When Masterharper Zist takes over as Harper for Natalon`s coal-mining camp, he takes with him his apprentice, the orphaned Pellar, and Pellar`s fire-lizard Chitter. Pellar has become a gifted tracker and Zist gives him his own mission - to find out if the thefts of coal are the work of the criminals condemned to a life of wandering and hardship.