Agnes was running as fast as her legs would carry her. She was dragging Dieter along beside her, her heart pounding, her mouth dry, her breath coming in great, sobbing gulps... She was running as if her life depended on it-and she knew it did.

1944. When the war comes to twelve-year-old Agnes' village her life changes in an instant. Her father is dragged away by soldiers and her mother is mercilessly killed, leaving Agnes and her younger brother Dieter orphaned. Frightened, and surrounded by enemies, Agnes has no choice but to carry out her mother's dying wish, whispered to her before the light flickered from her eyes: Promise you'll look after your brother for me, Agnes... But when Dieter's hand slips from her own while crossing a river, the rest of Agnes's world shatters in an instant-has she truly lost everything?

Cambridge, present day. When her beloved grandfather dies, Freya is distraught. Not only has she lost the man who helped raise her, but she knows his stories of World War Two, and a part of her family history, is gone forever. But when Freya meets her new neighbor Agnes, whose accent is just like her grandfather's, she notices a weather-beaten image of a little blond boy in braces and boots that looks strangely familiar... Could Agnes hold the key to unlocking Freya's past?

But Agnes has terrible secrets of her own, and she vowed never to speak about the little boy in the photograph who risked everything to save her... But if she doesn't, she might never discover what happened to her little brother all those years ago...