“Never mind astrologers,” Cornelia told her gently. “Pray to Diana the Huntress. She has horses too, you know—moon-white mares she drives across the sky, and she loves them. And you’re her namesake, so she’ll listen to you.”

“You think so?” Diana dashed at her eyes with a grubby hand.

“I know so.”

“—retaliation?” Drusus was saying, and Cornelia blinked.

“What?”

“I said, keep some guards around that little cousin of yours. Emperor’s favorite or no, a lot of unsavory people lost money when she won against orders. Someone might be angry enough to try for revenge.”

“Oh, she’s untouchable—too much of a heroine.” Cornelia couldn’t help a smile, nestling closer against Drusus’s chest. “All those young tribunes who race up and down the Campus Martius worship her now. There’s been a whole new spate of marriage proposals. Tullia doesn’t know what to think—she was preparing a great scene, shrieking about the disgrace Diana brought on the family, and she was just working up to full volume when a cluster of the finest bachelors in Rome appeared on the doorstep with flowers. Quite took the wind from her sails. She’s retired to bed from the strain of it all.”

“What about you?” Drusus grinned.

“Oh, I’ve retired to bed from the strain of it all, too.” Kissing him. “Hadn’t you noticed?”

October now. The days were still warm, but the nights cooled quickly. Normally October was a festival time in Rome, when the last patrician families returned from their summer villas and prepared for the fall round of parties and gladiatorial games. But the city this fall was curiously quiet. Fabius Valens had finally gone north with the last of the troops, hurrying to join Alienus and his army against the Moesian legions and leaving Lollia behind on a high tide of bliss. “He’s gone, he’s gone, he’s gone,” she sang, and all but skipped back to her grandfather’s house to play all day with Flavia. The Emperor had retired to a little villa just outside Rome, declaring himself unwell . . . or maybe fleeing the whispers that the battle up north had not been a victory at all, but a hideous loss.

“If only we’d get some news!” Marcella groaned over and over, feverish to know what was happening, but Cornelia didn’t care. Lovers are selfish, she couldn’t help thinking. All Rome waiting to see if the Moesian legions are coming to murder us in our beds, and all I can think is how easy it’s been to see Drusus. She’d been sneaking out to him every night for weeks now, and no one in the household seemed to suspect a thing. Not Tullia; not sharp-eyed Marcella, who still hadn’t noticed that her sister could barely stay awake through dinner these days.