Synopsis: The Secret Society of Girls

Irgolid: city of light, crown of the north, shield of the west - capital and heart of proud Valkyrion.

Nineteen year old Kiphain Tazeer left Irgolid at fourteen for the frontline of the Mexantese war, and now he's bringing a lot of baggage - physical and psychological - back home. But there's no time to settle down into life as the Tazeeri heir: a nobleman must serve a mandatory year in service to his city, and Kiph's been made a peacekeeper. A junior peacekeeper, at that, and so he's given the case no one else wants: dealing with the recent spate of girl-murders in the city. Women may be third-class citizens, but that doesn't mean unchecked killings are permissible.

Kiph applies himself half-heartedly to finding out the identities of the sixteen dead little girls, and who killed them - but the first question, astonishingly, proves impossible to answer. The girls are utter unknowns, unnamed and unrecognised, and apparently without father, brother or husband.

Suddenly, hunting the murderer becomes secondary to Kiph's desire to find out who these girls were. His world is the world of men, and women are allowed no mysteries. His search for answers will bring him into perilous opposition with the murderer, with the four women in whose hearts the secrets of the girls of Irgolid are hidden, and with himself ...