Already the beekeeper’s son had his life’s plans in front of him but the Master Sorcerer, Silvestrus, promises the boy’s parents that Thaddeus, instead, will learn an honorable trade and become his Apprentice. Though the youth is befriended by a scholar, street thief and sentient mule, his journey is beset by beasts, brigands, a Daemon, a black-haired Courtesan, the King of the Moths, tree fiends, ghost legions and Greensward Aelvae, and the Master Assassin of the mysterious Cin.