At the base of a giant crackled-bloodwood tree, fifteen-year-old Aarkin holds vigil for an animal companion.

Like many before him—those in Calinn who worship Iustyn, the God of Pacts—Aarkin has found a place of perfect solitude deep within his home forest. A Circle of his own, where he waits with bated breath for a Companion—a bird? a forest cat? something else?—to seek him out, to close the Circle by joining Aarkin, spirit to spirit.

But instead of a forest creature, on the tenth day a bedraggled dog finds Aarkin instead. One who won't speak to him, but whose scars and sad eyes tell tales all the same.

Of wrongs perpetrated somewhere in this very forest.

Wrongs that need righting.

And suddenly, the Circle becomes a Path.