The Tsar's Business

The mid-17th century. Cannons thunder, thick gunpowder smoke crawls over the ground, and cannonballs whistle as they smash the крепостні walls and towers!

Cavalry charges wildly—sabre flashes—and at sea there are ships with blue hulls, three golden crowns on their flags. The flag of the Swedish King Charles Gustav! The Baltic Sea is already “the Swedes’ lake,” and Swedes in the Baltic are everywhere.

Another Russo-Swedish war is underway, and the Russian army—under the command of the very Tsar—heads to Livonia. The goal is the siege and capture of Riga. It’s a difficult task, and it would be great to have a trusted man among the besieged.

Such a man becomes Nikita Petrovich Buturlin, a young landowner from Tikhvin who had previously made a name for himself in the Swedish city of Nien.

Nien is taken, and now Buturlin must penetrate Riga without raising suspicion. Find a job, get the right contacts, gather information, pass it to the Russian army—then, after carrying out this important state mission, go to distant Africa, where the Swedes have a colony: the Gold Coast.

And everything would be fine… if only Nikita Petrovich hadn’t run into a shrewd young lady whom many people considered a witch…