“No,” Lollia whispered as ripples fluttered through the wedding guests. Horror stirred in their eyes, panic still close to the surface after last week’s storm of murders. “No,” Lollia said again, stupidly, as her new husband looked into the sack that fell from Cornelia’s trembling hand. He leaped back swearing, as Cornelia sobbed into Diana’s shoulder.

“No,” Lollia whimpered, but it was too late. An emperor was murdered, and she’d never be able to laugh giddy and unaware at a party again.

Looking back, Lollia thought she was the first to see it—even before Marcella, who saw everything. The first to see that Rome had tilted on its axis, and that the coming year would bring nothing good. She clutched after herself—Cornelia Tertia, known as Lollia, who could have been a better mother, who could have been a kinder wife, who could have treated the slave in her bed like a man instead of a stud.

A strong hand covered hers. “Domina?” whispered Thrax.

She gave his hand a fierce squeeze. “Call me Lollia.”

The wedding resumed, but everyone was stilted, awkward, cut short. Lollia sleepwalked through it all. So much for the Quiet Wedding. Thanks to her dear, darling, savage little cousin, this would forever be known as the Wedding with the Head.

Enough said.

PART TWO - OTHO

PART TWO

OTHO

January A.D. 69–April A.D. 69

“By two actions, one utterly appalling, one heroic, he earned just as much renown as disgrace in the eyes of posterity.”

—TACITUS

Six

Six

WHY am I doing this for you again?” Lollia whispered.

“Because Gaius wouldn’t let me go alone,” Marcella whispered back. “Which really means Tullia won’t let me go alone, that curled cow.”

At the front of the long room, a man in the stiff pleats of his best toga was declaiming in a nasal voice. He had a good turnout for his reading, Marcella thought—the long hall had been filled with rows of chairs, and every chair was occupied by an attentive listener. Or at least, they’d been attentive at the beginning. Now everyone was beginning to yawn and fidget.

“What’s he going on about now?” Lollia whispered. “Whatever his name is.”

“Quintus Numerius, and it’s his latest work.” Marcella made dutiful notes on her tablet. “ ‘The Administrative Problem of Cisalpine Gaul during the Consulship of Cornelius Maluginensis.’ ”

“Fascinating,” Lollia sighed.

“He was an ancestor of ours.”

“He was a crashing bore, and so is Cisalpine Gaul.”

“You owe me, Lollia! All the times I’ve listened to you rave on about your pet stud—”

Lollia’s eyes flicked toward the big blond Gaul who stood beside her, gently waving a fan. “Don’t call him that.”

Quintus Numerius concluded the latest quotation and bowed. A bored ripple of applause crossed his audience. “A brief pause,” he said, and everyone broke into a buzz of conversation.