Summary

Ned Marriner is spending springtime with his father in Provence, where the celebrated photographer is shooting images for a glossy coffee- table book. While his father photographs the cathedral of Aix-en- Provence, Ned explores the shadowy interior with Kate Wenger, an American exchange student who has a deep knowledge of the area's history. They surprise an intruder in a place where he should not be: "I think you ought to go now" he tells them, drawing a knife. "You have blundered into a corner of a very old story." In this sublime and ancient part of the world, where borders between the living and the long-dead are most vulnerable, Ned and those close to him are about to be drawn into a haunted tale, as mythic figures from conflicts of long ago erupt into the present, changing and claiming lives.