It's 1340 AD. A medieval baron and his company of soldiers are abducted into the larger universe to soldier for aliens led by a 'Demon Jester.' Their lives were saved from an ocean typhoon, but the price is high. The Demon Jester's merchant association has gotten it's own successful war-making primitive army, but the lives of the individual 'primitive' slave-soldiers are worthless in their culture's society. Examples are made. The Baron doesn't like it, and looks for a way to save his men, wife, and child.
This novel has three distinct parts: the abduction and settling in (well done), the later years in alien's employ (drags), and the Excalibur Alternative (abrupt perspective shift-over) near the end. Weber goes overboard on conversational exposition, resulting in the characters telling the reader what happened, instead of showing and describing events.
