“Search the waters!” A familiar shout went up from near the castle. “Find that traitor!”

To where does one flee when hunted by the world? What if you, the accused, held the very fate of the Ancien Régime in your grasp? And to survive, you had to become someone else?

Espionage has a new face in the age of revolution. Meet a legend in the making.

Against the sweeping backdrop of the Swiss Alps in 1791, this first instalment to the series “Vain & Valour” unfolds. In a confederacy poised on the brink of chaos, where secrets are currency, loyalty is a luxury, and every precarious step swings between survival and destruction, one false move could ignite revolution across Switzerland’s neutral cantons. A mysterious fugitive ensnared in an assassination plot becomes the unwitting agent of destiny. But with the past holding the key to the future, will his choices save a nation or destroy it?

Just as the title suggests, this narrative juxtaposes forces and themes that interplay brilliantly throughout its pages. As much a comedy of manners as it is a spy thriller, moments of laugh-out-loud absurdity collide with heart-pounding tension as we witness the birth of a secret agent. We encounter characters — peasants and aristocrats, altruists and schemers, lovers and fighters — who each embody the struggles between selfish ambition and noble sacrifice.

“Vain & Valour” is more than a historical epic; it’s a celebration of genre-blending artistry. A symphony of contrasts that captures the dance of deception and loyalty, burlesque and drama, mystery and romance, folly and grandeur. Evoked is the essence of Fleming, Dumas, le Carré, Hugo, Ludlum, and Fielding. Blended is the brilliance of adventure with the complexity of character study, where the vanity of one man is pitted against his capacity for valorous deeds.

This is a story that promises not only to captivate with its plot but to resonate with its depth. Espionage has never looked so good.

“In vain doth valour bleed...” — Milton