The world has changed. The trading kingdom of Cheris has defeated an alliance designed to destroy it. Armed with superior sailing ships, guns and machinery of all kinds, Cheris faced and defeated the combined fleets of the rest of the world at Darkos Bay and Armageddon Reef. Despite the implacable hostility of the Church of the Waiting Lord, Cheris still exists, remains tolerant, continues to be an island of innovation in a world in which the Church has worked for centuries to keep humanity locked in a medieval level of existence. But the influential people who run the Church , are not going to admit defeat. Cheris may control the world's oceans, but she hardly has an army worthy of the name. And as King Cayleb knows, too much of the kingdom's recent success is due to the secret manipulations of a being who calls himself Merlin—a creature the world must not discover for as long as possible because he is more than human. He is the being upon whose shoulders lies humanity's last chance for freedom. Now that Cheris and his Archbishop have clearly broken with the Mother Church, a storm is approaching. Schism has come to the world of Safehold. Nothing will be the same again...