Mesopotamia

The battleground of Beneventum still dallied in Rome’s collaborative memory as a strange admixture of triumph and apprehension. Pyrrhus had withdrawn, defeated not by a single decisive blow but by prostration, by the stubborn grind of Roman adaptability, and by the stirring runs of Italian politics that deprived him of abettors . Yet indeed as the bank cleared and the Epirote king sailed down, leaving only fractions of his formerly-grand ambition behind, Rome set up itself poised on the edge of metamorphosis. Palm had n't brought peace; it had brought occasion — dangerous, tempting, and laden with liabilities the Republic had noway 

With the appearance of early spring, the denes and plains of southern Italy exfoliate their downtime silence, awakening with the restless murmurs of renewed conflict. The wind that swept across the Ionian seacoast carried with it the smell of blooming vineyards and damp soil, yet beneath this pledge of renewal lay the heavy shadow of war. Farmers returning to their fields set up the earth scarred with the remnants of camps, fosses, and forgotten spearheads buried in the slush. Roads were worn deep by cart bus hauling inventories to and from Tarentum, and distant columns of bank marked the shops where blacksmiths pounded munitions for 

The ocean, calm and deceptive beneath the rising sun, stretched from the southern tip of Italy to the distant props of Sicily, a liquid trace that would soon carry Rome’s intentions beyond the promontory. For decades, the Italian Republic had concentrated inward, conquering Samnites, subduing Lucanians and Bruttians, and integrating the Greek metropolises of Magna Graecia. Its legions, forged in the gauntlet of Pyrrhus’s juggernauts, had come the backbone of a chastened, adaptable military force. Yet the world beyond Italy remained a complex shade of power, wealth, and ambition. Carthage, with its lines patrolling the western 

The steps coming down the stairs were n't simply loud; they were incredibly heavy, each one making the rustic way creak as though bearing the weight of commodity far larger than a mortal being. Tarek felt the climate through the floorboards, pulsing up through his shoes and into his bones, each step sounding like it belonged to a critter sculpted out of gravestone and shadow. Arman artificially backed up until his shoulders hit the cold

The voice that rumored her name was n’t loud. It was n’t hanging . It was n’t distorted like the critter’s icy, concentrated speech. rather, it sounded soft — far too soft — like a breath pressed gently against her observance, a private murmur meant only for her. The impropriety of its tenderheartedness stupefied Maya’s blood more deeply than any monstrous roar could have. She staggered backward artificially, her heel catching on the depraved floorboard behind her, but her aspect