36 AD - The city of Alexandria is a center of Roman commerce—and a sinful playground for the pleasure-seeking rich and powerful. For wealthy merchant Decimus Tarquitius Aculeo, however, Alexandria has become a living hell. Ruined by a string of mysterious investment disasters, abandoned by friends and family, Aculeo is desperate to recover his wealth and status. Aculeo's search for the reasons behind his downfall draws him into a web of violence. A common slave is found murdered in the magnificent temple of the god Serapis. Days later, the brutalized body of a high-priced hetaira is discovered floating in a canal, after an evening entertaining the city’s elite. The grim truth soon becomes clear: A ruthless killer is moving among Alexandria’s aristocrats, commercial titans, and philosophers. Ominous clues connect those murders to Aculeo’s own quest. Aided by an Egyptian mortuary attendant, a brilliant philosopher, an exotic hetaira, and his last remaining friends, Aculeo must unmask and stop a deadly murderer if he is ever to reclaim the life he has lost. But first, he must survive…