The face that stared at him through the glass was his mum's, but it didn't look like her. Stephen's mouth dropped open and real fear grabbed his stomach. His mum's face was chalk white, her mouth twisted in pain. Behind her was a dark shadow. Stephen dropped the bones.

A six year-old boy has vanished, his mother and grandmother horrifically murdered. At the scene forensic scientist Rhona Macleod finds a chilling African talisman, made from the bones of a child. Can she decipher its meaning and track Stephen down before he becomes the next link in the killers' chain?