"Where are the children?" Petronius rasped hoarsely.
There was a very slight pause. "We sent them back," Norbanus claimed silkily. It seemed a long time since I had heard that urbane voice. "We sent them to the residence."
"Maia!" Petronius insisted. "Are they telling me the truth?"
Norbanus tugged at her arm, at the same time hauling her more upright. She nodded. With her head covered that way, she must feel disoriented. It was a slow movement; I could deduce little from it except that, as Silvanus said, she needed our help urgently.
It was now two days since I had last seen my sister. Anything could have happened to her. From her state now-and remembering how Florius treated Albia-it probably had.
"We'll let her go now," Florius announced. "Falco, move to the crane. She'll come over to you. Longus! You move the other way, then come in."
"I touched Petro slightly on the shoulder, then we moved quickly apart. I could see what they were aiming at. Maia and Petronius would now cross paths at an angle, some distance apart. He had no chance to grab at her. If he tried anything, both Maia and he could be shot.
I reached a position away from Petronius. Norbanus muttered something, then pushed the red-clad figure toward me. He seemed to instruct her to walk forward. She did so, with faltering footsteps, unable to tell where she was going or what was underfoot. Instinctively, I started toward her, but Florius swung his weapon so it covered me. I stopped. He laughed. Maybe he was jumpy, but certainly he enjoyed the power.
"Come on, now!" Florius yelled at Petro. "Don't try anything, Longus. Get in here."
Petronius advanced, watching the hostage. The woman kept coming across the roadway, small feet testing the ground ahead of her uncertainly. Petronius matched his advance to her pace. Eventually they were level, equidistant from the building, a few strides apart. Petronius stopped and said something.
"Don't speak!" bawled Florius frantically. "Mind it-or I'll do you both!"
The hostage walked on. I began to step toward her. Florius had the bolt-shooter aimed at Petro, who remained halted: he seemed to be thinking. Florius urged him on with wild movements of the weapon, finally swinging around to train it on the hostage. Petronius walked forward again. The men at ground level began backing toward the doorway, some ahead of him but others closing in behind.
They were drawing into a tight predatory group. Florius ordered Petronius to put down the shield. He did so, stooping to lay it on the road. As he straightened, Florius barked out another instruction; Petro, using both hands simultaneously, unslung and dropped both his sword and his dagger. Head up and in silence, he had turned to stare back after Maia while Florius angrily motioned him into the customs house.
The door was being opened wider. Outside, I was two strides from the slight-figured woman in red and reaching out for her.
Suddenly, Petronius started and yelled something to me. At the same moment he was rushed. Gangsters snatched him and dragged him inside. The heavy door slammed shut. Petronius was gone.
I ripped off the woman's blindfold and understood what he had said.
"That's not Maia!"
LV
The woman turned out to be a pallid prostitute, half starved, and shaking with nerves. She said they had forced her to do the impersonation. Well, she would. Luckily for her, Silvanus yanked her back out of reach as I lashed out.
As she blinked in the torchlight, I cursed my stupidity. Petronius knew my sister better than I did. He had seen-too late maybe-that this was a decoy: right height, but wrong shape and wrong build. The dress she wore was a tawdry, ill-dyed shade and of coarse-weave material. Even allowing for some distress, her walk was quite wrong.
I raged at this hollow-eyed travesty to tell me where my sister was. She claimed she did not know. She claimed she had never seen Maia. She knew nothing about the children. None of them had been at the warehouse; none were at the customs house.
She was led off.
Someone slipped through the military cordon and joined us: Helena. She stood beside me in silence, carrying a cloak that I knew belonged to my sister-not that we had any use for it.
If the decoy was right, the gang never had Maia, so no exchange had ever been possible. They would have lost nothing if Crixus had killed Petro at the Shower of Gold, and by believing they had power, we had let them get their hands on him unnecessarily. So where in Hades was Maia? And how could we extract Petronius before Florius killed him?
The soldiers were itching to act. I agreed. My one thought now was to rescue Petronius. Already it could be too late.
Florius knew what he had achieved. He appeared once more on that balcony, this time triumphantly showing us two of his men holding Petro between them. Now he had new demands. He wanted a ship, and safe passage for his men and himself to go aboard.
It was at this moment that we were joined by the governor.
Decisions were no longer mine to make. Frontinus must already have been briefed. He took stock very quickly. The life of a Roman officer was at risk, but a public building had been taken over, and if he allowed criminals to do as they liked in this way, his provincial capital would reach a state of anarchy. "I can't have this. We'll go in."
I kept myself under control as best I could. "If you attack the building, they will kill Petronius."
"Don't fool yourself," Frontinus warned. "They intend to kill him anyway."
We were taking too long. Frontinus left me and went into a huddle with his staff officers.
"You could have kept him off the scene," I muttered to Silvanus.
"He's no slouch. He wouldn't hear of going home for borage tea and waiting for a report later. I don't want him here, Falco, believe me. Can't risk losing him to a bloody ballista bolt."
"Oh, such consideration for an imperial legate!"
"It's consideration for myself." Silvanus grinned. "Just think of the reports to write if we let a legate of Augustus get wiped out!"
Now I definitely knew that he was a member of the canny Second.
While the governor brooded bureaucratically, the gang lost patience. Maybe they spotted Frontinus and guessed his hard attitude. Maybe the numbers of soldiers now arriving made them give up hope of negotiating their way out. A shutter smashed open; a ballista shot through the opening nearly killed Silvanus.
We all fled for cover. Silvanus was desperately ordering men to remove Frontinus from the danger zone. There was nothing for it. The legionaries would fight to regain the customs house.
"We can burn them out or batter them."
"Try to save the building," Frontinus said dryly. "I have enough demands on my works budget."
We had no idea what was going on inside. I could only hope that the distraction of an attack would deter Florius from any plans to put Petronius through torture.
I wanted to help but was rebuffed. "Keep out of the way. You're not in the damned army now. Leave this to us, Falco."
Silvanus called the order. Timbers appeared out of nowhere; in a hail of missiles, men rushed the main entrance and started beating in the door. Forming a classic testudo, under walls and a roof of shields, they managed to approach close enough to pile in through windows and shin up to the balcony. Ballistae were fired, but they are long-range weapons. Once the legionaries ran up close, they were more than a match for the gangsters. The speed of their reaction to the first shot seemed to take the mobsters by surprise, and the boys in red soon burst in on them.
There was a sharp bout of fighting inside. Silvanus and his men were ruthless. Ten or so heavies, some bleeding copiously, were taken into custody. A handful had been killed. Norbanus was captured. Soldiers swarmed through the offices, searching for Petro as a priority Uniformed men ran in all directions. But in the chaos, our quarries escaped. I searched the building myself; I scanned all the prisoners and lines of bodies and wounded to make sure: unbelievably, Florius had given us the slip. There was no sign of him. No sign of Maia. No sign of Petronius.