Fresh from the field of Waterloo, Matthew Hervey, newly appointed aide-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington, is dispatched on a mission of the utmost secrecy. Leaving behind his fiancée, Lady Henrietta Lindsay, he must journey across tempestuous seas to India, an alien, exotic and beguiling land that will test his mettle to the very limit. For the princely state of Chintal is threatened both by intrigue from within and military might from without, and Hervey, sabre in hand, finds he is once more destined for the field of battle…