Antonus Paullus faces personal tragedy caused by the greed and double-dealing of Romans, Carthaginians, and Spaniards. The master spy fights his personal demons as he struggles with grief on his path to maturity. The novel deals with the period from 215 to 208 BC when Rome fought Carthage and Hannibal. During this period Antonus Paullus finds love, builds a family, and looses a boyhood friend to patriotism. He battles to lead Rome out of a crisis in the middle of the brutal and barbaric conflict that was to last sixteen years. The young spy helps break Carthage's hold on Spain, thus depriving them of the mineral wealth they needed to pay their mercenaries. This was a turning point in Rome's war of attrition.