In 1792, Philip Radclife, the bastard son of Benjamin Franklin, comes to France to deliver a letter to Thomas Paine. But the guillotine of the Terror has the nation under its bloody blade - and he is caught up in a conflict more horrifying than the Revolution. Unknowingly, he saves the life of Prince Vlad Dracula, the most eminent and honorable of the Nosferatu. In doing so, he makes a powerful ally, but by foiling Vlad's brother Radu's attempt at fratricide, he and his descendants are doomed eternally to suffer the vengeful assaults of a powerful vampire. Now in 1996, the current Philip and June Radcliffe are kidnapped on their honeymoon. Their captor, a mysterious Mr. Graves, swears that he is trying to protect them. But as his thrilling story unfolds, involving Napoleon, Robespierre, Madame Tussaud, the Marquis de Sade, the Scarlet Pimpernel, and Charles Darnay as well as Jerry Cruncher and Detective Dupin, the young couple refuses to believe him - a mistake that is almost certain to cost them their lives.