“It does, doesn’t it!” Menander says wonderingly. “What do they put in the flour?”

“I miss my mother’s stew.”

“Me too.” He shoots her a sly look. “Bet mine’s was better.”

“Nobody makes better stew than the women in Aphidnai.”

“Is that a promise?”

“Might be.”

Menander kisses her again, and this time, the darkness stays at the edges, unable to break through.

The afternoon, which always drags so painfully in the brothel, seems to end moments after she has sat down with Menander, even though hours have passed.

“Amara! There you are! You were meant to meet us after the second gladiator fight! We’ve been wandering round and round for ages!”

She has never been sorry to see Dido’s face before, but now, the sight makes her heart drop through her stomach. She stares up at her four friends, ranged round, and instinctively grips Menander’s hand. “It can’t be time to head back, not yet!”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Victoria says, looking furious. “Celadus hasn’t even been on yet!”

Felix had ordered them all to leave in good time, to make sure they missed the crowds and were back at the brothel to pick up the inevitable surge in trade after the event. As the most famous gladiator, Celadus’s duel must have been left until the end.

Menander rests his hand on her arm. “We’ll see each other soon,” he says gently.

“But we won’t! You know we won’t!”

He hugs her, crushing her against him. “We will have another whole day, just for ourselves. I promise. Even if we have to wait until the Saturnalia.”

“Amara,” Cressa says. “We can’t be late.”

She doesn’t say goodbye and neither does he. Letting go of Menander, standing up, walking away from him, knowing what she will now have to face instead, almost stops her breath. The pain is physical in its ferocity. She cannot bear to look back. She tells herself it is easier not to want, not to feel. When you cannot make your own choices, what good is wanting anything, or anyone?

Dido takes her hand. “I’m here,” she says, squeezing Amara’s fingers.

21

“For assuredly to live is to be awake.”

—Pliny the Elder, Natural History

The stall selling flowers and garlands is on the shady side of the street, but the heat of the late afternoon has still caused many of the blooms to wilt. Amara and Dido whisper together, trying to pick out the freshest stems from buckets of water, watched by the hovering shop assistant.

“Can we afford lilies?”

“We should probably make the effort, if we want Aurelius to book us again.”

It’s only the second time they have been to the wine seller’s house. Aurelius is a friend of Fuscus, but not Cornelius, and his tastes seem more decorous. A secret brothel at the end of his garden is an unthinkable idea.