When Hildegard is sent on a mission to the fabulous papal palace in Avignon, she is well aware that Clement VII is known throughout Europe as the Butcher of Cesena and, with England at war, she will have to watch her step while inside the very stronghold of the enemy. Shortly after arriving, an English knight and his brutal bodyguards turn up. He is a vassal of one of young King Richard's deadliest rivals. What is his purpose in Avignon? Why has he abducted two innocent men from the streets of London and smuggled them into the palace? And, worse for Hildegard, two other Enlighmen are here, one close to her heart but a traitor to the king and the other a violent and dangerous obsessive. When the body of a chorister is found stabbed on a sack of gold inside Clement's most secret and private treasury, Hildegard cannot walk away from the troop of young pages who seek her help in finding his killer. Can she solve the puzzle of the murder before the murderer finds her? Danger follows the intrepid nun every step of the way to a final and gruesome reckoning.