“Well, I don’t like being called a whore just because I married Otho’s brother,” Lollia said shortly. “We lost your father to Nero’s whims. You know how easy it would be to lose the rest? For Otho to confiscate the family estates and exile the lot of us? He’s a charmer, but don’t think he wouldn’t do it if the mood took him. I’m on my knees to his brother every other night, asserting the family loyalty, but that doesn’t make me a whore. I keep all of us in food and roofs and silk dresses.” Lollia plucked at her airy green draperies. “I keep my grandfather alive and making money that the rest of you are only too happy to borrow, as long as you don’t have to acknowledge where I came from. I keep my daughter safe.”

“Lollia, I’m sure Cornelia doesn’t think you’re a whore—”

“Oh, she does. But I don’t mind. Someone has to do it, after all. It’s what women are for: whoring themselves out to useful men. And who will do it in this family, if not me?” Lollia’s lush curving mouth was set in a straight line. “Cornelia isn’t much use, carrying on like a pleb who lost her man in a tavern fight. Diana could have her pick of important suitors, but she’d rather run around with her horses all day. And frankly, Marcella, you aren’t much use either. Keeping to your loom and your scrolls, watching us all, keeping above everything. I don’t know what Nero did to you, because you won’t tell anyone, but you’ve certainly milked it for all it’s worth. Any excuse to stay locked in your tablinum.”

“Lollia—”

Little Flavia ran in at that moment, dripping wet, a scolding nurse behind her as she dumped a soggy handful of water lilies into her mother’s hands. Lollia bent and exclaimed over them, her voice brittle, and Marcella looked away, clamping down hot words as the maids busied themselves with the yellow silk stola. “Lollia,” she said finally. “I wish you hadn’t said those things.”

“I wish I hadn’t either.” The words were muffled in Flavia’s curls. “I think I’m done fitting dresses today.” Lollia picked up her daughter and held her tight, moving off in a flutter of half-pinned silk with maids fluttering behind.

“I think I’m done too.” Marcella unpicked the yellow silk, slipped into her own stola again, and climbed slowly into her litter. She didn’t go home, though. She ordered the bearers to the Gardens of Asiaticus. “Leave me,” she snapped as the litter came down, and set off alone down one of the wide curving paths.