Lydia twisted the ring on her finger around and around, smiling as she thought of her friend. “No, but I rarely do until the Quincense sails into Celendrial’s harbors.”
“Serves you right for befriending one of the Maarin. They go where the winds—and the profits—take them.”
The litter came to a stop before the steps of the Curia, ending their conversation, and Lydia accepted the arm of her father’s guard, Spurius, to help her stand, then turned to assist her father.
“Now, now, my dear. Please, allow me.”
Lydia’s skin crawled, and twisting around, she found Senator Lucius Cassius standing behind her, along with a pair of servants holding sunshades over his head.
Perhaps in his midforties, Lucius was a man unremarkable in face and form, his golden skin loose around the jowls, which emphasized his weak chin. He wore the same white toga as her father, his dark blonde hair clinging to his neck, which appeared oily, as though his masseur had not toweled him thoroughly after a recent massage.
All of those were secondary impressions, however, for it was his eyes that commanded one’s attention. And they were eyes one would never forget. Small and deep-set, they possessed a depth of cunning and a dearth of empathy, and having them fixed on her made Lydia want to recoil.
Lucius pressed a hand against the small of Lydia’s back to ease her out of the way, leaving a sodden mark on the silk of her dress. “My friend, my friend!” he said to her father, taking his arm. “This heat is the purest form of misery.”
“Truly, it is.” Her father steadied himself against the other man, the servants with the sunshades pressing forward to keep both protected from the glare. “We’ll have drought again if the weather continues as it has.”
A shout of dismay stole Lydia’s attention from the conversation, and her eyes went up the Curia steps to see soapy water spilling down the marble, one man berating another for his clumsiness. The column next to them had been defaced with more graffiti, and Lucius’s name was only slightly faded from their efforts.
“Nasty business,” her father said. “Have the perpetrators been caught?”
“Not yet. Though I do intend to have strong words with the legatus of the Twenty-Seventh. The policing of our fair city is a position of privilege, but his men appear to be treating it as an opportunity for leisure.”
Her father gave a slow nod. “Policing Celendrial requires a certain temperament of men. A legion that has seen combat, but not endured the trauma of heavy casualties. A legion with experience dealing with the peregrini. And one with an appropriate reputation. The Twenty-Seventh is a good fit.”
Unlike the other two legions currently camped outside the city, Lydia thought, though it would explain the as yet unexplained presence of the Thirty-Seventh and Forty-First.
“As always, Valerius, your counsel is good,” Lucius answered. “Perhaps I let my emotions get in the way of my good sense. In my heart, I know that it was the peregrini’s relentless abuse of my character that drove my late wife to her grave, so the sight of these baseless criticisms sparks anger in my blood. Makes me desire to take action.”
He pumped his fist in the air as though he might personally hunt down the perpetrators, and Lydia had to bite the insides of her cheeks to keep from laughing at the very idea of it.
Then a shout cut the air, driving away her amusement.
“Thieves!” A tall man raced across the Forum in their direction. His pale freckled complexion and the cut of his red hair suggested he was from Sibern Province, though he wore Cel garments.
“You give me back my son, you Cel vermin!” He jerked the knife belted at his waist free, lifting the blade. “You give him back or I’ll kill you both!”
“Take cover, Domina!” Spurius pushed Lydia into the litter with such force that she rolled out the other side, landing on her knees in a soapy puddle.
Heart in her throat, she peered through the curtains, seeing both her father and Cassius had their backs against the litter, while Spurius had his weapon out, moving to intercept the attacker.
At the sight of the retired legionnaire, the Sibernese man slid to a halt, his eyes wild.
“Put the knife down.” Spurius’s voice was calm, and he cautiously set his own weapon on the ground. “We can all still part ways peacefully.”
“Peacefully?” The Sibernese man screamed the word, sweat and tears rolling down his freckled cheeks. “You golden-skinned demons don’t know the meaning of the word! You stole my boy away! Stole his freedom and his life!”
His speach was garbled with grief, but Lydia understood—as would anyone in the Empire. His child had been taken as part of the child tithes to the legions. Gone to Campus Lescendor where he’d be forged into a weapon and then used to enforce the Senate’s authority.
“It is not theft.” Lucius’s voice was frigid. “It is the law. All must abide. I myself gave up my second son and I bore my grief with honor, not by groveling like a woman in the middle of the Forum.”
Spurius’s jaw tightened, and he held up a hand, trying to silence Lucius.
But the damage was done.
“You stole him!” The grieving father lifted his knife. “And once you demons have beaten all that he is out of his veins, you will send him to slaughter his own people!”
The legionnaires guarding the Forum sprinted their direction, gladius blades gleaming in the sun, their expressions grim. Lydia clenched her teeth, not wanting to watch but unable to look away.
“Calm yourself, man,” Spurius said, and Lydia knew he saw the other soldiers coming. Knew that he had only moments to diffuse the situation. “That is not the way of it. You may yet see him again, but not if you carry forward with this ill-thought plan.”
“He will no longer be my son!” The man lunged, his eyes bright and fixed on Lucius and her father, and Lydia screamed.
And then a blade sliced through the air.
Lydia clapped a hand over her mouth, watching the Sibernese man’s head roll across the stones, coming to rest against the steps to the Curia. The legionnaire who’d decapitated him frowned, then bent to wipe his weapon on the dead man’s tunic.
“Blasted fools!” Cassius shouted at them. “While you sat on your laurels, we were nearly killed!”
“Apologies, Senator,” one of them—a centurion, judging from his armor—said. “We came as soon as we saw his weapon.”
“Spare me your excuses! The Twenty-Seventh is done in Celendrial—time you were sent somewhere that will sharpen you back into the weapons we trained you to be!”
Spittle flew from Lucius’s mouth, but Lydia’s father placed a calming hand on his shoulder before addressing the soldier who’d murdered the poor man. “You need not have killed him. It was poorly done.”
“Apologies, Senator,” the man answered, but to Lydia, he didn’t seem at all repentant. Likely because he knew the punishment for allowing harm to befall two senators would have been far worse than harsh words.
Rising on weak knees, Lydia held on to the side of the litter for balance, then circled around to the front. Blood pooled around the dead man, streams of it trailing away, following the straight lines between paving stones. One of the legionnaires picked up the dead man’s feet, dragging him across the Forum, leaving red streaks across the stone, while another caught hold of the head by the hair, tossing it after his comrade. “You forgot a part!”