Calix Kalidii is a boy stripped of his birthright. Before his birth, his family terraformed Mercury, earning the privileges of the planet - and it took no time for rival Houses such as the Helios to slaughter the Kalidii and take the planet for themselves. Now, Calix has been raised a warrior by his surviving family on the far moon of Deimos, fitted with the responsibility of infiltrating the Mercurian Academy - the prestigious military school of the Helios warmachine - and tear down the entire system from within. Faced with death and violence beyond his understanding, Calix soon discovers the worse of human nature, but also encounters the very best. Calix realizes that many of his fellow Academians are just like him, people of love and hope, and not the monsters that his embittered family whispered into his ears all of his life. Calix must determine whether to choose between his old, spiteful family, or the possibility of a new future.