'The emperor's mistress had been murdered, and the world had been taken hold of and turned upon its head' Prague, 1599 Christian Stern, a young doctor, has just arrived in the city On his first evening, he finds a young woman's body half-buried in the snowThe dead woman is none other than the emperor's mistress, and there's no shortage of suspects Stern is employed by the emperor himself to investigate the murder In the search to find the culprit, Stern finds himself drawn into the shadowy world of the emperor's court - unspoken affairs, letters written in code, and bitter rivalries But there's no turning back now