In this forest, armed men from the new settlement ventured to investigate strage lights and found three fires burning, a child at their centre tethered to a stake. The boy appeared to be white, perhaps three or four years old, unable to speak. He watched the men darting, fearful eyes of a wild animal and at their approach he crouched, snatched a stick from the fire and snarled. So begins Dirk Wildnight's life in the tiny Victorian settlement of Tilmore. Reluctantly he's taken in, only to be treated with suspicion, negelect and cruelty. Then a strange turn of fortune leads him not only towards freedom, but to an understanding of the mystery of his earliest years. (LA)
