After the Skøl invasion, the system that they imposed on all their colonized cultures is based on the motto: Life is Golden. Except that probably doesn't does mean what you think it means, because in the Skøl system, people must pay a tithe to continue to be allowed to live.

So, when teenage Mora survives the invasion, she basically faces a life of indentured servitude. And then she discovers that the handful of meaningful connections she has made are threatened by the actions of the new governor. What can Mora actually do to protect the people that she cares about? And how far will she go to do it?

A scary dystopian thriller, this novel shows how hope, and the aspirations for freedom so deeply coded into the human DNA, survive beyond challenging circumstances.