Tom Cleary is a free settler looked up to by pretty much everyone in the area, even the convicts occasionally sent out to work his land. An ex-master of artillery, he does smile sometimes, but his expression has never quite been unalloyed by sorrow since his wife died. He's still not sure what got her, only that it must have been fast, startled and extremely venomous.

He's been doing his best to help his neighbours through the drought years and to ease tensions between squatter farmers and natives whose land- and water access has been interrupted by cows and fences.