Swordplay, sorcery, strange visitations, unspoken secrets, and unsuspected truths are the components of this fantastical tale set in a mythical world -- a world supported by a huge pillar which is poised in the center of the vast an mysterious Deep. In this world the Protectors own the land and are constantly feuding with the Just, who wish to return the land to the Folk. The Protectors, however, are divided within themselves, the Reds against the Blacks, as bitterly opposed to each other as united they are opposed to the Just. After a typical skirmish between the Reds and Blacks, two Endwives, whose job it is to come after battles to nurse the wounded and bury the dead, find a strange being, a Visitor from the sky, nameless, sexless, with a purpose to fulfill unknown even to himself. It is the Visitor who one day will make the unthinkable journey to the Outward -- to the very margin of the Deep.