Ivy Lovely has been a scauldrony maid in a castle surrounded by slurry for as long as she can remember until one day she is unexpectedly fired. As soon as she leaves the castle and reaches the end of the slurry fields, she is taken by a scout for the Halls of Ivy, a school where students are taught to master their magical blood or stones. She is not there for very long when things start going wrong. Ivy is late to class and brings a mysterious book back from a glanagerie--a bottle able to transport people into what the owner is imagining. Even odder than that, when the book is locked up in a room that causes you to forget about what is inside, Ivy still remembers it. But worst of all, a black carriage comes to the town. It is the Dark Queen. For some reason she and her henchmen are particularly interested in Ivy. Why does the Dark Queen seem to know her? Something is going on, and Ivy is determined to find out what.