Back to the beginnings of culture. The distant future: Humanity has spread throughout the galaxy over the last ten thousand years. Artificial intelligences, thinking spaceships, and human-machine beings are now part of everyday life in the so-called Culture. But how did it all begin? When the ruling elite of an ancient civilization is completely wiped out, a suspect is quickly presented - but Lieutenant Vyr Cossont is innocent. She sets out to find the culprits and becomes embroiled in a conspiracy that reaches back thousands of years, to the very beginnings of the Culture...