The year is 1290--twilight of the Crusades. War-weary Knight Templar, Jonathan St. Clair, is garrisoned in the port city of Acre and more interested in learning Kabbalah than fighting Moslems. He possesses an ancient scroll with a cryptic inscription, the key to unlocking the secrets of Jerusalem's Temple Mount. But none of the Jewish scholars in Acre can decipher the inscription. And time is running out. Acre will soon come under siege, and the one man able to decipher the scroll's meaning, Rabbi Samuel of Baghdad, has been targeted for assassination. Deep in enemy territory, St. Clair apprentices himself to Rabbi Samuel as they travel to Jerusalem, risking everything to fulfill their shared and sacred destiny as guardians of the Temple Mount.