Aurelia knows exactly what she's doing when she engages in a clandestine affair with Cassius, a plebeian soldier: plotting her escape from her mundane and privileged life on one of Rome's seven hills.

Her plans are routed when Cassius's legion suddenly leaves Rome, she realizes she's pregnant, and her family arranges her betrothal to Domitius, a power-hungry senator.

Abortion or exile are now her only choices.

Aurelia sacrifices her baby and her freedom in order to wed Domitius, all in the name of duty and satisfying her ancestors, whom she has the power to visit in the Underworld.

Resigned to a dull and loveless life, Aurelia is shocked to discover that her husband and uncle conspire to kill the emperor and destroy the empire—a move that would disgrace her, her entire family, and her ancestors. Unable to stand by while her uncle razes everything her family once stood for to the ground, she poisons him.

Now a criminal, Aurelia flees, undertaking a thousand-mile odyssey which threatens poverty, slavery, death, and dishonor. What is Rome to her now? That is the question she must face as she forges a new life with people she would have called "barbaric" from her ancestors' hilltop perch.

Start reading now to join Aurelia on an epic adventure that spans a thousand miles.

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