“Britannia was a weird place, no question. Growing up in a Mediterranean clime, Scipio never imagined in a thousand years that he would come here. Britannia was so cold and distant and insular and northerly as to be almost mythological, a miserably damp demi-realm confabulated out of gray stone and wet leaves and coarse grass. A different sun hung over Britain, a worn, debased tin version of the great golden coin that stared unblinking down at Rome.”
