The slaves who'd carried the brazier into the courtyard seized him, holding him immobile. Flaminius picked up the iron rod with great deliberation, then nodded to his men. They stripped the boy's tunic back from his thighs. He whimpered....
The sickening smell of seared flesh and a high, ragged scream jolted Margo. Oh, God... .
They branded him with a lurid "F" across the thigh. Margo gagged and feared she might pass out. By all rights the boy should have. He didn't. He just lay on the ground moaning and clutching at the dirt with thin fingers. Flaminius reheated the branding iron. Slaves held the boy again. This time Flaminius moved the iron toward the boy's face ....
"NO!"
Margo was on her feet, the cry torn from her.
Flaminius halted in surprise. Then stared at the tears welling in her eyes. Then, very slowly, replaced the branding iron in the brazier. He gestured to his men. They released the trembling boy, who kissed his master's feet-then wept on Margo's. She swayed...
Flaminius eased her back to a seat on the marble bench and called to a slave. A moment later, the rim of a goblet touched her lips. She swallowed strong red wine and fought to regain control of herself. Flaminius was speaking quietly to his slave. Margo recognized very little of what he said, catching only the version of her name she'd oven him: Margo Sumitus. When Flaminius escorted her back to her sick room, she didn't argue. What surprised her, however, was the boy who'd been branded. He limped after them, still chained and struggling, then took a seat next to her bed He remained behind even when Flaminius left, putting himself between her and the door as though he intended to guard Margo's very life.
She wondered what his name was and why he'd run away in the first place. He met her gaze, clearly curious about his foreign benefactor who'd kept him from being branded a second time, then flushed and jerked his gaze down again.
She sat up in bed. Then touched her chest. "Margo," she said. Then she pointed to him.
The boy whispered, "Domine, sum Achillei."
Domine?
Surely she'd misunderstood? But Malcolm had been clear about the meaning of that word. Dominus meant master.
Young Achilles glanced up. "Esne Palmyrenus?" he asked, sounding awestruck.
She shrugged. That wasn't important. "Et to?"
His "Graecus sum ... ." came out strangled, so tremulous Margo's heart constricted. How had this boy come to be a slave?
More importantly, how had he come to be her slave? And what was she going to do about it?
When her host returned to check up on her, Margo struggled to ask. Her Latin was insufficient for the question, but Flaminius removed all doubt when he put Achilles' chains in her hands and said, "Achilles tuus est servus. "
Oh, great. What am I supposed to do with a slave?
He handed her an iron key.
Margo stared at it for a moment. Achilles sat on his heels, head bowed. Maybe he'll run again., but so what? I won't hunt him down if he does. She unlocked his chains. Achilles caught his breath, then tears welled up in his eyes and he ducked his head. Flaminius grunted softly, a sound of profound surprise, then shrugged as if to say, "Your loss."
At dinner that night, Margo's unexpected new acquisition waited on her hand and foot. He escorted her to bed, made certain she was comfortably covered, and blew out the lamps. Then took up a guard stance again between her bed and the door.
He was still there the next morning, asleep but in the same spot.
Huh.
By her calculations, she had two days left to find the Time Tours inn, explain and apologize to Malcolm, and go back to La-La Land-a wiser and more cautious trainee scout.
When she tried to leave, Flaminius exclaimed in horror and insisted, by gestures and signs, that she was a guest in his home and he wouldn't think of allowing her to leave while she was still recovering. Desperate to get out of the house, she finally resorted to saying, "Circus, Quintus Flaminius. Ludi Megalenses ..." figuring if she once made it out into the crowded streets, she'd be able to slip away and break free of his smothering hospitality.
Understanding lit his eyes. Whatever he said, she suspected it ran along the lines of, "Of course, you've come all the way from Palmyra to see the games and here one of my slaves has injured you so you've been too ill to go, ... .
By gestures and signs, he made it clear that tomorrow they would go to the games. Margo bit down on her frustration and acquiesced. Meanwhile, there was the problem of Achilles. She didn't like having a slave. He hovered . Everywhere she turned, there he was. If she'd given permission, he'd have dressed and undressed her, even bathed her. Fortunately, the villa had its own private bath which Margo was able to use in complete privacy, barring the door when Achilles tried to follow her in.
Let 'em think I'm an eccentric provincial, she groused.
Whatever Margo's host and slave thought, the heated bath was extraordinary. She didn't want to leave. Ooh, a person could get used to this ....
She lazed in the heated pool of water half the day, just soaking away aches and bruises and scrubbing every inch of herself clean. Then she ate an equally lazy lunch in the courtyard garden, listening to the tinkling splash of fountains and wishing Malcolm were here. Tomorrow, she told herself. Tomorrow she would find that opportunity to escape her host's clutches.
Unfortunately, her host had other ideas.
Margo didn't walk to the Circus.
She was carried there, in a sedan chair supported by long poles. Perched on the shoulders of four sweating slaves, the chair carried Margo well above the heads of the surrounding crowd She felt ridiculous, conspicuous, and foolish. And utterly helpless to climb down and get away. Another sedan chair a few paces behind carried Quintus Flaminius.
Achilles, eyes bright despite the limp which he struggled to hide, followed Margo's chair. Outside the Circus Maximus, thick crowds fought toward the entrances. Dozens of stalls marked the locations of shops selling food, wine, even glass bowls and cups with circus racing scenes molded into them. Commemorative sports glasses, Margo marveled. Who'd have guessed? Other stalls housed "bookies" who took bets on the outcomes of upcoming races and the combats scheduled for afterward. Crowds of men thronged the betting stalls, shouting for their turn to place bets before the games began, collecting their markers, handing over their coins.
She'd read somewhere, in one of those endless books in La-La Land's library, that betting on the games had been illegal in Rome. If that were the case, those charged with enforcing the law apparently didn't mind looking the other way most of the time.
Quintus' slaves set the sedan chairs down near an arched entrance to the great arena. Margo thought seriously about bolting through the crowd, but Quintus took her arm, smiling and chatting, and guided her straight toward the entrance. He paid her admission and collected three red handkerchiefs to cheer on the faction favored by the emperor. At least, she was pretty sure red was the color Claudius favored, since she overheard the words Imperator and Princeps used in connection with the red handkerchiefs. He handed her one handkerchief and handed the other to Achilles, then dismissed his own slaves.
He gave Achilles some copper coins and dispatched him on some errand; the boy returned sooner than Margo had expected with a basket of food and a jar of wine. Then Quintus escorted Margo into the Circus Maximus. She slowed to stare, overawed. Quintus grinned, then led her to seats midway up a wooden section of the stands, in the second tier near the first turning post. Everyone she saw up in the third tier was either collared as a slave or dressed as a foreigner: no togas. She smiled grimly, pleased she'd understood that all on her own. Doubtless the only reason she was seated here, rather than up there, was because she was the guest of a Roman.
The Circus itself was nothing like she'd imagined. The vast course wasn't an oval. One short end-where the starting gates were located-was essentially straight. Two long straight-aways created an oblong ending in a semi-circle. Three levels of seats, some wooden and some stone, rose in tiers. Including the seats, the huge arena was by Margo's estimation just short of a full mile from starting gates to the back of the seating.