“I still can’t go back.”

“As Paulinus’s wife, you’ll have to.”

“Then I won’t marry Paulinus.” She looked up in desperate apology. “It—it isn’t him. He seems perfectly pleasant when he’s not—”

Gazing glaze-eyed at his stepmother?

“But surely he doesn’t care much about marrying me, and I can’t—can’t deal with this life. Banquets and drinking and—and Indian leaves. Oh, maybe my family’s been around since the Republic, but I’m a country girl.” She leaned forward. “I grew up in Toscana, with vineyards and ponies and swimming holes. It’s supposed to be a great thing for me, marrying the Praetorian Prefect, but I don’t belong in palaces. Not palaces like that.”

He thought she might burst into tears, but she looked away and controlled herself. Country-born, but patrician-bred.

Marcus considered his words. “Perhaps you won’t believe me, considering what you’ve seen tonight, but this isn’t Paulinus’s world, either.”

Calpurnia looked at him.

“My son is a simple sort: a soldier, an idealist, a good Roman. It’s a great honor, his position as Prefect, but he’s floundering. If someone were to help him find his feet, he’d be grateful.”

“You want me to do that?”

“I think you could do that,” Marcus said gravely. “You’re a fine honorable girl, Calpurnia Sulpicia. I don’t have to know you long to see that. My son needs a girl like you. He knows it.”

“Maybe so.” She pleated a fold of stained silk between her fingers. “But it’s not what he wants. What he wants is—” She bit her lip just in time. She might not have known Lepida long but then again, one didn’t have to.

Marcus looked at her baldly. Yes. Your betrothed wants my wife.

They both looked away.

“May I ask a favor of you?” Marcus spoke as formally as if he were quoting a point of law in the Senate. “Think long and hard before you end the betrothal. That’s all I ask.”

Calpurnia looked, twisting the ruby around her finger, and Marcus thought she would strip it off then and there. But she offered her hand instead. “All right, Senator.”

“Marcus, please.” He took her hand in both of his, and smiled. “And thank you.”

Twenty-four

TIVOLI

YOU’RE late,” Arius greeted Vix.

“Had to rub down the horses.”

“Run twice around the vineyard to warm up. Then start drill number five.”

They sparred in the spring rains, slipping through liquid mud. Sparred under scorching midday sun as summer advanced, sweat slicking the hilts of the wooden practice swords. Sparred until the muscles screamed, until the bones creaked, until the palms of Vix’s hands split and Arius staggered home wondering why he was doing this at all.

Maybe because his life behind the vineyard had gotten a little too quiet. Maybe swords and drills and practice bouts had gotten into his blood, like it or not.

“When do I get a real sword?” Vix complained.

“When you earn it,” Arius growled, just as his brothers and endless gladiatorial trainers had growled at him.