Jonah Murtag is an Acolyte on the New Bethlehem police force. His job is to eradicate all heretical religious faiths, their practitioners, and artifacts. Murtag's got problems-one of his partners is a zealot, and he's in love with the other one. Trouble at work, trouble at home. Murtag realizes that you can rob a citizenry of almost anything, but you can't take away its faith. When a string of bombings paralyzes the city, religious fanatics are initially suspected, but startling clues point to a far more ominous perpetrator. If Murtag doesn't get things sorted out, the Divine Council will dispatch the Quints, AKA Heaven's Own Bagmen. The clock is ticking towards doomsday for the Chosen of New Bethlehem. And Jonah Murtag's got another problem, the biggest and most worrisome: he isn't a believer anymore.