Bronte is ten years old when she receives a letter saying that her long-absent parents have been killed by pirates, and the lawyers tell her that their will (reinforced with serious magic) requires her to deliver gifts to her ten other aunts (not Aunt Isabelle, whom she lives with), and to start the trip immediately and alone--but as she travels the kingdoms, she begins to suspect that there is more to this journey than delivering treasures, and that...

Esther, an ordinary middle child, returns to school after a quiet summer to discover that her friends haven't returned and the mountains surrounding the school, usually alive with Faeries, have become dark and threatening with Shadow Mages, and it's up to Esther to do something extraordinary.