In summer, 1546, King Henry VIII is slowly dying. His Protestant and Catholic councillors are engaged in a final power struggle and whoever wins will control the government of Henry's successor, 8-year-old Prince Edward. As heretics are hunted across London, and the radical Protestant Anne Askew is burned at the stake, the Catholic party focus their attack on Henry's 6th wife, Matthew Shardlake's old mentor, Queen Catherine Parr. Shardlake is summoned to Whitehall Palace and asked to help the beleaguered Queen.