Florence, 1291. In a disused church on the ouskirts of the city the disfigured corpse of a master mosaic artist sits at the foot of his latest - unfinished - creation. Young, ambitious Dante Alighieri, Prior of the City, is sent out to investigate. He quickly discovers not only that the church hides secrets of its own, but that the murdered man was connected to a shadowy organisation known as the Third Heaven, a disparate band of scholars and adventurers whose influence could undermine the city's government - in favour of the all-powerful Catholic church and its brutal emissaries. Seeking to uncover the truth in the mosaic that was too dangerous to be told, Dante is drawn into a power struggle that leads him back into the secrets and myths of an ancient imperial dynasty - and into peril as the charms of a mysterious smoky-eyed dancer begin to blind his reason...