Maggie Magee is a teenage girl who lives in a tower block in West Newcastle with her aunt. The most extraordinary events begin to happen when, abandoned by her aunt, her grandfather turns up. Meanwhile, in rural Northumberland, the Carnell family, living in the ruins of Asheldore Hall, conspire to send someone back through time to change history so that what happened in 1899 will not happen and the family's power and prestige will be restored. In the Old Dowerhouse of the Hall live the Temple family: Tom, a retired crafts teacher, his wife Ellen, and their teenage children, Nikki and Stephen, innocents who will be manipulated to serve the wicked purposes of the Carnells. Maggie is unaware of the power she possesses that will take her and grandfather, Michael Magee, the failing Magus, to the edge of the fatal abyss. The threads of the conspiracy tighten and suffocate. Nothing is what it seems. Who can tell the daemons from the angels?