At the speaking of names ceremony, Leora Flint revealed to everyone in Saintstone that her true mother was a blank, somebody without the tattoos that record a persons triumphs and sins; now she has been sent to the blank settlement, Featherstone, as an exile, and as a spy because the two communities are inching closer to war--but there are some people who hope to use her as a bridge to peace, others who will do anything to prevent that, and Leora is caught in the middle, unsure of which half of her heritage has the greater claim to her soul.