For centuries, the Gil-Dah ruled the highland citadels, sworn guardians of the Eye of Gil-Dah, a sacred firestone that pulses with an unnatural light. Below, the Bantock, a proud race of lizard people, command the marshy lowlands, their floating strongholds drifting through the river valleys. Bound by The Pact, a sacred treaty renewed every fifty years, the two civilizations maintained a fragile balance—one upheld by tribute, trade, and fear of an ancient curse neither fully understood.

But this year, the wet season has not ended.

A new queen has not risen.

The lowlands, once fertile, have become a vast and permanent inland sea. The Bantock have adapted, their warbands striking the highland borders at sunset, raiding settlements to claim what the rising waters have taken. In response, the Gil-Dah prepare for war, believing the Bantock have broken the Pact.

Yet neither side realizes the true danger.

Far away, in another world, Rowen Marks and her best friends, Ben Warren and Roz Butters, have just started their last year of high school. Life seems to have a clear path.

Rowen tells herself she should feel excited by the endless possibilities. Only the steady pulse of panic has already begun to rise along the smooth ridge of her shoulder blades, pooling at the nape of her neck like a rising tide along a rocky shore.

Something is coming. In the recesses of Rowen's mind, doors open—visions of fear and love, war and water.

Soon, Rowen would be plunged into a future she neither understands nor wants. A future that the Eye of Gil-Dah has already prophesied.

Is she truly theone? The one sent to mend a broken world?

Is she strong enough to endure the life that is her birthright? Or will Rowen fall victim to an aging queen bent on her destruction, and the growing fractures within her own people?

Does anyone honestly believe in prophecies anymore?