Altar of Victory

Decimus Junius Norbanus was eighteen years old. He was going to Rome from his provincial town to study, as his father had instructed. However, the year was 382 AD, and Junius was not fated to have the quiet life of a student. An astrologer warned him that Mars and Venus were particular dangers to him. Junius was not a credulous young man, but he had to wonder later if it were not true. Mars and Venus, war and love.

Christianity was making a final assault on the ancient religion of the Romans. Junius knew what he believed. ‘I prefer to remain with beauty, even if this world turns out to be so despicable that beauty cannot survive in it. I prefer to stand with truth, even if the whole world is destined to follow a lie. I will remain faithful to the immortal gods…’

The war of religion was not the greatest threat to the empire. The poet Horace had made a prediction many years before.

Alas, a barbarian conqueror
will stand on the ashes,
and the horseman will strike
the city with resounding hooves,
and the bones of Quirinus
which are removed from the winds and the sun
will be scattered arrogantly

And love? Amor vincit omnia. Junius would love two women, each with mysterious charms. He found that he could love both. They were so very different. It was like worshipping two gods on Olympus, like devoting himself to the empire, while revering the memory of the free republic. He could do that – or could he?

Could there be a happy ending in a world sliding toward an unthinkable fall?