Talented but penniless dancer Ninette Dupond finds her luck changing when she meets a cat who, speaking to her mind-to-mind, orders her to impersonate a missing Russian ballerina, plunging her into the middle of a war against the darkest Elemental Spirit.

Living most of her 25 years in her native India, Maya Witherspoon is the daughter of a prominent British physician and a Brahmin woman of the highest caste--and a doctor herself. Maya's mother was a former priestess of the magic fueled by the powerful pantheon of Indian gods. When her parents are murdered, Maya flees to Edwardian London where she must master her own magic.

Fledgling Water Master Mari Prothero rebels against her expected arranged marriage at age eighteen until she learns that her family's magical heritage is actually protected by these unions.