Wait for me, he had said, but two days later, it was Julia who stood at the docks in stunned disbelief as she watched Agrippa's flotilla of ships leaving for the open waters. She had barely managed to say goodbye. Even if she had caved in to temptation and tried to rush down the way to hold him before he left, she would haven't been able to wade past the sea of sobbing women that crowded the beach. Wives were already mourning their husbands, mothers their sons. War had come.
Word had come that a bloody coup had topped the Rome-supporting government on the island of Mytilene, and every hour, every minute that the troops delayed was one too many. Agrippa had been on the way to a council meeting, rumors said, when a messenger barreled into the streets, pounded on the door of his carriage and
