Synopsis: A time-stream accident sets a madman loose in the past... While rival houses of nobility use deception and murder to gain power and wealth in Renaissance Italy, a time traveler struggles against the machinations of his evil twin. The only portal back to his time damaged, Noel is condemned to travel blindly into the past. Thrust into sixteenth-century Venice, he arrives just in time to step into a trap set by his mad double, Leon. Sentenced to torture for a crime he didn't commit, Noel attracts the interest of a sorcerer who wants the mirror-image twins under his control. He will plunge Noel into a shadowy realm of terror, madness, and death. There's only one person Noel can trust to help him survive—the very twin who has pledged to destroy him. (from the back cover of the Ace Books first edition)