Throughout the Western world, great kingdoms have fallen and despots lay crushed beneath the heels of Rome's advancing legions. But in this age of magnificent truumph and barbaric cruelty, internal rebellion threatens the stability and survival of the mighty Republic. And an aging, ailing Gaius Marius, heralded which was prophesied many years before: an unprecedented seventh consulship of Rome. It is a prize to be won only through treachery and with blood, petting Marius against a new generation of assassins, power-seekers and Senate intriguers----and setting him at odds with the ambitious, tormented Lucius Cornelius Sulla, once Marius's most trusted right-hand man, now his most dangerous rival.