It had not been long she had been there, but still.

“I come to make you an offer,” Cassius told her.

“You have nothing I desire,” she returned.

“Not even your freedom?” he queried.

She glared at him.

“It would help greatly if all three of my father’s wives were to share openly about their treatment at his hands—” Cassius began.

“That is not happening,” she snapped.

“Is it simply that you feel you did not suffer at his hands? Or that you would not be willing to attest to what you knew about what the others endured?” Cassius asked.

“Your father, my husband, my king was always most kind to me. To all of us,” she declared.

And at that, I jumped, for Cassius let out a bark of genuinely amused laughter.

I studied him closely, wondering if strain was perhaps having an effect, but as his laughter waned, he said to Horatia, “That was most amusing.”

“I wasn’t being funny.”

“You do know I saw with my own eyes Gallienus not being most kind at all,” he reminded her.

“What happens in a man’s bedchamber—” she started.

“Enough,” he interrupted, then regarded her before musing, “I don’t understand it. Do you have some sort of madness?”

“No,” I answered for her. “She had status, she had power, and she used it, did you not?”

“I am a woman, and I—”

“Saved yourself by offering them up,” I surmised. “You cowed them so that he could truly cow them, and at their expense, you thrived. Not queen of a land. Not partner to a king. But queen of your little dominion. In order that you would not face it, you made it so he turned to them.”

“It is their duty to their lord and king,” she retorted, finishing snidely, “And husband.”

“And it was yours as well, was it not?” I asked.

She sniffed. “He would use me.”

“Would he?”

“Of course, I am his wife.”

“We have kindly not discussed this with Domitia. She needs some time to heal,” I shared. “Cornelia is quite closed off. She needs some time to learn to trust. But when the time comes that they feel safe to chat, what will they tell us?”

“I couldn’t begin to imagine,” she replied.

I took a step toward her. “You do know, it is understandable…not acceptable, but in your world and how you had no choice but to exist in it, it is understandable that you would seek to protect yourself. However, now you have other protections, and I encourage you to use them.”

“You think the Regent will prevail,” she said with no small amount of disgust.

“I know he will,” I told her.

“Then it is you who will see precisely what it is like to exist in this world if he does not spirit you from it when he fails,” she spat. “Until then, you cannot stand there and judge me. You have no idea.”

“I have more idea than you can imagine,” I retorted.