A teenage soldier in World War I—a simple village boy with a naive youthful dream of fame and medals—throws himself into the unknown and goes blind in the first battle, thus taking on a new job: intercepting enemy planes by listening to the air through huge metal funnels.
The shrill and tragic story about an event that involved Count Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. In an infantry regiment of the military based in the Tula region an offence occurs. In this regiment, the capital’s lieutenant Grigory Kolokoltsev — inspired by progressive ideas — does his service. A military tribunal and execution await the soldier charged with the offence. Kolokoltsev asks Count Tolstoy for help — and he decides to protect the innocent man. The pointed history about the complexity of choice and fidelity to one’s ideals is based on real events.
Returning to Saint Petersburg after a long exile, the dashing Yakovlev, a retired army officer, makes a comfortable living by winning other people's duels. An enigmatic, focused, and extremely skilled professional, he leaves a trail of dead bodies behind him as he swirls through polite society, frequently called upon to wield a pistol as a surrogate in duels at dawn. But when Yakovlev meets the naïve young Prince Tuchov and his beautiful sister, Princess Martha, the normally cold-hearted mercenary is surprised by hitherto undetected emotions. What transpires uncovers a series of revelations about his past and his present self.
