In 1698, Sicily faced a succession problem of its own involving one of Palermo’s most powerful and wealthy noble families, the Albamonte. The head of the family, Emanuele Duke of Motta, had been at war on behalf of the Spanish and was returning home when his ship was attacked by Turks and Emanuele died fighting to defend it.

The duke left behind a wife, Aloisia, who was carrying a child in her womb, the fruit of their last lovemaking, and an ambitious younger brother, the twenty-eight-year-old RAIMONDO.

The viceroy of Sicily’s dispositions were clear: should Lady Aloisia bring a daughter into the world, Raimondo would become the new Duke of Motta. But if it were a son, he would be named the child’s guardian until the boy came of age.

A boy was born. But the Albamonte family was then rocked by another tragic event. Lady Aloisia and her child were kidnapped – by a servant of her deceased husband, according to an official investigation – and the two vanished into nowhere.

At that point, Raimondo became the new Duke of Motta. Yet he was actually the man behind the kidnapping and disappearance of Aloisia and his nephew and had given orders that they be killed.

However, while his murderous plan had been successful in Aloisia’s case, the newborn heir did not meet the same fate and was saved and raised by GIROLAMO AMMIRATA, a member of the mysterious confraternity of the “Beati Paoli”.

Besides this unexpected twist, of which he was unaware, Raimondo had not taken into account others who saw a dark side to the tragedy, such as Aloisia’s father, PRINCE GERACI, and an influential aristocrat, CORIOLANO DELLA FLORESTA, for who Emanuele Albamonte had been a genuine mentor and who was secretly the actual head of the Beati Paoli. Above all, Raimondo had not taken fate into account.

In fact, fifteen years later, what made this smouldering tension explode was the arrival in Palermo of a knight with no past in search of redemption and of his origins, the son of nobody, BLASCO DA CASTIGLIONE

Genre: Period Drama, Thriller

Executive Producer: Giuseppe Tornatore

Location: Italy

Language: Italian