Mейт has gotten used to being a victim. Together with her stepmother, they bet on Lerdеs—the beauty, the younger sister to whom Mейт gave her magic. Selling everything they could, the three ladies Kotisur move to the capital, where the best suitors gather for a season of balls. Mейт comes to the first ball disguised as a servant, to gather information about them and help her sister marry successfully. But after going down into the garden, Mейт accidentally overhears a conversation between drunken lords—and then she almost becomes a victim of violence. And then, in the house of the Kotisur family, one of the strongest mages of the empire appears, the Duke Calvert. Only he is interested in something completely different from Lerdеs…