Although Darkover was a world inhabited by humans as well as semi-humans, it was primarily forbidden ground to the Terran traders. Most of the planet's wild terrain was unexplored... and many of its peoples seclusive and secretive.

But for Andrew Carr there was an attraction he could not evade. Darkover drew him, Darkover haunted him - and when his mapping plane crashed in unknown heights, Darkover prepared to destroy him. Until the planet's magic asserted itself - and his destiny began to unfold along lines predicted only by phantoms and wonder workers of the kind Terran science could never acknowledge.