After a moment of high spirits—a tantrum, her mother called it—Emily is sent from the plantation to her inn-keeping uncle in Detroit. There she meets Malachi, the son of freed slaves, who challenges everything she’s grown up believing. With plenty of bumps and humor, their abrasive relationship develops into respect, then friendship. But when Emily stumbles upon two runaways hidden in her uncle’s barn, she finds that old ways die hard. And Mr. Burrows, the charming Southern slave catcher, is lodged in the hotel.