Born into a world which had specific rules about multiple births (twins, triplets, etc.) Mashu should have been sacrificed at the first solstice after her birth, because she was a female born with a male twin. However because her twin brother was a shadow walker, a demon sent to earth to help mankind no one knew what to do with her. When her brother was sent to the shadow walker Haidar to be raised and trained she was sent with him. She had not been named when she was sent, so he called her Mashu which meant twin in the ancient language. To keep her occupied Haider hired a number of people to teach her things she showed interest in from music to woodcraft and weapons training. He helped her talk through her unique situation, having no family to arrange it, marriage was unlikely for her, so she had to put her energy toward other pursuits. When she was seventeen Haidar dies. Escaping the town which thinks that she is a slave, she sets out on the road to find her brother. Facing a demon and goblins and a paranoid town, she escapes the monsters and then picks up traveling companions, a soldier of fortune, a seven foot tall giant and a white wolf.