Plotina knew every step of the path ahead of Dear Publius. Legate during Trajan’s upcoming war in Dacia, then governor of somewhere (Gaul, perhaps?), then consul, then Prefect of Egypt… and eventually, Emperor. Emperor Publius Aelius Hadrian. She was perfectly certain. So was Juno.

And really, was there any difference between the two of them?

VIX

“We’ll be sorry to lose you, Vix.” Lady Calpurnia set down the little robe she was embroidering for the coming baby. “Can I persuade you to stay on?”

“No, I’m grateful for everything—you’ll thank the senator for me?” I shifted from foot to foot. “But guarding’s not for me.”

“Send us word how you get on, then.” Lady Calpurnia gave me a purse. “And take this for all your service to us. You won’t wait an hour? My husband just left to take Sabina to the Capitoline Library.”

“No, I’ll be going now.” I’d been very sure to pick an hour when both Sabina and her father were out. “Thank you, Lady.”

The day was cold and blustery as I left the Norbanus gates. So much for a job. So much for the year to come—the city looked gray and listless after the previous night’s Agonalia festivities: forgotten pennants lying in the gutters, the occasional wreath of festival flowers lying brown and crushed underfoot. Men winced as they plodded along, nursing headaches from the night’s drinking, and housewives looked harassed and cross from the day’s cleaning they were doubtless facing. Hooray for a new year.

Last year in my father’s house in Brigantia, the year’s-end festival had been a cheerful thing. My mother had been born a Jew but wasn’t too strictly devout anymore after her upbringing in Rome; my father had had most of his belief in any kind of divine power drubbed out of him during his years in the Colosseum—but there had been a celebration anyway, meat and mead and games, my father and I fighting a friendly bout on the grass with wooden swords while my mother and sister cheered, my baby brother choosing that day to take his first steps, a neighboring family coming over to join us for a long and friendly firelight dinner.

The turn of this year had been far less pleasant.

I pulled my cloak about me and trudged along to the Subura, arguing with my old landlord to give me my room back. Half of Lady Calpurnia’s purse did the trick, and I promptly set out to dispose of the rest.