The time is 1771 and the colony of North Carolina teeters on an uneasy edge - an internal conflict between the colonial aristocratic rich planters and the struggling pioneers of the backcountry is threatening to explode. Jamie Fraser is a man of worth - respected by all, born of good family and possessed at last of the land he has longed for. But Jamie has a lot to lose. His wife, Claire, is known notoriously as a wisewoman or a witch. As a traveller from the twentieth century she is all these things and more. Her unique view of the oncoming Revolution is both a deliverance and a danger- a torch that may light Jamie's way in the perilous years ahead or the spark that may ignite a conflagration that will leave their lives in ashes. And far more than just their lives hang in the balance. The lives of Jamie's tenants, his daughter Brianna, her husband Roger, his grandson Jemmy, his nephew Ian and his foster son Fergus could all get caught in the blaze. Claire and Jamie know war only as those can who have survived it can. And they will have to use all that knowledge, and more, to follow the path of the fiery cross to battle once more...and try to survive it if they can.