“No, you assumed that. And I let you.”

Amara remembers Rufus setting down the harp on the night of Helvius’s dinner, the suppressed violence in the way he carried himself, her own confusion, the feeling of his fingers at her neck. And she understands what happened to Faustilla. What Rufus must have done. “No,” she says, gripping hold of Philos, not wanting to hear it.

“I made so many excuses for him,” Philos replies. “I told myself he was no different from any other man of his class, they all use their slaves that way, and nobody thinks anything of it. Perhaps they don’t even know what they’re doing. Except that’s a lie, isn’t it?” Philos gently disentangles himself, so they are facing one another. “Because in the end, it’s two people in bed together. And when you are this close”—he grasps her by the shoulders—“it’s impossible not to notice another’s distress. It’s not a difficult thing to see. He cannot have been unaware. But hurting a slave is meaningless to him, just as it was to his grandfather. They’re no different from one another.”

“But your relationship to them both is different,” she says, suspecting Philos is more conflicted about his master than he is able to admit. “And Rufus is a hard man to hate. I don’t always manage it, in spite of everything. You mustn’t blame yourself if you can’t, if you still love him sometimes.”

“I don’t find it hard to hate him,” Philos replies, his voice cold. “He’s not a child anymore. He’s a man, like his father and grandfather. One who would kill me for touching a woman who belongs to him.”

“But I don’t belong to him now,” she replies, kissing him. “Not when I’m with you.”

After a moment’s hesitation, he kisses her back, and Amara is relieved to end the conversation. They lie for a while, caressing one another, lazily at first, then with more urgency, until he moves his body over hers. She tries to pull him closer, wanting to feel the weight of him, to blot out the sense of shame, the memory of the tomb, the thought of Faustilla. But he resists, kissing her neck rather than look her in the eyes. “You always belong to him,” Philos says, his voice a whisper by her ear. “I should know. He made me draw up the contract.”

Amara pushes herself upright, angry and disorientated. “What did you say to me?”

Philos sits up too, not attempting to keep hold of her. “Is it easier for you to hate him now?”