Only when fear is at its most intense can true heroism come into the light.

In the year A.D. 9, three legions of the Emperor Augustus are massacred in the forests of Germania. It is a defeat that fills the heart of the Roman Empire with terror.

Meanwhile, in Rome, Gaius Justus Vitalis and his surviving men are struggling with the trauma of their battle with the Immortui in the Carpathian Mountains, an experience that has changed them forever.

When shades of the dead whisper to Gaius that something more sinister and terrible is responsible for Rome’s recent defeat in Germania, he knows that his days of peace are numbered.

Aware of Gaius and his men’s unique experiences, the Emperor orders them across the Danube frontier to discover what has happened to the lost legions, and to bring the perpetrators to justice. The stakes are high, and Gaius knows that if he does not succeed, he and his family are doomed.

With a handful of warriors, and a boy who may hold the key to his enemy’s defeat, Gaius crosses the frontier to hunt down the truth behind the horrors he suspects in the forests of Germania.