1791. The age of belief and superstition is passing. A new light dawns. In Paris, revolution threatens to set the world ablaze. But whose hand stokes the fire? Across the sea in England, Thomas Peach lives in quiet retirement. Some call him a magician, others a madman. But when his friend the poetess Arabella Farthingay falls prey to a sinister seducer, Mr Peach’s fading powers are called on once more. He follows her to France and into a world where reason contends with terror, brotherhood with bloodshed, and the last remnants of faith with the oldest enemy of them all.