Neither Cross Nor Crown

“With the sword, weight and strength mean nothing. The wielder need only know when and where he must thrust his blade.”

Europe in the early 16th century is in a state of flux. The Ottoman Empire extends its long tendrils from east and south, the great Habsburg and the Valois dynasties vie against each other for dominion and across the continent a half dozen small wars are waged between cities and principalities. Barbary corsairs and the Italian states raid across the Mediterranean and across Europe the old order is being challenged. War is still the sport of kings and its fought for personal reasons, honour, vanity, even prestige.

The external threat is one thing, the taint goes much deeper. In the Schwarzwald its rumoured the dead walk, in Milan few dare to whisper of the depravities and rituals at their overlord's court. In Prague sedition and rebellion is plotted and all the while the shadow looms over them all.

Exiled from his homeland, Cathal O'Sullivan is a down on his luck mercenary soldier. Fleeing his homeland to stay one step ahead of the noose, he's languishing in the cells of the Schlossberg, wrongly accused of murder. He's penniless and seemingly alone in a strange land.

Jean Luc is a thief, correctly convicted of larceny, embezzlement, wanton burglary and a dozen other crimes. The excesses of the last few years have finally caught up with him and its either going to be slave labour or dancing the hempen jig. He's eager to talk.

Luis Etxandi is a disgraced duellist who's ignoble career has seen him the participant in illegal judicial killings as well as suspected of several murders. He's been content to live his life through the bottom of a bottle, making him the most ambivalent of the three.

And coming to them all is one man, an agent of the Inquisition. Empowered by the Church to actively seek out heresy and corruption, he is need of desperate men. In Freiburg, he's found them.