When Jaf Daskal betrays the sinister fellow who paid him to recover a mysterious ‘treasure,’ he feels like his little band of crooks is being pursued by the mythical Dragons of Vashtar, but even the Dragons couldn’t contrive this bizarre adventure of fraud, power, sex, drugs, and religion that culminates in a battle for freedom.

Jaf’s underworld reputation gets him a job to recover a mysterious treasure in the desert of Mobahey. He recruits some partners in crime and they head out on a treasure hunt, but in Jaf Daskal’s world nothing is pure or simple. Busted schemes and betrayals land them all in the unknown land of Caliuga where Jaf’s friend is mistaken for the long-awaited Inspector General of the Emperor. So glad are the Caliugans to connect again with the Empire that Jaf’s party is lavished with luxuries, feasts and the attentions of very-friendly Caliugans — each with an angle and eager to work a deal, to explain ‘the facts’ for Jaf.

The Caliugans have mostly coexisted peacefully, but some recent arrivals are consolidating and gaining power over the other stranded colonies. By forming a continental union and coercing other colonies into joining they’re looking to end up in charge of Caliuga, and they’re not keen on re-connecting with the Empire. Jaf and his party are small-time crooks, but it looks like this Caliugan Union is a racket on a whole different scale.

The discovery of zoocaine, a drug which enhances sensuality and turns every woman into a nymphomaniac and every man into a satyr complicates Jaf’s efforts to stay clear of all the intrigues. With all the luxuries and perks he wants to stay – until it looks like he picked the wrong side. Fraud, confusion, intrigue, schemes and plots ensue as Jaf is sucked into the politics of Caliuga, and it all culminates with battles and bloodshed.

With revenge-bent killers close on his heels again Jaf jumps into bed with a retired mob boss, Blues Shareed. His new job? Figuring out what’s going on with the boss’s two wayward daughters, young women with too much time, too much money, and too many smarts for the tedious lives Dad Shareed planned for them.

It’s a sweet gig, running around with the older daughter and the ‘in crowd’ to nightclubs and raves, all expenses paid, almost like stealing – Jaf’s kind of job exactly! Adding to the fun is the new drug in town called ‘zoke’, which is said to enhance sensual pleasures — which sounds waaay too much like the ‘zoocaine’ Jaf thought he’d left behind in Caliuga years before, and which he recalls with fondness and dread.

If zoocaine has followed him, what else – and who — from his adventures in Caliuga has tagged along? And where has the younger daughter Carmen disappeared to?

Jaf eventually tracks Carmen down and learns she has big plans — and also that he’s not the only one on her trail. Although all the rich kids seem happily distracted with plans for all tomorrow’s parties, when opportunities arise to act up and express their frustration the ‘in crowd’ turns out to want an uprising even more than they want zoke. Carmen and Jaf are right in the front of their revolution as Carmen has money and Jaf is experienced in illegal activity and clearly untroubled by destruction.

Jaf rides the wave of success after the ragtag revolutionaries triumph in their first engagement, and he enjoys the donations and groupies that are the rightful fruits of gambling your life and winning.

But there will come a bigger battle, one where Jaf’s tricks won’t surprise anybody, a do-or-die battle where Jaf intends to ensure his life isn’t risked at all. How can he escape death and ensure his reputation for brilliant leadership survives? His people may be massacred, but his prestige must protect him, must be carved into stone.

But stone has no flex, no leeway — stone is forever. Jaf Daskal feels the trap closing, that he’s headed for disaster.