Toamic, the last Duke of Parramind, has fallen on hard times. Burdened by ancestral debts, and unable to sell any more property due to entails, he ekes out a meager living for himself and his widowed mother by teaching etiquette to the nouveau riche. But a chance encounter at the home of one of his clients, a retired aventurer, will set him on a path to lose everything he has left in exchange for something he can't get any other way.