others—who are trapped on Earth at the time are bred as slaves, called "demons" by their human masters. The Spark Lords form a ruthless but relatively benign tyranny, "Spark Royal" or the "Spark Protectorate", that controls the worst effects of warfare and natural disasters. The rule of this small group, however, is fairly loose; they tolerate, and even cooperate with, a range of criminal organizations. By the time of the novel's action—"One day before the spring equinox" in 2457 A.D.—humanity has settled into a lifestyle of previous centuries. Most travel is by horseback or coach; swords are far more common than guns; candles and oil lamps provide most light. Obscure religious sects flourish. Gardner's future Earth, in these respects, participates in the theme of a "medieval future" explored by writers like Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe among others. People live among the remains of past higher technologies. "Welcome to our modern world! Where OldTech computers serve as footstools, while the rusted remains of jumbo jets get converted to beer-halls and brothels." Plot summary The novel opens with five friends out for a night of drinking and occasional brawling. All five are teachers at a less-than-first-rate boarding school called Feliss Academy, situated in the town of Simka in Feliss Province (a future version of Simcoe, Ontario, the author's hometown, and not far from the author's Waterloo current home). Future versions of other real locations, such as Niagara Falls, Port Dover, and the Port Dover mausoleum appear in the novel. The five, frustrated and bored with their unsatisfactory lives, are: Sir Pelinor, the school's fencing instructor, who fancies himself a courtly knight; Sister Impervia, the self-defense trainer, and a Handmaid of the Holy Order of Magdalenes; the Steel Caryatid, sorceress, psychic, and gifted in pyrokinesis; Myoko Namida, whose specialty is telekinesis and levitation; and Philemon Abu Dhubhai, Ph.D., the novel's narrator, a scientist and the scion of a wealthy and powerful family in the Middle East. Tonight, however, is an unusual night: the Steel Caryatid has received a premonition that the group will undertake a quest. The quest reveals itself when Dhubhai encounters a ghost and learns that one student at the school has been murdered while another, the victim's boyfriend, has runoff. The group embarks on a search for the missing boy, which soon transforms into something far more sinister: a hunt for a shape-shifting alien creature, malevolent and very dangerous.