On an Earth that is very much like our own, the civilizations of ancient man have been crushed; the giant glaciers that cover the northern part of the globe continue, even now, moving ever south, grinding the remains of the sky-touching cities of men beneath them. This Ice Age created warfare between two mighty nations, and in the midst of this mechanized slaughter, a virulent influenza plague ultimately killed most of the human population of the Earth within just one year.

Now, almost 2,000 years later, some of the survivors of that plague have again gathered together in a few vast city-states. In the wild lands between these megalopolises, the individuals who'd chosen not to return to the sprawl of the city-states roam as the Free Tribes in the company of sabretooth cats, mammoths, and dire wolves. In this world there is only a tentative peace; there are those in the Black City of the West for whom only one thing matters: the power to dominate and subjugate; the power to kidnap and enslave children and women into a sexual bondage purporting to save their souls, but in reality to supply wealth to a priesthood whose hearts are as black as the zeppelins they fly.

Into this steam-power world, two young people must journey. It will be a journey from innocence that will carry them from their tribe into the black heart of the basalt city. It will be a journey that will change them forever and bring them closer together than they'd thought possible.