Portugal 1808. Captain William Hurst, a young British infantryman injured in an early skirmish of the Peninsular Campaign and now desperate to rejoin his regiment, is horrified to be tasked instead to escort a small party of civilians in search of a missing Portuguese nobleman, Duarte Cabral. The search begins badly and grows frostier. Hurst resents nursemaiding the civilians: Cabral's young English wife, Doña Antonia, and an elderly relative, Sergio Tavares, who have no idea that the man they seek is not what he seems. However by the time events have reduced the small party further, and they discover Cabral's trail, Hurst has altered his opinion of the lady - and when Antonia is taken secretly to meet her husband in a monastery hidden high in the frontier mountains, Hurst is obliged to follow her. Where will Doña Cabral's loyalties lie when she discovers the truth? And when she and Hurst part, what will there be to forgive?