Poor Lt. Rhys.
He is a lowly acting aide de camp. Family connections got him safely parked away in Battalion headquarters away from the riff-raff of common soldiers.
And he would remain there, polishing his boots forever if it isn't for a strange death in the regiment. The death of a single Union soldier amidst 100,000 comrades typically is not cause for concern. Senior commanders simply want confirmation that local sympathizers are the cause. Hang a couple of Virginia farmers and the killings will stop. Besides, it helps morale.
It's a simple task for an earnest Lt. Rhys. But another soldier is killed. And another. And damn, yet another.
Alarmed, the commander orders young Rhys to collaborate with the only other officer they can muster - a brilliant, eccentric, opium-addicted field surgeon to solve the killings.
The two unlikely investigators stumble through their task while the bizarre murders pile up. Oh, and the young lieutenant discovers that he is now being stalked by the killer.
And then there is the war. It rolls across the countryside like a furious summer storm and the lieutenant, the doctor, the killer and thousands of other soldiers are put through the meat grinder called Gettysburg. Afterwards decimated units reassemble and the dead buried while survivors plod gamely on to the next battle.
But for one soldier there is a strange twist. He inadvertently discovers the identity of the killer that preyed on his unit and killed his friend. Against common sense and the military justice system, he is determined to set things right. If the fog of war is not confusing enough, there is the murky realm of vengeance that he must navigate through. Killing an enemy soldier is one thing; killing one of your own, well, that's just killing.
