PROLOGUE

PROLOGUE

JULY, 44 BCE

They say a comet burned across the Roman sky the summer after he died.

A streak of fire. Brilliant, unnatural, divine.

Some said it was a sign from the gods. Others said it was a god. The soul of Julius Caesar, ascending to the heavens, leaving behind the body they’d stabbed 23 times on the Senate floor.

The people called it the Sidus Iulium, Caesar’s Star.

Because what do you do when a man like that dies?

You immortalize him. You rewrite the laws of nature. You pretend the sky had always planned for this. You name a star after the man who broke your world open and rebuilt it in his own image.

Julius Caesar wasn’t supposed to happen.

Rome was a Republic. Cold, calculating, ruled by Senate and tradition. You weren’t supposed to rise through charisma. You weren’t supposed to court the mob. You weren’t supposed to crown yourself king in all but name.

And you sure as hell weren’t supposed to live long enough to get away with it.

But he did.

He seduced empires. He crossed sacred lines. He fought civil wars in the name of peace, and declared himself Dictator perpetuo, dictator for life, like it was already true.

And when they killed him for it, they made him eternal.

This is not the story of a humble servant of the state.
This is not the story of a tragic victim.
This is the story of a man who knew what he was.
And dared to act like it.

You already know how it ends.

Knives. Blood. Marble. Betrayal.

But that’s not where it started.
To understand why the skies burned…
You have to go back.
To where the fire began.