• explicit sexual activity: FMC & MMC have multiple consensual sexual encounters

• grief due to brothers’ deaths: FMC’s beloved brother has recently died when the story opens, and MMC’s beloved brother dies from illness before the midway point of the book

• human violence during war: Chapters 1 thru 14 take place during the 19th-century Peninsular War with combat injuries and deaths; somewhat graphic, on-page depictions occur in:

       – Chapter 5 – death of a British soldier; FMC’s first experience killing French combatants; FMC sustains a relatively minor injury

       – Chapter 10 – MMC sustains a relatively minor injury

       – Chapter 11 – MMC is critically injured

       – Chapter 12 – violent siege & sack of Badajoz, Spain, by the Anglo-Portuguese Army

       – Chapter 13 – FMC is critically injured

       – Chapter 14 – FMC undergoes surgery

• death of horses during war:

       – Chapter 7, on-page – MMC’s much-loved horse dies

       – Chapter 10, off-page – reference to a horse being shot during combat

• on-page passive suicidal ideation [Chapter 1]: FMC has resigned herself to death at war and feels she would not be sorry if it happens; this is referenced briefly at several other points

• casual remarks about sexual violence by incidental characters [midway point of Chapter 12]: a brief scene in which British soldiers are on the verge of sexually assaulting a Spanish civilian; FMC intervenes before the soldiers can follow through

• past off-page violence and neglect in a family home: FMC’s stepfather was physically abusive to both FMC and her older brother