipitate action in a chilling, ironic climax that raises provocative questions about neohumankind's place in the eternal scheme of things.