Raven Greager is a young woman, envious of her brother's ability to go off to war. She decides to leave her family rather than fulfill her father's goal for her to get married and have babies. To show her abilities in battle, she decides that she will find and defeat the Beast of the Wood. Elsewhere, Covenant watches as the woods explode around him. The explosion was made by a sorcerer; a giant named Dumas. And while Gareth attends to the funeral of his friend Makus, he is attacked by Christians of the order of Bishop Gaston Gui. The Christians are seeking the Necroplasm, and they find it while leaving Gareth to die.