Quick-witted, ambitious Ji Lin is stuck as an apprentice dressmaker, moonlighting as a dance-hall girl to help pay off her mother's mahjong debts. But when one of her dance partners accidentally leaves behind a gruesome souvenir, Ji Lin plunges into a dark adventure: a mirror world of secrets and superstitions. Eleven-year-old Chinese houseboy Ren also has a secret, a promise he must fulfill to his dead master; to find his master's severed finger...

It's been years since Helen Franklin left England. In Prague, working as a translator, she has found a home of sorts -- or, at least, refuge. That changes when her friend Karel discovers a mysterious letter in the library, a strange confession and a curious warning that speaks of Melmoth the Witness, a dark legend found in obscure fairy tales antique village lore. As such superstition has it, Melmoth travels through the ages, dooming those she persuades...