At the age of fifteen, Katherine Widcombe, the niece of a baronet, is found missing from her bed whilst visiting her maternal aunt in Bristol. She is returned to her aunt and uncle's home, Widcombe Hall, blindfolded and with the weight of a terrible secret on her young shoulders. Six years later, she is invited to spend Christmas with her cousin, Philippa and her new husband Conrad, Earl of Croston. She is horrified when Conrad confesses his love for her. Dismayed by the awful truth of her past, Katherine returns to the Hall and decides to accept the marriage proposal of Sir Herbert Fox, a man thirty years her senior. But marriage doesn't bring her the peace she craves and in fact, she discovers that her husband has secrets of his own and this will bring terrible consequences for Katherine. These consequences will mean a perilous journey and privations that a woman of Katherine's wealth and rank would never be expected to endure and will draw on all her strength and courage to overcome.