“Your German. Odoacer. Bring him here to the palace. Show him the marbles and tapestries, the statues and mosaics. Impress him with Rome’s past as you have me, and perhaps he will spare the present. You’re good at it—the act.”

He looked at her angrily. “You’re unnecessarily cruel, madam. I have my job to do. And that job is to preserve Rome from bloodshed, perhaps ruin. Is that ignoble?”

She felt a stabbing pain in her stomach—as if the thing in her belly had rolled and kicked, like a monstrous fetus. But by a monumental effort of self-discipline, she kept her posture upright, her face clear. She would not show weakness before this creature of a boy-Emperor.

She walked out of the palace without regret, and hurried home. But the pain followed her, a shadow in the brightness of the day.

Chapter 33

Chapter 33

After the birth, Lucia recovered quickly.

She understood what she was going through. She worked through her postnatal exercises for her abdomen and waist and pelvis. Her uterus was returning to its normal size. Her postpartum discharges did not trouble her and were soon dwindling. Like everything about the pregnancy, her recovery seemed remarkably rapid.

But she was not allowed to see the baby again.

Lucia tried to immerse herself in the workings of the Order once more, to forget as she was supposed to. But her anger grew, as did an indefinable ache in her belly, a sense of loss.

Rosa worked in a small office on the Crypt’s top story. She had a role in the management of the larger corporate clients of the scrinium.

Lucia stood before her desk, and waited until Rosa looked up and acknowledged her.

“Why can’t I see my baby?”

Rosa sighed. She stood, came around her desk and had Lucia sit with her in two upright chairs before a low coffee table. “Lucia, must we go through all this again? You have to trust those around you. It is a basic principle of how we live. You know that.”

Perhaps, Lucia thought. But it was also a basic principle that they should not have conversations like this. You weren’t supposed to talk about the Order at all; ideally you wouldn’t even be aware of it. Rosa had her own flaws, she saw. Perhaps it was inevitable that Rosa, who was once a contadino, had a broader perspective than the rest, whether she liked it or not. She said none of this aloud.

She insisted, “I want to see my baby. I don’t even know what name you have given her.”

“So? . . . I think we’re talking about your needs, not the baby’s. Aren’t we, Lucia? You grew up in nurseries and crèches. Did you know your mother?”

“No—”

“And did that harm you?”

Lucia said defiantly, “Perhaps it did. How can I know?”

“Can you be so selfish as to blight your baby’s life?”