1760. Jamie Fraser is a paroled prisoner-of-war in the remote Lake District. Close enough to the son he cannot claim as his own, his quiet existence is interrupted first by dreams of his lost wife, then by the appearance of Tobias Quinn, an erstwhile comrade from the Rising.

Lord John Grey - aristocrat, soldier, sometime spy - is in possession of papers which reveal a damning case of corruption and murder against a British officer. But the documents also hint at a far more dangerous conspiracy.

Soon Lord John and Jamie are unwilling companions on the road to Ireland, a country whose castles hold dreadful secrets and where the bones of the dead are hidden, in an epic story of treachery - and scores that can only be settled in blood.