A rich and engrossing thread of Romance runs through this tale of the motherless son of a valiant robber baron of Medieval Germany. Young Otto born into a warring household in an age when lawless chiefs were constantly fighting each other or despoiling the caravans of the merchant burghers is raised in a monastery only to return to his family's domain and become painfully involved in the blood feud between his father and the rival house of Trutz-Drachen.