In 1390 two monks are murdered at Hailes Abbey and its celebrated relic of the Holy Blood is stolen. Crispin Guest becomes involved in returning the relic while trying to protect a former enemy from a murder charge. The enquiry draws him into the affairs of a mysterious woman and into political tensions that reach back towards Richard II’s court. Away from London, Crispin must judge a community in which monastic authority, pilgrimage income, personal grievance and devotion are tightly intertwined.
Hailes Abbey was a major Cistercian house whose Holy Blood relic became one of medieval England’s best-known pilgrimage attractions. Westerson uses that historical setting to show why the theft of a relic could threaten far more than private piety: shrines generated prestige, visitors and revenue, and questions about authenticity did not erase their social power. Set during Richard II’s reign, the novel contrasts the routines of a religious house with the political world Crispin once inhabited, while continuing the series’ interest in the material consequences of belief.
