‘What, right now?’ Macro looked at the young guard on the right. ‘Isn’t it past your bedtime, lad?’

The young Praetorian glared with outrage at the officer. The guard on the left cleared his throat and said, ‘We are here on orders from the imperial palace.’

Macro sobered up. A summons to the imperial household, well after dusk? He shook his head.

‘You must be mistaken. I’ve already collected my award.’ He proudly tapped the bronze medals strapped across his chest, which he’d been presented with by the Emperor before the festivities at the Statilius Taurus amphitheatre earlier that day. The defeat of Capito had cast a cloud over proceedings and Macro had left his seat as soon as the gladiator had fallen, sensing the mood of the crowd was about to turn ugly. He’d sunk a skinful of wine at the Sword and Shield tavern not far from the amphitheatre. It was a stinking hovel with foul wine, redeemed by the fact that the owner was an old sweat from the Second Legion who insisted on plying Macro with free drinks in recognition of his decoration.

‘The Praetorian Guard doesn’t make mistakes,’ the guard said bluntly. ‘Now come with us.’

‘No use arguing with you boys, is there?’ Macro slid out of his bench and reluctantly followed the guards outside.

The crowds had taken their anger out on everything in the streets. Market stalls had been overthrown. Carved miniature statuettes of Capito with their heads smashed off littered the ground, and Macro had to watch his step as he ambled down the covered portico of the Flaminian Way towards the Fontinalian Gate. The Julian plaza stood at his right, its ornate marble façade commemorating Caesar. To his left stood rows of extravagant private residences.

‘What’s this all about, then?’ Macro asked the guards.

‘No idea, mate,’ the one at his left shoulder replied, blunt as the spear Britomaris had been equipped with. ‘We were just told to find you and escort you to the palace. What you’re wanted for is none of our business.’

Gods, thought Macro as the guards escorted him through the gate towards the Capitoline Hill. A Praetorian who wasn’t sticking his nose where it wasn’t wanted? He couldn’t quite believe it.

‘You never get used to the smell here, I suppose,’ Macro said, creasing his nose at the foetid stench coming from an open section of the great sewer that carried the city’s filth out from the Forum.

The guard nodded.