Twenty-five year old widow Emma Andrews grew up in the shadow of her mother's madness, so when she arrives at Dulwich manor in the midst of a plague and soon thereafter begins to see specters, her family fears fate has finally caught up with her. But one guest among them knows Emma's visions are more than a trick of the mist. Valerian Fox has hunted the great vampire lord Marius through time and continents, and he knows that Emma's senses are heightened by her birth: she is Dhampir, vampire hunter.
When Emma's young cousin is marked for death, Emma and Valerian must disregard propriety and their own passions to prepare for battle. Poised at the intersection of life and death, with madness nipping at her heels and the Pope's secret society sabotaging her every move, Emma finds that, in order to save the most innocent among them, she must embrace the inheritance she has feared and denied.
