Damien is no longer Regent but he is still immersed in running the Protectorate as Prince-Chancellor now that Kiera, Mage Queen of Mars, has reached her majority. After an attempted kidnapping of the Mage Queen ends with thousands dead, Damien leaps at the chance to lead the investigation himself. Meanwhile, an old acquaintance turns to Roslyn Chambers for help when he realizes that his criminal organization most likely supplied the nukes used to destroy the Mage Queen's ship. In return for amnesty he's willing to give up the leader of the arms smuggling ring, who just happens to be Roslyn's ex-boyfriend and the reason she ended up in Juvenile Detention. Damien and Roslyn have never been closer to capturing the head of Nemesis, the organization who's scheming has created wars, as well as assassinating Kiera's father and brother among other atrocities. Damien may be getting a late start in this race, but he's determined to end Nemesis once and for all.

Damien is back having a central role in the story, which is where this series started, and a welcome change from the last three books where he only had a minor role. Since the story takes place on her homeworld, there is also a lot of growth in Roslyn's backstory this time too. This is a pleasant surprise since there is so little character development in the series as a whole. Overall, there is little "new" about this book, it simply focuses on the best aspects of the series. This series has never shied away from a high body count and as usual Nemesis has left plenty of nasty traps behind them. The trick with Nemesis is figuring out their objective, since their schemes to prepare the Protectorate for an alien invasion rarely make sense in the short term. Neither the characters, nor the reader, see any logic in them at all this time. Either Kent Riley has gone completely insane or once again he knows more than we do. I'm fairly certain we'll find it's the latter in the next installment. Stay tuned...