Seemingly always the outsider, Gavril Andar – an impoverished young painter – yearns to join the privileged circles of Muscobar polite society. However, unbeknownst to him, he does have royal blood in his veins: the dark and powerful blood of a father he never knew – the Drakhaon, ruler of the isolated northern kingdom of Azhkendir. And when the Drakhaon is brutally murdered, an unwilling Gavril is forced to take up the mantle of both his father’s rule – and his power. For blood will out. And the Drakhaon’s blood carries within it a taint that gives its bearer access to awesome, unimagined magics – but at a soul-shattering price.