THERE I WAS, CROUCHING outside the gates of the agricultural complex with a bunch of frozen police officers, wracked with indecision. What was I supposed to do here? Was there even anything I could do?
There was running the hell away and worrying about the rest later, which sounded theoretically appealing. Except for the part where the House of Anna lived practically on our doorstep. And also knew my name. And could probably starve us out by destroying all our food anyway.
The sheer enormity of what we were facing hit me all at once, and no matter how I turned the problem over in my head, I could only come to one conclusion. Rome was screwed.
Unless—by some miracle—something happened to diffuse the situation. Now. Before things could get worse. And this was beyond anything I could handl
