The Imperial steward descended on us then, recognizing Titus’s name and rank, offering me a blander glance, and ushered us through. The finest villa in Mog wasn’t much compared to the ones I’d seen in Rome, but it had been commandeered for the Empress and her entourage when they arrived—and now it hosted the Emperor’s victory celebration. The floors might be crude stone instead of supple mosaics and the dining couches might be soldered metal instead of carved silver, but the Emperor stood in the center drinking and roaring campaign stories with his officers, and his happiness had spilled over everything and turned it to pure gold. The music was bright and the laughter from all those guests crowded around him was brighter, but everything looked off-color to my eyes. I could have taken Demetra to this, and she’d have put all these powdered patrician beauties to shame. I grabbed a goblet of wine from a pretty little half-naked cup-bearer who beamed at me as if she’d marched to defeat the Dacians too—but I couldn’t drink. There was a bubble in my throat, hard and unyielding.

“What?” Titus asked me. “You look grim all over again.”

Demetra’s dead, I nearly told him. My child with her. But I didn’t. He’d have covered me with his warm sympathy, thinking that was why I couldn’t enjoy the banquet, and I couldn’t have borne it. He’d have thought I was grieving, and I couldn’t have taken credit for that. The bubble in my throat that wouldn’t burst?

It was… relief.

No child. No wife. Nothing to weigh me down or drain my purse or stop me from following my stars. Poor, dull, beautiful Demetra was dead, my child was dead, and what did I feel? Some sadness… but mostly a twisted, shamed relief.

What a bastard I was. No wonder Sabina hadn’t wanted to stay with me.

I’d seen her at once, as soon as I entered the room, but I didn’t look at her. I forced my wine down and held out my goblet to another cup-bearer, who promptly filled it. A good wine, far better than the sour posca I’d had to drink on campaign, but who cared? “Let’s get drunk.”

“Better bow first to your hostess,” Titus advised, steering me toward the little dais where the Imperial couches had been laid. “Empress Plotina does not approve of drunkenness. One wonders if she approves of anything, to be honest.”