Spring, 1312. At Malmaison Manor, Lord Simon is concealing a dark secret, but someone knows about the crime he committed and they've found a way to make him pay. When he is found mysteriously slain, other deaths soon follow. Meanwhile, ships on the Devonshire cost are being deliberately wrecked, their crews slaughtered, their cargoes plundered. United with Lord Simon by the Secret Chancery, Corbett begins his 21st investigation (after Death's Dark Valley), but he is once more dragged into a tangled web of lies, and it's not long before secrets of his own start to surface.