CATCHING fish, Sabina?” Marcus smiled down at his daughter, plumped earnestly on her knees by the fountain in the garden, trailing her fingers in the water.

“Petting them.” She stretched out toward a flicker of iridescent scales. “Trying to pet them,” she corrected herself.

“Let me help.” Marcus dropped to his knees beside her. “I’ll shoo them toward you, and you can pet them all you like. But gently.”

She trailed one finger down a carp’s gray-scaled back. A quiet girl, his Sabina. Excitement brought on her seizures.

They swished the water back and forth. Marcus wondered if his grandfather Augustus had ever paddled his feet in a fountain with his own daughter. But Augustus’s daughter had ended badly, dying alone and in exile. And his adopted sons had all died before him: murdered, poisoned, drowned. All young. All dead. Marcus stroked Sabina’s shiny brown hair; thought of Paulinus’s straight soldierly bearing and serious eyes. Better not to be an Emperor.

Sabina looked up at him and smiled, and for a moment his heart chilled. Julia had looked like that once, when she had been four years old and toddling after the adventurous Paulinus like a baby legionnaire. Happy and trusting and whole . . .

“Father?” Sabina’s voice. “Father, you let the fish get away.”

Marcus looked down at Sabina. “I did, didn’t I?” He smiled again as she skimmed her hands through the water. Better not to be an Emperor.

LEPIDA

THE evening came off beautifully. The dinner was superb, the flowers lovely; the lutes chimed softly in the hidden alcove. The triclinium, all austere gray-veined marble and simple cushions in the republican style, was far too plain to be fashionable, but it worked to my advantage. In my pale pink stola and pearls I was the center of the room, framed by the window overlooking Brundisium’s jewel-blue bay.

“I hope you didn’t promise Sabina a story?” I toyed with a stray tendril of hair. “I was thinking about retiring early this evening.”

“I’d planned to start my new treatise,” Marcus said mildly, but with a gleam in his eye. “I suppose it can wait.”

“Good.”

A weighted silence. Just as he reached for my hand, I murmured casually, “Marcus . . . have you given any thought to going back to Rome?”

“I’m glad you mentioned it.” He bent his graying head to fold a kiss into my palm. “I’ve made plans to go back.”

“You have?” I flung my arms around him. Jewels, banquets, lovers, Emperor . . . “Oh, Marcus, I adore you!”

“Lepida.” He pulled away to look into my eyes. “Sweetheart, you’ll stay here. It’s time you slowed down a bit. Sabina hardly sees you—”

“Sabina doesn’t need me!”

“Yes, she does. It’s partly for her sake that I’ve decided to leave you both in Brundisium. The sea air is good for her. I’ve asked Paulinus to look after you both. He’ll squire you about if you’re bored.”

I leaned forward, twining my arms about his neck. “You can’t leave me,” I murmured in his ear. “I’ll miss you too much. Won’t you miss me?” And when he opened his mouth to answer—if only I could get him to stop talking!—I kissed him.