In 1097 the Pope appealed to all virtuous and God-fearing men to join the Crusade to wrest Jerusalem from the Infidel. But by 1100, Sir Geoffrey Mappestone is one of the few kings who has survived the harrowing journey, the battle to take the city, and the political infighting over the rule of the kingdom.

Upon returning to Jerusalem one day following an exhausting desert patrol, Geoffrey hears screams coming from the house of a Greek baker and discovers that one of his closest friends, a fellow knight, has been murdered in the woman's bedchamber. But this is not the first suspicious death in the city--other knights and priests have also been killed, and all, it is discovered, with the same type of curved dagger with a jeweled hilt.

Ordered to investigate the deaths by his liege lord, Prince Tancred, Geoffrey realizes too late that they are somehow part of a plot to topple the most formidable lords from their uncertain hold on power. It is not long before he finds himself drawn into dire straits involving some of the most dangerous men in the city--and learns that his closest friends could also be his deadliest enemies.