In the Balkans, preparing a thrust northwards into Central Europe to block the Russians and Austrians, a horde of Muslim mercenaries is gathering. But they will not move without a shipment of gold ingots from Sheik Ibn Hazm which, according to British intelligence, is on its way via camel caravan to the coast of North Africa. It is this gold that Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin must at all costs intercept.

If any man can do the impossible it's Richard Sharpe... And the impossible is exactly what the formidable Major Sharpe is asked to do when he's dispatched on an undercover mission deep in the Spanish countryside. For a remote village is about to become the center of a battle for the future of Europe. Sitting high above the Almaraz bridge, it is the last link between two French armies, one in the north, the other to the south; if they meet, the British...