The Search for Erik Cain...

The Superpowers of Earth have fought their final war, leaving Earth a devastated ruin, populated only by scattered groups of survivors living in primitive squalor. Out in space, however, humanity moves forward, and the former colonies of Earth's dead nations are now free from the yoke of the despotic governments that had long ruled over them. For many, it is their first taste of liberty. But a thousand free worlds, varying enormously in wealth and power, cannot long exist in peace, and soon they begin to fight, to seek to bend their neighbors to their wills.

Darius Cain is the commander of the Black Eagles, the most feared and renowned of all the mercenary companies that fight the colonies' wars. His veteran warriors have fought dozens of battles, and they have never met their equals. The wealthiest colonies compete to hire the Eagles, for contracting with Cain's warriors is the surest guarantee of victory in any dispute. But there is another power, one whose very existence has been the most closely guarded secret in human history. The Triumvirate. For decades it has operated in the shadows, interfering secretly in the affairs of the former colonies while steadily building an invincible war machine. But the Triumvirate has come to fear the Black Eagles, and the decision has been made. Darius Cain's private army must be destroyed utterly before the final invasion of human space can begin.

A message reaches the Black Eagles' base, with evidence that the father he'd thought long dead might still be alive, a captive of the shadowy enemy, held on a planet called Eldaron. Darius Cain is skeptical, a man slow to believe what he is told without incontrovertible proof. But Cain didn't build the greatest military force in human space by being cautious or timid...and even the slightest chance his father is alive compels his course of action.