 Each of the 14 chapters plus an epilogue is headed by a quote from a fictional newspaper article, some written by the novel's characters.The novel opens with a young Russian woman of "progressive" sympathies, Varvara Suvorova, traveling to meet her fiancé Pyotr Yablokov, who has volunteered to fight in the war between Russia and the Ottoman Empire.Her guide steals all her luggage and disappears as she approaches the war zone, but she is rescued by Erast Fandorin, who has been fighting as a volunteer to forget his tragedy.