Harge was a world wholly owned and controlled by the Cinque, the five families. To them everyone else was in debt; for them everyone else must work or starve. There was one way to gather the cost of escape. The was through the singing jewels.
The singing jewels could be found in the burrows of the most vicious monsters on that world of sand dunes. Find a good one and it would pay your passage out.
That was Earl Dumarest's problem. He could fight humans, he could match wits with the implacable Cyclan, but against that web of sand would he be just another human victim?
FOr his next step to find Lost Terra, his way must lead downwards through the dark tunnels of death...