Charlie Gauntlet, a retired spy, is visited by Kit Palfrey, Britain's most notorious Cold War traitor, and finds that Kit has stolen five ancient scrolls that have serious implications for Christianity from a Moscow prison and hidden them in a Scottish monastery. Meanwhile, Charlie's new wife, Bex Olesker, is tracking the Alchemist, a hired assassin, across Europe. Then the impending visit of the Russian president to London begins to bring both plots together.