Trapped with his back to the sea, Major Richard Sharpe and a handful of men must stand against a battalion of French troops. Winter, 1814 - The invasion of France is under way, and the British Navy has called upon the services of Major Richard Sharpe. Sharpe's mission seemed simple: capture a small unguarded French coastal fort, cripple Napoleon's supply lines, and retreat across the sea. But behind the lines, Sharpe's old enemy, Pierre Ducos, awaits Sharpe's arrival with a battalion of French soldiers and a vicious commanding general who keeps the scalps of his dead enemies as trophies. Outmaneuvered by Ducos' treachery and abandoned by his own navy, Sharpe has only two choices: to escape with the aid of the charming, unscrupulous American mercenary, Cornelius Killick, or die.