Tom Harper

A TRAIL INTO THE HEART OF A FIVE-HUNDRED-YEAR-OLD MYSTERY.

In a snowbound village in the German mountains, a young woman discovers an extraordinary secret. Before she can reveal it, she disappears, leaving no trace other than a picture of a mysterious medieval playing card that has perplexed scholars for centuries.

Nick Ash does research for the FBI in New York. Six months ago his girlfriend Gillian walked out and broke his heart. Now he's the only person who can save her - if it's not too late. Within hours of getting her message, Nick finds himself on the run, delving deep into the past, asking questions that people don't want answered...Hunted across Europe, Nick follows Gillian's trail into the heart of a five-hundred-year-old mystery. But across the centuries, powerful forces are closing around him. 

There are men who have devoted their lives to keeping the secret, and they will stop at nothing to protect it.

In 1098, the First Crusaders pushed the Turks out of the Holy Land, but were halted outside the fortress of Antioch in Syria. When a Norman knight is murdered Demetrios Askiates is appointed to find the killer. The trail leads to a viper's nest of betrayal and fanaticism at the heart of the crusade.

Twelve golden tablets sit in museums around the world, buried in ancient times and each providing the dead with the route to the afterlife. Archaeologist Lily Barnes, working on a dig in southern Italy, has just found another. But this tablet names the location to the mouth of hell itself. And then Lily vanishes. Has she walked out on her job, her marriage, and her life - or has something more sinister happened?