From USA Today best-selling author Michael James Ploof comes the epic debut of an exhilarating new fantasy adventure series.

Talon follows the early years of a unique boy, a 15-year-old runt living on the barbarian island of Volnoss. Born premature during the frozen plague that took his mother, shunned by his father, and raised by his grandmother, Talon has always felt like he doesn't belong.

For years he dreams of growing big and strong like the giants that surround him. But as the day of measure draws near, he begins to realize that he will never be named a Vald, and will be cast to the village of the Skomm to live a life of slavery.

Barely surviving the beating that follows his failure to meet the measure, Talon is banished to the village of misfits. There he finds friends in the most unlikely of places, and begins to hope he might find some happiness as a Skomm.

As Talon tries to settle into his life in the slave village he is challenged at every turn. The Vaka overseers have it in for him, as does the Chiefson of Timber Wolf Tribe. The Kelda Agaeti is drawing near, called by the Skomm the night of dying, when seven warriors from neighboring tribes win the right to go on a bloody rampage through the village.

After barely surviving a random attack by drunken Vald that left nearly a dozen dead, Talon and his friends decide that they must somehow escape the island. For Chiefson Fylkin has vowed to kill him first on the night of dying.

What follows is a fast-paced race against time, an underdog story wrought with action and adventure, rich with magic, culture, friendship and lore.

Set 200 years before the events of Whill of Agora, Talon reveals the origins of Dirk Blackthorn's spirit wolf, Chief. Fans of the Legends of Agora books will be introduced to unforgettable new characters, and revisit a few old friends.