Jason Hood, a baker's apprentice from the quiet town of Fairhope, is persuaded to abandon a comfortable existence by Vincent Griffin, a promethean orphan who dreams that he will die on his eighteenth birthday unless he undertakes a great journey to discover the fabled Phoenix.Along the way they are joined by Sarah Mitchell, a hermean with a dazzling hidden power, Alexander Marco, a yeoman militia captain with a secret past, and the angels Euryalus...