When he has left, she walks over to the painting of Dido. From this low angle, looking up, her friend is distorted, eyes narrowed and hard. “I would have done this for you,” she murmurs, laying her hands at Dido-Diana’s feet. “It’s only right I do the same for Victoria, isn’t it?” She follows the goddess’s melancholy gaze to the half-human stag. Amara did not dare paint the face of the man she most wanted to see in Acteon’s place, the man she blames for Dido’s death. Hatred wells up hot in her heart. “You are right,” she says. “It will hurt him to lose her.”

Virgula greets Amara as she and Philos leave the house. The fabric seller is hanging up a rack of freshly dyed linens—or rather her slave is hanging them up, while Virgula supervises. Amara notices the girl’s hands are stained orange, and wonders if the color ever scrubs off. Neither Philos nor the servant girl say anything while the free women speak.

“If you ever want a gift for your man,” Virgula is saying, “we have some new linen in. Pure white. Perfect for a celebration, if his candidate wins.” She smiles, nodding to the election slogan painted on her shop wall, proclaiming Helvius as the best choice for aedile. Virgula clearly knows how to ingratiate herself with those who matter.

“What a wonderful idea,” Amara replies. “Lay some aside for me, please. I will be in later to choose it.” She nods and walks past, Philos behind her. When they have reached the end of the street, Amara waits for him to walk by her side. It is the mirror image of the courtesy he used to pay her, when he collected her from the brothel. Though it would be unthinkable now for him to offer his arm, or for her to accept.

They walk along together, leaving a dignified gap on the pavement that makes others trying to pass them tut or swear in frustration. Soon, they reach the grocer at the crossroads with the Via Veneria, which Amara always views as the edge of her new neighborhood. Once they have picked their way around its barrels of slick green olives and pushed through the shop’s dawdling customers, she starts to feel more apprehensive.

“I don’t want to be trapped inside with Felix,” she says to Philos. “We need witnesses. I think it’s best if I ask Paris to bring him to the square outside the Sparrow.” Felix’s women are all well-known at the Sparrow, a tavern around the corner from the Wolf Den. The landlord, Zoskales, is Amara’s almost-friend, and his waiter Nicandrus was Dido’s almost-lover. She realizes she has not seen Nicandrus since the night of Dido’s murder. The thought of how sharp his grief must be brings an ache to her chest.