“A night attack, maybe,” Vix was muttering, oblivious. He stared up at the black shape of Old Sarm where it reared with magnificent disdain over the surrounding detritus of camped legions, siege engines, and assault platforms. “Get a few picked men over those walls to open the gates…” He attacked his gladius again with the whetstone. Vix wasn’t really meant for waiting—a month’s worth of siege was a month too long, as far as he was concerned. Sabina came behind him and rose to her knees so she could knead at his shoulders, and his muttering broke off in a reluctant gasp. “Left shoulder, harder—I pulled something sparring today—”

“It’s always the left that knots up on you.” She dug her fingertips into the one particular muscle below the shoulder blade where he always carried the worst of his tension. “It’s never liked being demoted to shield arm.”

“They made such a fuss about fighting left-handed when I went to legion training, it was easier just to learn to fight with the right—ow!”

“Your left arm isn’t happy with it, that’s all I’m saying.” Sabina slipped a hand under the neck of his tunic, kneading the shoulder. His skin was warm under her fingers, but not from the campfire. Vix never needed a fire to keep warm. His flesh was always hot to the touch, as if the blood inside ran close to boiling.

He captured her fingers in his own, rough from the sword and oily from the polishing cloth, and gave them a quick squeeze as he continued his rant against the Dacians. “Get me over those walls with a rope—”

“I give up.” Sabina abandoned the massage. “There’ll be no relaxing you now. At least not till later, when I can get the clothes off you.” She crawled around to his other side, surveyed the sword lying across his knees, and stretched out to lay her head in Titus’s lap instead.

“—have those gates open,” Vix was still grumbling.

“Oh, Hades, give it a rest,” Titus said. “The city falls, or it doesn’t. Likely it matters very little.”

“What do you mean it matters very little? I didn’t waste a summer of my life marching through Dacia if all we’re going to do is march home with nothing show for it!”

“Who says you have nothing to show for it? It’s been a rather nice summer, full of fine weather and lovely scenery and vigorous exercise. It’s even convinced me of the occasional pleasures of army life.”