Like all those of their race, Fah-Laën and his fiancé Mei-Hood live in the ghetto of the semi-elves of Cadanla. Fah-Laën is a quilter at the huge slaughterhouse of the city, a hard and physical work that he performs 15 hours a day, every day. One morning, Meerok, the brother of the regent Dunngov, goes to the slaughterhouse, meat served in an inn and at the regent's table would be poisoned. He then decrees the quarantine and locks up Fah-Laën so that he kills all the infested animals in order to limit the contagion. But by leaving the enclosure he makes place a bar to prevent any exit, abandoning Fah-Laën to a certain death. At night, scouts are savagely massacred by horrific monsters, gules!