Historical
In Philippopolis, during the Third Crusade, the German Crusaders have seized the city, but finds themselves stranded between Byzantine hostility, political uncertainty and the long road still ahead to the Holy Land. William FitzCount and his Scottish companions are drawn deeper into the machinery of the crusade as the Emperor’s army pushes towards Constantinople, crosses into Asia Minor and enters the punishing interior of Anatolia.
The army’s passage is fraught with suspicion, strained diplomacy, hunger, betrayal and increasingly savage warfare. Victory is never simple as each advance brings new losses, and each act of survival carries a moral price. William is forced to grow as a leader, Roland Gifford struggles to preserve his faith and honour amid cruelty, and Fearchar “McTaggart” pursues his own ambiguous path through danger, opportunity and deception.
A novel set around the rescue of imprisoned envoys, the uneasy dealings with Byzantium, the crossing into Asia, Turkish raids, starvation and the final assault on Iconium. It combines close personal drama with large-scale historical conflict. Thoroughly researched and unsentimental in tone, it explores faith, ambition, loyalty, prejudice and the cost of endurance in a world where crusading zeal is steadily stripped down to hunger, fear and survival.
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