I laughed again, eyeing her in surprise. The Reds came by last, a Gaul flourishing his red-beaded driving whip to make his team of chestnuts prance, and Sabina waved her pennant. I put two fingers to my lips and let out a piercing whistle that had all our neighbors wincing.

“How interesting,” said Sabina. “Show me how to do that!”

I showed her how to double up her tongue behind her teeth. She regarded me with unblinking attention, put two fingers to her own lips, and had it on the third try. “Excellent,” she said, pleased. “Thank you, Vercingetorix.”

“It’s just a whistle.”

“It’s something new. I try to learn something new from everyone.”

“What about bad people?” I couldn’t help wondering.

“Even villains have something worth knowing. Look at my mother.”

“What did you, uh, learn from her?” I blinked away a certain memory of Sabina’s mother, all airy green silks and fragrant black curls, informing me in her low sweet voice that I was a cowardly little brat destined to die in the arena. Yes, I remembered Sabina’s mother quite well. Wondered how much her daughter did, though…

“My mother dressed beautifully,” Sabina said. “Otherwise, I have to say, she was a spoiled spiteful scheming waste of life.”

“That about sums her up,” I agreed. “Say, if you’re so interested in learning new things, I can teach you more than whistling—”

Sabina looked amused but turned back to the arena, doubling her tongue expertly behind her teeth and letting out a shriek of a whistle. “Reds!” she shouted, and Trajan dropped the kerchief up in the Imperial box and eight chariots surged off the line.

There was the usual jockeying against the spina, a team for the Whites went down promptly in a flurry of hooves and dust and screams, and then the crush thundered away toward the other end of the arena, blue plumes in front with green and red close behind. They disappeared around the hairpin turn on the far end, shouts and cries rippling to the other side of the stands, and I flopped back in my seat again. “So you’ve got suitors,” I said idly to the senator’s daughter. “Any of them leading the pack?”

“One or two.” Her blue gaze came back from the arena to me, unblinking. “My father said I could choose whom I liked, within reason.”

“What’s within reason?”

“Well, the Emperor has to approve my choice of husband,” said Sabina. “And neither he nor Father would allow me to marry a freedman in a butcher’s shop, or a wastrel with a pile of dicing debts. And my father wouldn’t like it if I chose a man who travels a great deal either.”

“What’s wrong with traveling?” The chariots thundered around the second turn, a storm of cheers going up as the Reds fought up on the outside against the Blues.