Theodore Kurita is heir to apparent to the Draconis Combine, one of the most powerful realms of the Inner Sphere. But the Draconis Combine has never been a place of smooth transitions. Kurita's perilous journey to power is a twenty-year odyssey of lethal encounters and narrow escapes. And at the end awaits the most dangerous foe of all, the man whom Theodore must one day depose-his own father.