Contains spoilers for this episode and earlier episodes.
Shipwrecked Vorenus and Pullo reach an isolated shore with no supplies and little hope of rescue. They build a raft using the bodies of drowned comrades and make their way back towards the mainland. Their absence leaves them outside the battle taking shape between Caesar and Pompey. Caesar has received only a fraction of the reinforcements he needs, while Pompey has the stronger army and could wait for hunger to weaken his opponent. The senators around Pompey demand a decisive victory instead. He gives in to their pressure, attacks at Pharsalus and loses, leaving his supporters to decide whether to surrender or continue the war elsewhere.
Caesar welcomes Brutus and Cicero back rather than punishing them. In Rome, the news reverses Atia and Servilia's positions, while Octavia's sympathy for Servilia becomes an intimate attachment. Vorenus and Pullo unexpectedly meet Pompey travelling with his family. Pullo sees a chance for a reward, but Vorenus hears the defeated general's account and lets him leave for Egypt. Caesar is furious when they report this mercy, yet spares them, convinced that their repeated escapes suggest divine protection. Pompey's journey offers no such reprieve. On reaching Egypt he is murdered by Septimius, a Roman serving the Egyptian court, while his family watches from their boat.