“Are you sure you don’t want me to come,” Victoria asks. “Perhaps I can persuade him to be reasonable?”

“Better I go,” Britannica says. “He not try anything with me. I protect you.”

Amara looks at her two friends, at their earnest faces so full of concern. Their love goes some way to counterbalance the regret she feels, now that her first reckoning with Felix is finally due. “I think seeing you again might make him angrier,” she says gently to Victoria. “And I will take both Juventus and Philos, I promise,” she adds, pressing Britannica’s arm.

“I better man than them,” Britannica says, jerking her chin at the two waiting servants. “Give me knife, I prove you.”

It occurs to Amara that both Victoria and Britannica have their own unfinished business with Felix, quite aside from any concern they feel for her. How gratified their old master would be to know the influence he still exerts over his women’s lives. “I will be fine,” Amara says. “He will never harm me, not now that I have Rufus as a patron. And I will get Juventus to close the doors behind us so you can bolt them until our return.”

Britannica shakes her head. “At least take knife.”

Amara ignores the remark, embracing them both, before joining the two men. They pass through the narrow hallway, and when they have stepped out onto the street, Juventus closes the tall wooden doors. Amara can hear the scrape of the bolt from inside, and for one wild moment feels as if she has been locked out of her own house, that she will never get back in. She rests her hand on the brass studs that protrude from its surface, more gray than gold in today’s dull light.

“Ready?” Philos asks. She knows he is trying to hold her gaze, to communicate with her beyond the words he says. Their relationship has been strained ever since he guessed that Rufus had hurt her. She accepted his apology shortly after their row but has avoided any private conversation since. His compassion embarrasses her. She doesn’t like being reminded of her own weakness.