"e;The air is different than it was, imi-ib... I sometimes wonder if we can go back to what was far less than even we imagine…"e; Eight years have passed since Octavius Caesar – now Augustus – discovered the fate of Arsinoë and her daughter, Aetia. He has built Rome an empire on the bones of the fallen Ptolemies and his great-uncle, Julius Caesar, now worshipped as a god. But the peace of his world is threatened from within by a conspiracy that echoes the murderous past he is so desperate to forget, and the only one who can save him from it may be the girl he fears the most… Free-spirited Aetia is perfectly satisfied to leave Rome to Octavius and his contentious inner circle. But when the gods of Egypt choose her to avert a disaster that could destroy everything her beloved mother fought to defend, she and her father's suspicious heir will have to put aside their differences if they are to prevent their enemies from altering the very course of history…
