If one lives long enough, they will experience more than their share of profound sorrow.... Tragedy and death are the latest obstacles that stand in the way of William Barrow (aka Judas Iscariot) staying true to the burden upon his His mission to reclaim the thirty blood coins that were his payment for betraying Jesus Christ. William and his companions return from Hungary to the United States, where they must find a new and secure place to call home. Alistair's suggestion of New Orleans appears to be the right choice... until an old nemesis comes to town. Ratibor... the bloodthirsty killer who once slaughtered prostitutes for food under the name 'Jack the Ripper', and a villain successful at eluding William's and Roderick's efforts to apprehend him for more than a millennium. Known to surface every eighty to one hundred-twenty years, the immortal serial killer usually stays in Europe. However, this time Ratibor seeks to avenge an old score with William, who as Emmanuel Ortiz interfered with Ratibor's feasting on human flesh and blood in London during the horrific Whitechapel crimes of 1888.On the heels of the last misadventure with Krontos Lazarevic, and later Viktor Kaslow, the emergence of older enemies promises to increase as William closes in on recovering his last few coins. Ratibor takes what is more precious to William than the sum total of his coins and draws him back once more to Eastern Europe, this time to the Balkans. However, it isn't simply a matter of finding a cursed coin.... Plagued with a heavy heart, the immortal man better known as Judas Iscariot must find a way to stop this fiend before Ratibor goes into hibernation with the assured reality of striking violently again in the distant future.Much is at stake, and for William, the painful realization that seeking to atone for his most famous sin upon the earth's stage can't guarantee lasting happiness.