“He will hurt you too in the end,” Brutus said softly. “And he won’t even know.”

He tilted his head, watching as tears flowed down her cheeks and spoiled the powder. As he began to step away from her, she reached out with surprising strength and drew him into an embrace. For a long time, she held him in silence and he could feel the wetness of her tears on his throat.

“You are my only son,” she said at last. “Did I tell you how proud I was when you stood on the tourney sand and the crowd rose to cheer you? Did I tell you that?”

“You did, and I knew it anyway,” he murmured into her hair. “You were shining with it, in front of them all.”

“Is there nothing I can say to you? Will you not even give me an hour? It is not such a great thing.”

“Let it go, Mother,” he said, his expression hardening. “Let me go.”

“Never,” she said. “You are too precious to me.”

“What a pair of fools we are,” he said. He raised his hand to her face and this time she did not draw back as he smoothed the tears from her. “In my letters, did I ever say there was a battle where I wore his helmet and cloak?”

She shook her head and he shrugged, looking back into the past.

“They thought they were following him. The legions were tired and starving and in pain, but they followed because they thought he was calling them out for one last charge. He was helpless with his shaking sickness and he could not do it. I led them because I love him more than any other man I have known. He has been with me all my life and we have seen places I would not have believed. We have conquered countries together, and by the gods you should have seen the armies we broke. Enough to fill little Rome twice over, and we went through them.”

“Then why?”

“Because I cannot give my whole life to a man who does not even know what he has been given. He showed how much he valued me with his gift to Mark Antony.”

He clenched his fists at that memory.

“I could have been more, do you understand? If he had died in Gaul, I would have mourned him, but I would have taken his place and cut my own path. I could have done it, Servilia. He and I have something running in our blood that no one else in this feeble city has, not anymore. Either one of us could have risen over all of them and accepted no equals—no masters, Servilia. Yet with him, I am a servant. He sends me, I go. He tells me to stay, I stay. Can you imagine how that feels, for me?”

He stroked her hair gently as he spoke, but his eyes were distant and cold.