'As do mine, young man,' the physician replied sharply. 'Now lie still or I'll make you sew your wounds up yourself, and you can get back into bed, too, madam.'
Rosenna's lips pinched. 'Holy Nox, you don't seriously expect me to make a run for it in blooming bandages?'
Pushing her thick tangle of curls back from her face as the physician announced that she wouldn't be running anywhere with that amount of blood loss, young woman, and anyway, if the investigator intended to press charges, she'd be in the army's infirmary, not the temple's, Rosenna felt a rush of colour to her cheeks.
She glanced awkwardly at Orson, who beamed proudly back.
She twizzled a curl.
The colour of rosehips in autumn, eh?
Claudia watched the exchange and thought, they'll be all right, her and Orson. Both were fighters in their different ways, and though he was younger than her, just like her brother, he had a wise head on his shoulders, and Claudia envied the man who could truly be content with himself.
Yet something wasn't right. Although the infirmary was warm, goose pimples rose on her arm and the hair prickled on the back of her neck. It was as though the Herald of Death had just passed.
But if Terrence was in chains, Darius was innocent, Orbilio was alive… who was being summoned?
Aurelia stared at the goblet on the wooden table. Everyone said hemlock was painless, but no one she knew had firsthand experience. She wouldn't know for sure until she drank.
But there was nothing to live for. So long as Felix was suffering, she had been happy — if happy was the right word. She'd been able to wallow in her own cast-offmisery, barren, unloved and empty. Her world had revolved solely round retribution, calling upon Veive for revenge. Veive had answered. He sent his arrows straight into Felix, and the winged avenger dipped them in poison for her without even asking.
She had watched impassively as the evidence mounted against him. The clerk testifying that it was Felix Musa who'd incited him to steal from the Treasury. The witnesses who'd seen Felix stash it away in his saddlebags. That actor had been worth every penny, she thought. The way he'd impersonated her ex-husband's walk, his dress, his every mannerism. Not that Aurelia attended the trial. She was supposed to be the tolerant ex, and of course she could have gone along to support him, but what if her emotions gave her away? She'd stayed in Cosa, content that he'd been found guilty, his assets stripped, his shame and humiliation made public — exactly like hers had been.
Fifteen years. Fifteen years she'd loved that man, and then what? He threw her away like an old sandal, and it wasn't her fault his father and mother were dead. They took their own lives. It was their decision, not hers, but oh how she rejoiced when Mariana had died giving birth. Now Felix would know what it was like not to have children. To be barren and sterile, like her.
And then Claudia brought her face to face with him again. Her Felix. Her very own Felix…
The love that she'd felt from the beginning welled up, but this time it came with an emptiness like she'd never known. He would not take her back. Not now, not ever; it was over. She'd hurt him too deeply for him to reciprocate, they couldn't even build again on a friendship, and now he was leaving with some coloured bitch and, worse, adopting her white bastard child.
As long as Aurelia had believed Felix dead she hadn't cared, but now, oh, the pain. The pain of seeing him, loving him, of being not only discarded for another woman a second time, but hated. Truly hated.
'Wolf-headed Aita is waiting,' the Herald of Death whispered softly.
Aurelia reached for the goblet. 'I'm ready,' she sighed.
In the House of Shadows, where no sunlight shines, the Seraph who measured the thread cut through cleanly.
Standing at the top of the steps, Claudia stared out across the landscape of Tuscany, over its vines and its olives, its sheep and its pastures all bathed in centuries-old sunlight. Down in the precinct, the water in the Pool of Plenty sparkled beneath the pomegranates, and it must have been a trick of the light, but she swore she saw one of the satyrs wink. A gentle warm breeze carried away the sacred incense that burned in the tripods — frankincense, cedar, cinnamon and juniper — and the ethereal music pulsed softly around her. Lyre, flute and tambour.
The gods had answered her prayers before she'd asked them, she thought. They'd given him life when she feared death, but the emptiness remained. He was leaving. Going back to Gaul to resume his post as Head of the Aquitanian Security Police, while she was returning to Rome.
'Don't suppose you know where a chap could find a crutch around here?' a baritone rumbled.
Claudia spun round. He'd managed to clamber into his long patrician tunic, but with his arm bandaged up, hadn't been able to belt it and was in danger of tripping himself up. Mindful of his wounds, she tied it gently and resisted the urge to push that ridiculous floppy fringe away from his forehead. As he leaned on her shoulder for support, she was sure she could smell sandalwood over the mouldy bread poultice they'd stuck on his wounds. Nonsense, of course. And besides, she was relieved he was leaving. Ever since that little white doughboy failed to win the effigy race, she'd been torn between fiddling her taxes (again), making a fraudulent claim for compensation (again), or watering the vintage (again). With the long arm of the law probing Gaul and not Rome, she was free to do all bloody three.
'Shouldn't you be in bed?' He was less than steady on his feet as she helped him down the steep steps.
'The doctor says providing I don't do anything stupid for a couple of days, I should be fine.'
'Liar. You didn't even ask the physician's permission, and that's stupid for a start. Did you see the way he punched Rosenna's pillow?'
'I was just too damn quick for him,' Marcus quipped, wincing as his side caught the handrail. 'Although I'll happily to go back to bed, if you'll come with me.'
'If we're playing doctors and nurses, you need to remember that I've already cauterised one patient this morning. And why didn't you have Rosenna arrested?'
'What, and rake the whole nasty business up even more? Right now the focus is firmly on Terrence, exactly where it belongs.'
Finally they reached the bottom, where the temple kittens found the hem of his tunic the perfect height to play catch.
'Yes, why did Rex try to cover up Lichas's murder, if he believed his son was innocent?' she asked, disentangling their sharp little claws.
'Because he was ashamed it would come out that Hadrian — his only son, and heir to his illustrious name — was running off with a commoner,' Orbilio said, puffing from the exertion. 'In dear old Uncle Rexie's book, that's worse than homosexuality, but put the two together and the disgrace it would bring if it became public was worth anything. Even covering up murder.'
Claudia distracted the kittens by trailing a herbal garland over the flagstones.
'So, er, you're not marrying Terrence, then?'
And who'd have thought that playing with a couple of cats would have made a grown man grin from ear to ear? Honestly, she'd never understand these patricians!
'No, but I gave him his ring back,' she said, rubbing the sapphires on her skirt. 'Right in the eye as it happens.'
'Dammit, Claudia,' the baritone was suddenly gruff. 'You could have been killed.'
Or worse, she thought. 'Didn't you know? I'm indestructible, Marcus.'
'Oh, yes. Absolutely.' There was a twinkle at the back of his eye now. Sunlight, presumably. 'But you're still faced with the same old problem, you know. Widow, with your two State-allowed years of mourning well past.'
Bugger. She'd forgotten about that, and that's the trouble with bullies these days. You just can't rely on them. If only Terrence had browbeaten her into announcing their engagement, she'd be off the hook. Another reason to hate him!