Ten years After civilization collapsed, a walled city is the only world Stace Tomlinson has ever known. Undead ferals and living marauders still prowl the wilderness outside, but the residents of Shawnee Lodge have adapted as best they can. With ammunition, electronics, and gasoline all distant memories from Before, people have once again taken up the bow. When almost all the horses and cattle were slaughtered, they learned how to turn ferals into dociles, pulling their plows and wagons, turning the wheels of their mills.
It's a simple life of crops and crafts, but Stace doesn't want to end up stuck on a farm. She wants to follow in her father's footsteps, outside the walls. Rob Tomlinson is a Ranger - one of the best, a master of fieldcraft and feral hunting - and living in the shadow of such a fearsome, well-respected figure comes with its own problems. The pressure Stace feels to match up to her father's expectations can be unbearable. Sometimes, though, life has a habit of showing you one path, then leading you down another.
Stace has struggled to prove to her father that she's up to the job. Today, though, she's going to have to step up. Both of their lives depend on it.