Domel gives shelter to a suspected rebel being chased by security forces through the streets of Baleras. She watches from an upstairs window as Imperial Guard and city security personnel converge on her house. Despite their initial hesitation about entering the home of such a prominent family, Domel is arrested. The following night, as she waits to board a prison transport ship along with other suspected dissidents, she sees an Imperial Guard soldier preparing to shoot a family making a desperate run for freedom, and pushes him aside at the last second. Another soldier silences her with a blow to the back, and the fleeing family is gunned down. With her husband having been charged with an even more serious crime, no one can come to her aide ("Point of No Return", "Out of the Forest of Memory").
Domel is imprisoned on Prison Planet 17, but an opportunity for freedom eventually arrives. More than a month after arriving on the planet, Domel is pressed into service to assist with a surprise visit from a supposed princess of Iscandar being transported to Garmillas. She greets the woman with the proper rituals, and convinces her to change out of her alien uniform into proper Iscandarian attire. A short time later, a riot is initiated by dissidents in the Garmillas military loyal to another high-ranking prisoner, Admiral Gul Dietz. The prison personnel are overwhelmed, and Domel is liberated. ("Prison Planet 17"). Along with Dietz, the admiral's daughter, and others, she meets with the command officers of an alien vessel that are also fighting the forces of Leader Dessler, in an attempt to build an alliance. The alien officers are accompanied by the true princess of Iscandar, Yurisha, and Domel is able to confirm that the woman who had been brought to the planet before was their kidnapped shipmate. Domel joins Dietz in a campaign to liberate more prison worlds and to expand the Garmillas Civil War