Thalia has finally finished Drusilla’s hair and hands her mistress the mirror. Drusilla checks the maid’s work then nods to dismiss her. “There’s nothing like it,” Drusilla says, when they are alone. “You will feel like a god.”

Both women stand, helping one another with last-minute adjustments to their clothes. Drusilla’s fingers are gentle as she fixes the line of Amara’s red silk at the shoulder. Amara had been surprised by the robes Rufus gave her. The silk is not transparent, but still more revealing than she would have expected, the folds clinging to her body. She had insisted upon wearing the silver necklace with the amber pendant, his first gift to her, and the sentimentality of the gesture pleased him, though he has made sure more of his wealth is pinned to her body in other ways: pearl drop earrings loaned from his family business, silver bracelets, and glittering pins that stud her tightly coiled hair.

For all this, Amara knows that Drusilla still outshines her. Pompeii’s foremost courtesan is swathed in yellow silk and decked in gold, the gilding she has painted around her eyes glowing brightly against her dark brown skin. The knowledge gives Amara a pang, not so much of jealousy, more bitterness toward her lover. If I were not so thin, she thinks, we would be more evenly matched.

The sound of trumpets, carried on the warm afternoon air, alerts them both to the approaching procession. They hurry downstairs to the atrium, standing to wait near the door. Amara’s heart flutters with anticipation as the noise grows louder, not just trumpets but singing and shouting. It reaches a crescendo: the parade must have stopped right outside Drusilla’s door. To her surprise, Drusilla reaches over and grasps her hand. “Don’t be nervous,” she says, although Amara is not sure, from the uncharacteristically wide-eyed look on Drusilla’s face, whether the command is as much to herself.

There is a lull in the noise, followed by two trumpet blasts. Drusilla’s steward Josephus opens the door. Standing on the road outside is an enormous, crimson carriage, its four gilded wheels almost the same height as Amara. Two bay horses are harnessed to it, their sides flecked with froth and their nostrils wide. One of them is pawing at the paving stones, shaking its head in a way Amara finds alarming. Perhaps it is agitated by all the commotion.