1261. Oxford, England. An envoy returns from the land of the Tartars to
meet with an English scholar and share a deadly secret. The two men vow
that the knowledge of gunpowder must die with them as the consequences
are otherwise too fatal to contemplate.
1290. Hurnwych Green, England. After his quiet life is shattered by
tragedy, blacksmith Jared begins a pilgrimage to the Promised Land.
Along the way he is invited to join the Knights Hospitallers as their
blacksmith on a holy crusade for King Edward. The adventure that follows
sees Jared encounter men from distant Cathay who harbour the secret of
huo yao, and so begins one man's obsession with the powder of death and
a king's determination to change the very nature of warfare . . .