As the witch-pyres of the Spanish Inquisition blanket Renaissance Europe
in a moral haze, a young African slave finds herself the unwilling
apprentice of an ancient necromancer. Unfortunately, quitting his
company proves even more hazardous than remaining his pupil when she is
afflicted with a terrible curse. Yet salvation may lie in a mysterious
tome her tutor has hidden somewhere on the war-torn continent.
She sets out on a seemingly impossible journey to find the book, never
suspecting her fate is tied to three strangers: the artist Niklaus
Manuel Deutsch, the alchemist Dr. Paracelsus, and a gun-slinging Dutch
mercenary. As Manuel paints her macabre story on canvas, plank, and
church wall, the young apprentice becomes increasingly aware that death
might be the least of her concerns.