For a moment, Amara thinks of borrowing Dido’s life story, taking it as her own. But she has already told Pliny the truth and cannot risk discovery. “No. I lost my father and everything else with him.”

“My poor darling,” Rufus says, kissing her again. He is a little bolder this time, easing her back on the couch, his hand creeping up her leg. She stops him.

“You can take what you want,” she says. “We both know it. But wouldn’t you rather it was given?” She kisses him to soften the rejection. “Wouldn’t you rather wait? If it was given along with my heart?”

Amara knows she is gambling, and the dice are not weighted in her favor. Rufus has every reason to feel irritated. He has paid Felix for her; he was promised sex, and now she is asking him to treat her like a virginal heroine in a play. But her lies have the intensity of truth. She gazes at him with wide, dark eyes.

“Yes,” Rufus says, touching his fingers to her lips. “I would like to win your heart.”

Four of Rufus’s slaves, including Vitalio, escort her back to the brothel. She feels the irony in knowing that the place they are taking her is not much safer than the darkened streets. The five of them walk quickly, the slaves’ torches throwing out fingers of light, brushing the houses as they pass by. Nobody speaks.

She thinks of Rufus, feels a sense of elation shot through with anxiety at the memory of his kiss goodbye. The tender way he tucked the jasmine back behind her ear before she left, his wholehearted acceptance of the part she offered him. She could almost love him for the gift he has given her: granting her the illusion of being a person and not a slave. But she knows it is an illusion, and the fantasy they have created together is fragile. It would be so easy to care for him, to forget how little she really has. Now begins the painstaking journey of discovering how he might help her escape. It’s not a journey on which she can afford to have feelings.

27

“Pythias: I don’t know who he was, but the facts speak for themselves about what he did. The girl herself is in tears and when you ask her she can’t bring herself to say what’s up.”

—Terence, The Eunuch

The screaming is like nothing she has ever heard. Fear grips Amara, and she runs to the door, terrified one of her friends is being murdered, but Thraso looks perfectly calm.

“Just the new girl,” he says, with a shrug.

She pushes past him, finds Victoria, Dido and Cressa huddled in the corridor.

“It’s Britannica,” Cressa says, her face wet with tears. “I can’t bear it.”

“What are they doing to her? What’s happening?”