AD 72. Titus Flavius Vespasianus, known as Vespasian, is Emperor of
Rome, but his grip on power grows increasingly fragile as economic
disaster threatens. The enormous riches from his Judaean campaigns are
all but spent, legions go unpaid, and the yields from Rome's vital
Spanish goldfields have fallen dramatically since the civil war.
Gaius Valerius Verrens is recently married and building a new home when
the summons arrives from the Emperor. Vespasian needs a man with the
combined skills of a lawyer and a soldier to investigate what is
happening in remote, mountainous Asturica Augusta where the authorities
claim a bandit called The Ghost is ravaging the gold convoys.
But when Valerius arrives in Asturica he faces a much more complex
situation. Stalked from the shadows he cannot tell ally from enemy, the
exploited native tribes are a growing threat, and the tortured landscape
itself seems capable of swallowing him up. Gradually he finds himself
drawn into a much wider conspiracy, one that could plunge the Empire
into a new conflict and that will place him on a deadly collision course
with his old friend and most dangerous adversary, the former gladiator
Serpentius.