A metamorphosis. She spread her wings and flew, aiming herself at the comet.

High in the stadium, the Psylli shouted a few furious words to the wind and signaled to the priestess. The wind changed direction, and Chrysate leaned forward as though this had been her plan all along. She held out her silver box. She had seen this moment in the scry months ago, though she had not known how it would come. She had waited for it. Auðr leaned forward as well, her eyes flashing. She would have only one chance. In her hands, she held the fates, trying to keep them controlled.

“Bring her to me,” she told the Psylli, but the man ignored her.

Behind Chrysate, the man sent by the senators moved for an instant, his hand outstretched to snatch the holding stone from Chrysate’s seat. In its place, he left a piece of green glass. He slipped back into the darkness, gone before the priestess saw him.

The newborn moth fluttered, caught in a current, helpless, rising, rising, and the wind, angrily following the orders of Usem, carried her into the priestess’s clutches instead of the seiðkona’s.

Chrysate’s face contorted as she fought against the power the fire had lit in the queen, using all her strength to close the silver box around the moth.

Everyone in the arena watched light wings disappear into the dark, and Chrysate cried out with triumph.

Beside the priestess, a small girl with long black hair cried out as well, a broken, despairing cry, and then, disregarding the emperor, disregarding the witch, disregarding the soldiers who tried to stop her, she ran out of the arena.

She did not look back.

24

Nicolaus rose from his crouch high in the stands and looked down into the dust where the bloodstains were still bright and the bodies of bestiarii and animals lay. There was a tremendous blackened circle in the sand at the center of the arena, and the smell of fire still lingered in the air.

How could he have been so foolish?

On the ship, he had seen what she had done, but he had not seen her do it. He had not imagined what she was capable of, not truly. A lioness, he knew, but tonight, with every flicker of torchlight, she became a new thing, and all of them equally savage. With every move, she lacerated skin and wounded innocent victims, without conscience, without care. Nowhere in the stories, nowhere in the histories, was there anything comparable. And the sky. He knew that the Romans had called the goddess back to earth with those flames, as surely as he knew anything. Fire was Sekhmet’s family. She was a daughter of Ra.

Now a lowly witch held her in a box.

Did they not understand that a witch could not cage a goddess? Cleopatra would escape, and when she did, she would tear the world apart.

Nicolaus knew that he should take to the sea and disappear beyond the horizon. He was a scholar and a fool, and she was a monster.