Pompey walked slowly through the gardens, his hands clasped tightly behind his back, lost in thought. Gradually, he felt the tensions of the day disperse. For years, it had been his habit to break the working day from his home life with a short stroll in the peaceful gardens. Refreshed, he could join his family at the evening meal and laugh and play with his daughters, the miserable Senate forgotten until the new dawn.

He almost missed the body of his youngest girl, lying facedown in the bushes near the outer wall. When his eyes glanced that way, he began a smile of recognition, expecting her to leap up and embrace him. She loved to surprise him as he came home, dissolving into fits of laughter as he jumped in shock.

He saw blood on her dress in dark brown stains and his face went slowly slack, drooping in a grief he couldn’t begin to resist.

“Laura? Come on, girl, get up now.”

Her skin was very white and he could see a butcher’s cut where her neck met the patterned cloth of her child’s dress.

“Come on, darling, up you get,” he whispered.

Someone crossed to her and sat down in the damp leaves by her small limbs.

He stroked her hair for a long time as the sun set and the shadows lengthened slowly around them. He knew vaguely that he should be calling for help, shouting, crying, but he didn’t want to leave her, even for the time it would take to summon his wife. He remembered carrying her on his shoulders in the summer and the way she would copy everything he said in her high, clear voice. He had sat with her through teething fevers and sickness and now he was with her for the last of it, gently murmuring to her, tugging the collar of the dress higher to cover the red-lipped wound that was the only bright color of her.

After a time, he stood and walked stiffly into his house. Time passed and a woman screamed in grief.

Chapter 26

                  CHAPTER 26                  

Mithridates looked out into the dawn mists, wondering if another attack would come. He pulled his heavy cloak around his shoulders and shivered, telling himself it was just the morning cold. It was hard not to feel despair.

The night attacks had grown in daring and hardly anyone slept easily in the sprawling camp anymore. Each evening, they would decide the sentries with lots, and those who were chosen would turn their red-rimmed eyes to each other and shrug, already expecting death. If it did not come, they would walk back into the protection of the main camp with a return of confidence that would last until they next took the wrong token from the pot as it was passed around.