King Edward requests that an alliance be forged between the Grey and Mullens families by the marriage of Eleanor to Mullens' village-plundering son Henry, and Eleanor seemingly has no choice but to run away from home to avoid going though with the arrangement. Meanwhile, the visiting trade representative from France turns out to be a woman.

Sir Thomas' son, Armus, returns from 8 years at the Crusades and the Greys journey to the Duke of Arondale's castle to pay their taxes, but there they are attacked by a group of bandits and held hostage along with Mullens and his daughter.

Eleanor is smitten with a handsome thief after she encounters him seemingly robbing from the rich to give to the poor. Meanwhile, Richard and Armus offer to train Cedric for an upcoming tournament in order to make sure that he will lose and thus become discouraged about becoming a knight and resume his path to a monastic life.

Cedric is waylaid while on an errand for Sir Thomas, negotiations founder with the Duke of Worringer, and Sir Thomas and Elizabeth encounter problems in their relationship.

Armus helps his old friend Humphrey, now a petty thief, stop an assassination attempt. Meanwhile Cedric runs into problems at a convent while recuperating from a snakebite, and Sir Thomas must entertain Elizabeth's boring son and daughter at the castle.

A bumbling student knight decides to become Eleanor's protector, and Mullens hatches another plot against the Greys. Meanwhile, the sister of Sir Thomas's late wife Anne comes to visit and looks enough like her to sweep Sir Thomas off his feet and endanger his relationship with Elizabeth.

Richard is enchanted by a lovely young woman who is being accused of witchcraft and hunted down by an evil Abbott. Meanwhile, the Friar announces that he wishes to leave Sir Thomas's service.