They found only one man alive. His leg had been gashed and infection had set in quickly. They found him when they heard him move to kill a rat that came too close to the smell of blood. He smashed its head with a stone and then yelled in terror as Julius’s men took him by the arms and brought him out into the light. After days in darkness, the man could hardly bear even the weak morning sun, and he babbled crazily at them as they dragged him back to the ships.

Julius summoned Cabera as soon as he saw the swollen leg, though he guessed it was useless. The man’s lips were rimed dry crusts and he wept without tears as they tipped a bowl of water into his mouth. Cabera probed the puffy flesh of the leg with his long fingers, finally shaking his head. He stood to one side with Julius.

“It has turned poisonous and reached right up to his groin. It’s too late to take it off. I can try to ease the pain of it, but he hasn’t much time left.”

“Can’t you . . . put your hands on him?” Julius asked the old man.

“He’s gone too far, Julius. He should be dead already.”

Julius nodded with bitter resignation, taking the bowl from his men and helping the man to hold it to his lips. The skeletal fingers shook too much to keep it still, and as Julius held one of them, he almost recoiled from the fever heat that burned through the taut skin.

“Can you understand me?” he asked.

The man tried to nod as he sipped, and choked horribly, turning bright red with the efforts that tore at his remaining strength.

“Can you tell me what happened?” Julius pressed, willing the man to breathe. Finally the spasms died and the man let his head fall onto his chest, exhausted.

“They killed everyone. The whole country’s in flames,” he whispered.

“A rebellion?” Julius asked quickly. He had expected some foreign invader, rampaging through a few coastal towns and back to ships. It was a common enough tale in that part of the world. The man nodded, motioning with his quivering fingers for the water bowl. Julius passed it to him, watching as he emptied it.

“It was Mithridates,” the man said, his voice hoarse and raw. “When Sulla died, he called them . . .” He coughed again and Julius stood in shock, walking out onto the deck and away from the ripe smell of sickness that had filled the room. Sulla was dead? He gripped the rail of Celsus’s ship until his hands cramped. He hoped it had been a slow agony for the man who had taken Marius from him.