India, 1803. Sergeant Richard Sharpe survives the massacre of a British detachment carried out by the renegade officer William Dodd and follows him into the service of the Maratha Confederacy. Sharpe joins Arthur Wellesley’s campaign and is drawn into the Battle of Assaye, where his pursuit of Dodd becomes entangled with the survival of the British commander and Sharpe’s own future in the army.
Assaye becomes a decisive moment for both Wellesley and Sharpe. The battle places a relatively small British-led force against a much larger Maratha army and gives Sharpe the chance to act beyond the limits of his sergeant’s rank. His pursuit of Dodd remains personal, but battlefield initiative also opens the path toward the officer’s commission that will transform the rest of his military career.
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