Once a magpie lived on the edge of a forest close to a marsh. The magpie loved all shining things. She picked up coins and beetle wings and took them to her nest. One day a young Centurion was packing to leave the camp on the marsh. The Empire was shrinking and the camp was being abandoned. As the young man filled a bag with his few belongings his ring slipped from his finger onto the ground. Rations had been short for many months and the ring had become too large. The magpie found the ring next day and flew off triumphantly with it.
Time passed, The magpie died. The nest crumbled. The oak and beech trees of the forest were all cut down. Within the walls of the old barracks a village grew then died of plague. The land became a wheat field and remained so for centuries. Farmers did not like the field. They constantly broke their plows on bits of Roman statuary. They could have used it for grazing but it gave a good crop of wheat.
A young man went rabbit hunting on the field. It was getting dark when he got a rabbit. As he bent to pick up the rabbit he felt a rock under his foot. He picked it up to look at it and he was about to toss it aside when he saw something in the dirt clinging to the rock. It was the ring.
Years later an antique show came to a nearby town, and the man took the ring out of curiosity. He stood in line for a long time and he nearly went home. When a staff member saw the ring he was quickly escorted to a Noted Expert. Cameras were set up and carefully focused on the ring. The Noted Expert checked his finger nails. When the cameras were rolling he spoke up. A treasure, he said, of enormous value. An amazing find. A Centurion's ring!
The rabbit hunter did not sell the ring. He wore it most of the rest of his life. One day when he was very old he was on his way home from the pub when the ring slipped from his wizened old hand and fell to the edge of the road. In the morning the sun glittered momentarily on the ring. A magpie caught the star of light and picked up the ring and flew with it to a nest in the church tower where it joined a pile of aluminum foil and broken glass.