The meek inherited the earth. But someone is still deciding who survives.

Sixteen-year-old James Tadworthy lives in a peaceful post-apocalyptic society where violence is unknown, disease has been eradicated, and the Shepherds of the Federation Church guide every community with wisdom and care. Life is safe. Life is harmonious. Life is controlled.

When his best friend's pregnant partner is secretly drugged and detained by those same trusted Shepherds, everything James believed shatters. His brilliant tutor dies under suspicious circumstances. His friends face a penance at the sand mines from which Grandmother predicts no return. And James himself is hunted through the night and thrown into a flooding river.

Rescued by his formidable grandmother, who knows far more about the world's dark secrets than she ever revealed, James descends into forbidden underground tunnels where ancient technology still hums and creatures with glowing red eyes roam. Somewhere in the darkness lies the legendary third seal, a vault of knowledge the survivors of the old wars locked away for posterity.

But reaching it means confronting horrors that make the Shepherds' tyranny look merciful.

James Tadworthy lives in a post-holocaust society in which there are no wars, no crime, no pollution, no disease, and no work. Everyone seemingly lives in perfect harmony with their tamed environment. Additionally, all knowledge is controlled by the Shepherds, a group that selflessly dedicates their lives to humanity's welfare and best interests.

But when James finds out the Shepherds' shocking and closely-guarded secret, he discovers that beneath the surface of his peaceful community is a world of violence and intrigue. Launched on a dangerous quest through a labyrinth of underground passages, James learns that the mysterious Third Seal is an airlock to the place of hidden learning from the past. Will their idyllic lives be changed forever by the truth?