Rome, 49 BC. Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon and advances into Italy while Pompey and the Senate prepare to abandon the capital. Before Pompey leaves, his cousin is found strangled in Gordianus’s garden, making the Finder personally responsible for solving the murder.
Gordianus’s family is divided between the opposing camps, with one son serving Caesar and a son-in-law vulnerable to Pompey. The investigation forces him to uncover the dead man’s political secrets while the institutions that normally support law and evidence collapse around him.