According to the Treaty of Prut, Russia lost its conquests in the south, and Tsar Peter, after the victory over Sweden, began to prepare a new war with the Turks, but did not have time. Under his successors, everything went to pieces, things came to the point that the nobility in the person of the eight “supreme leaders” decided to limit the king’s power to “conditions” and rule independently. Empress Anna Ioannovna, relying on the support of the guard, broke the “conditions”, becoming an autocratic empress, and decided to follow the path indicated by Peter the Great. And Europe is restless: there is a struggle for the Polish throne, the Swedes are conducting secret correspondence with the Turkish Sultan, whose troops are constantly threatening Russian lands, and Russia’s allies are very unreliable... A new novel by a recognized master of historical and action-packed prose.