I had nothing to say to her. I could only hope her daughter had her father’s character instead of her mother’s and had gone to warn him.

Lepida whirled, showing off the flash of her white arms and ankles against the crimson silk, and then suddenly bent low. “So what’s your secret?”

“Secret?”

“You held Domitian for years. How?”

Her pointed tongue flickered over her rouged lips, and I saw just how badly she wanted to know. From despair I dredged a smile. “I didn’t give him what he wanted.”

“What did he want?”

“Everything. So I didn’t give it, and it kept him interested. I imagine you gave him everything? You’ve always been obvious. No wonder he got tired of you so soon.”

Her smile slipped.

“Not only are you obvious,” I added for good measure. “You’re a crashing bore.”

She slapped me across the face. “You gave him everything!” She pointed a scarlet-lacquered fingernail at Arius: roped, slit-eyed, and silent against his pillar. “You’d have spread your legs for him in the middle of the forum if he wanted! How did you keep him for so long, if you didn’t hold anything back?”

“Because Arius isn’t insane,” I explained patiently. “Domitian, in case you haven’t noticed, is.”

“You don’t know anything about men.”

“Of course,” I agreed, feeling light-headed. “And that’s why they all like me better than you.”

She slapped me again. This time I was ready for it, and I got her little finger with my teeth. She had to pull at my hair to get free.

“You get everything!” She glared at me, shaking her fingers. “You got Domitian; you got him—” Lepida whirled on Arius. “Why her? She’s a gawky Jewish slave; there are a thousand girls like her. There’s only one of me!”

At any other time I would have thought it funny; a decade-old insult still biting at her pride. Beautiful women are so easily crushed.

“Why?” She drew back her silk skirts and kicked Arius in his injured ankle; he drew a breath through his teeth. “Why her? Why not me?”

He regarded her briefly. “Because you look like a ferret.”

She hissed, drawing back to slap him. His eyes gleamed. For a moment her hand hovered.

Then she straightened. Smoothed her hair and her face. Turned her elegant head back toward me, pearls swinging in her ears. “Well, Thea. It’s been lovely, but I really must be going. I could take you with me, but Arius is so unpredictable in close quarters . . . no, I’d better leave you here. There aren’t any slaves to free you, after all, and Marcus is off whispering with the Empress. He won’t get to you before I get to the Domus Augustana, if that’s what you’re hoping. Yes, I’ll just leave you here. The Emperor awaits.”

She whirled back suddenly and gave Arius a brief, savage kiss. Pulling away before he could move, she strolled to the polished steel mirror on the wall and patted her lip rouge. “He has a sweet mouth, Thea,” she said. “The next to kiss it will be the ravens flying around the Gemonian Stairs. When they eat his head off a spear.”