'Does it hurt here?'
'Ouch.'
For heaven's sake, do these aristocrats ration their principles? I mean, why was he the only patrician who didn't feel it beneath him to join the Security Police? And was Rome so starved of criminals that he needed to traipse halfway round the world just to catch defenceless young widows in the act of forgery and fraud? Surely it wasn't beyond Orbilio's talents to find a real felon to hound?
'What about here?' Mavor's fingertip gently probed the next vertebra down.
'Worse.'
Unfortunately, persecution had its rewards, and what supreme irony that was. It was because of Claudia's visit to Santonum last autumn that the Governor had offered him promotion in the first place, and talk about a vicious circle.
If she hadn't come here last September, she wouldn't have contracted her wine to the Scorpion. If she hadn't contracted her wine to the Scorpion, Gabali couldn't have blackmailed her into investigating Clytie's murder. And if Gabali had no leverage against her, she wouldn't have ended up next door to the only man in the Empire who could consign her to penniless exile at the snap of his finger.
This circle wasn't vicious, it was positively sadistic.
'And here?' Mavor asked.
'Ooh-ow.'
The redhead sucked in her breath. 'I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, but yours is not a condition that can be cured overnight. Those backbones will need several days of massage and manipulation, so on behalf of the College of the Hundred-Handed,' she patted Claudia's hand as she linked her arm with hers, 'I offer you hospitality and the hope of a full and speedy recovery.'
Speedy, thought Claudia, was the word. The quicker she solved Clytie's murder, the less likely she'd be caught up in rebellion, the lower her likelihood of attracting the Scorpion's attention, the faster a child killer was brought to justice.
And if leaving Santonum also happened to put three hundred miles between her and that pain in the neck, then so much the bloody better.
Scribes were scurrying about the Governor's palace like ants as that pain in the neck strode down the colonnade. The bitch, he thought. The absolute bitch. Orbilio glowered at one of the marble busts, sending daggers to his ex-wife. How could she? She knew damn well the divorce was absolute. That she, who'd run off with a sea captain from Lusitania, had no further claim on his money. But ho ho, now Marcus Cornelius had been promoted to Head of the Security Police in Aquitania, guess who decided the settlement was unfair and was demanding a full half of his estate?
Committee rooms sped past. Voting halls. Archives.
You bitch, you leave a national scandal behind in your wake and because you know I don't want it resurrected — not here, not in Gaul — you use it as an excuse to squeeze me for every sesterce you can bloody well get. He nodded absently at one of the secretaries, red-faced and puffing, with a quill behind one ear and rolls of parchment stuffed under his arms. Well, you can go to hell, you damned bloodsucking vampire. Marcus Cornelius Orbilio isn't funding anybody's personal gravy train, and it had nothing to do with the money. Goddammit, it was the principle and by Croesus, he was buggered if she was going to make a fool of him twice.
Taking the marble stairs two at a time, he knew they'd married too young, of course, and that was the heart of the trouble. Like most patrician marriages, it was a contract drawn up when both parties were toddlers, politics being everything to the aristocracy these days. Even so. If only she'd talked to him, for gods' sake. It wasn't as though either of them had ever made the other happy, and he'd have willingly given her an annulment or whatever, had she discussed it. Instead she elopes, her family disown her and yours truly becomes the butt of all jokes.
'You could neutralize that in an instant,' his brother had cautioned, in a rare moment of fraternal affection. 'Quit that ridiculous job in the Security Police and take up law like the rest of us, Marcus. It's what Father wanted, for his sons to continue the noble family tradition, and you'd make a bloody fine advocate, too.'
'Maybe so,' he'd told his brother, 'but don't you think it's more noble to be catching murderers and rapists than trying to get them acquitted? Or doesn't their guilt bother you?'
His brother's reply had been something along the lines that there was no place for vocation among the patrician class, that the notion of job satisfaction was idealistic and selfish, and sucking up here and making the right noises there went with the territory, if a chap ever hoped to take a seat in the Senate. To which Orbilio's reply had been something along the lines that blood might be thicker than water, but if his brother genuinely believed that he must be thicker than both, at which point family relations deteriorated to the extent that even his divorce seemed cordial in comparison.
At the top of the stairs he turned right, past painted battles in which horses reared, their eyes rolling sideways as their riders shielded themselves from a shower of spears while the dead and the wounded were trampled beneath their hooves. And to think he'd hoped life would get better! Dammit, Rome still gossiped about his ex-wife's infidelity. His family still sneered at his chosen career. And the only woman he'd ever loved wanted nothing to do with him!
He'd taken this job in Gaul to wash Claudia out of his system, and that had turned into a joke, too. Within days he realized he could no more put her out of his mind than he could turn back the tide or make the sun rise in the north, and lately he'd even stopped trying. He would go to sleep with her image engraved on his eyelids, and when he woke up those dark flashing eyes and wild tangle of curls were still all he ever wanted to see. She radiated that heady combination of beauty, independence and self-centredness that set her apart from every other woman he'd known. Claudia Seferius knew what she wanted then set about getting it without even paying lip service to the word compromise.
She broke every single rule in the book — not to mention a good many laws. She lied and she stole, she fiddled and forged.
And he'd marry her today, if she'd have him.
Taking a salute from a legionary beside a statue of an impossibly youthful Augustus, his attention was caught by a movement from the corner of his eye. Among the bustle of bean-counters and pen-pushers, three more shouldn't have attracted anyone's notice. So why his? As the legionary marched off, Marcus bent to adjust his bootlace and now he realized what it was about this particular trio. Whilst there was nothing furtive about their movements, there was nothing purposeful, either. And whilst the Governor's palace also served as the administrative seat for the province's capital, no one ever sauntered around as though they were on a picnic. There was communication between the three, too. A nod here, a raised eyebrow there. Together it added up to an uncomfortable feeling, but he was wary of calling the guard. For one thing, they were embroiled in a skirmish in the main hall, where some drunken fanatic was shouting anti-Roman insults whilst brandishing a very rusty bent sword. And for another, suppose they were the Governor's guests mooching about? Members of a trade delegation from Burdigala on the Gironde, for example? Or official messengers awaiting orders?
Nevertheless, it could do no harm to watch them, he supposed. And once again, his gut served him well. Hidden behind the statue, he saw the three men stop outside the Governor's office, glance round then draw daggers from inside their tunics. Marcus turned to summon the guard, but even as he spun round, he realized the drunk downstairs was a deliberate diversion. The guard was nowhere in sight. While his own dagger was lying on the top of his desk…
Surprise was his only weapon.
Charging into the room, yelling and screaming at the top of his voice, he managed to at least kick the knife out of the first one's hand. As it spun harmlessly into a corner, the Governor's thirty years of army training kicked in. He overturned his desk in the path of the second assassin, while his scribes scrambled to disarm the third. But having been thwarted of their original purpose, now the men's priority turned to escape — and the only thing standing between them and their freedom was a patrician with high ideals.