It may look like a perfectly ordinary New England town, a little larger than most. But Raine's Landing, Massachusetts, holds some very dark secrets. The real witches of Salem fled here just before the Trials of 1692, and the place has been full of magic -- the good and the bad kind -- ever since. And a curse hangs over the whole population ... there are so many people because nobody born here can ever leave. Now the Landing is facing its worst peril yet, monstrous flying creatures in the service of an evil older than the Universe itself. They have an unpleasant way of possessing people to their side, and their powers keep on growing until little can withstand them. Most of the major adepts succumb ... there are only two left to defend Raine's Landing. And the town's chief troubleshooter, ex-cop Ross Devries, has an enormous challenge on his hands. He needs to get his former sidekick, Cassie, back into the fight. And if they are to have any slightest chance of winning through, they're going to have to make some very strange new friends, and new alliances to save Raine's Landing, and save the world.