"The Eastern Roman Empire is weak, its enemies threatening from all sides. The widowed Empress Eudokia, in a desperate attempt to save her empire for her young son to inherit, marries not for love, but duty. Yet who she chooses shocks the empire. The traitor Romanus Diogenes. The new emperor sets out to secure the empire, and in the process, makes a discovery so shocking, it calls into question everything Christianity believes, but he dies before he can confirm what he has found. A thousand years later, what he discovered is found once again, triggering a race to find the truth."