RED COAT: BOOK 4: The Serpent's Throne Jedediah "Red Coat" Stone is a man of the high, lonely places, haunted by the ghost of his wife and the weight of a past he cannot outrun. His solitary life is shattered when a dying man's last words thrust upon him a terrible inheritance: a map to a prize far more dangerous than gold. He becomes the unwilling keeper of the Libro de los Pecados, the Ledger of Sins-a meticulous two-hundred-year-old secret that could topple an empire. The quest for truth becomes a desperate flight for survival as Jedediah is hunted by a trinity of relentless predators. There is Silas Kane, "The Vulture," a human predator whose greed has burned away to reveal a singular, murderous obsession. There is Don Alejandro Vargas, "The Serpent," an aristocrat of immense wealth and power, who commands a secret army and has held the territory in his coils for centuries. And a new, more terrifying player emerges from the shadows: Captain Josiah Harlow, "The Eagle," a cold, brilliant U.S. Army officer who sees the land not as a home, but as an asset to be acquired for his hungry, young nation. Jedediah is not alone in his flight. He is joined by a fragile, broken fellowship forged in fire and blood. Tala, a fierce Ute warrior with a heart full of righteous fury, becomes his reluctant guide and indispensable partner. And Father Mateo, a disgraced priest, becomes the living vessel for the Ledger's terrible secrets, his mind a battlefield for the ghosts of a bloody history. Together, they must navigate a landscape of shifting allegiances and brutal betrayals, from the sacred valleys of the Jicarilla Apache to the treacherous smugglers' roads of the Jornada del Muerto, where every friendly face could hide a bounty hunter's greed. Their journey culminates in a suicidal gambit: an infiltration of the Serpent's Nest itself during the Order's most holy celebration. In a night of fire, blood, and unthinkable sacrifice, the head of the Serpent is severed. But victory comes at a catastrophic cost. In the smoldering aftermath, a new, more insidious cage is forged. Rescued by the very man who hunted them, they are no longer fugitives. They are assets, bound in service to the Eagle's new American empire, their war for freedom just beginning.