Kosovo, 1999. In the shadow of an impending NATO bombing campaign, James Palatine of the Army Intelligence Corps has joined an elite unit of the SAS for his first mission behind enemy lines.

A woman’s desperate cry for help draws them to a remote farmhouse, where Palatine makes a split-second decision that he bitterly regrets. Just hours later he sees a chance to redeem himself—in his own eyes, at least—when his unit finds a young girl close to death in the freezing woods. But rescuing the girl proves only to be the beginning of a new nightmare.

Against a backdrop of escalating violence, Palatine’s life spirals into an underworld of predatory gangsters and duplicitous spies—and takes him on a journey deep into the horrors of war and the darkness within his own soul.

Kosovo, 1999. In the shadow of an impending NATO bombing campaign, James Palatine of the Army Intelligence Corps has joined an elite unit of the SAS for his first mission behind enemy lines.

A woman’s desperate cry for help draws them to a remote farmhouse, where Palatine makes a split-second decision that he bitterly regrets. Just hours later he sees a chance to redeem himself—in his own eyes, at least—when his unit finds a young girl close to death in the freezing woods. But rescuing the girl proves only to be the beginning of a new nightmare.

Against a backdrop of escalating violence, Palatine’s life spirals into an underworld of predatory gangsters and duplicitous spies—and takes him on a journey deep into the horrors of war and the darkness within his own soul.