Attilius Scaurus, a young citizen of Hadrian's Rome, has run up debts and is in danger of bringing his prominent family into disrepute.

To avoid a scandal, the family arrange for Attilius to be conscripted into the army and put into the care of a relative, the Legate of the Sixth Legion, stationed at York.

But Prasutacus has heard rumours that the Romans are about to leave Britain for good, and concludes that he can now deal with his daughter's lover without danger of retribution.

Now a fashionable young lawyer at Gray's Inn, he has offered to help with the elaborate preparations that are being made for a visit of Queen Elizabeth to the home of Lord Montague, the father of a friend.

Now in fear of his life, Anthony prepares to flee, but is prevented by Sir Francis Walsingham who asks him to undertake a private mission spying on the court of King Phillip in Spain.

As Adrian looks out across the city he is puzzled by what he thinks is a new building - the dome of St Peter's: it was the first time he had seen Rome for eighteen hundred years.

Mason had discussed the original idea for the book with his friend Rudyard Kipling, and consulted him as the story neared completion.

[2] Reviewing the first edition for The Sunday Times, Ralph Straus considered the book to be "frankly, a disappointment", with little to distinguish it from other treatments of metempsychosis.