Killer

The officer in charge-a tribune named Lacerta whom Vonones knew by reputation-wore a breastplate of gilded bronze. In low relief upon it was molded a scene of nymphs yearning upward toward the figure of Jupiter enthroned. "You," said Lacerta, pointing toward Vonones. "Do you speak Latin, boy? Go fetch the merchant Vonones."

"I speak Latin," said Vonones. He drew himself to his full height, although he was even then no taller than the Italian-born tribune. Vonones was twice the tribune's age as well; boy was purely from the assumption that the man in leggings and a coarse tunic had to be a slave. At that, an aristocrat like Lacerta might have used the same form of address for a man whom he knew to be the compound's owner. "And I am Gaius Claudius Vonones." He wiped his damp hands on his thighs.

"You're wanted," Lacerta said with a quick one-fingered gesture over his shoulder and out the gate. He frowned. "Get a horse, will you? You'll slow us up too much if we have to tie you to one of the saddles and let you run."

The troop of horsemen would have silenced a human crowd, but it had little effect on the compound's normal cacophony. Even the handlers were forced back to their normal duties by the nervous uproar of the beasts. Three men carried the blood-splashed ostrich to the corral and flung it inside with its fellows. The deputy manager and his clerks hovered between a desire to hear what was going on and a well-founded fear of being noticed. The Germanic horsemen glared about them with pale eyes and disdain for what they saw.

"I am a Roman citizen!" Vonones blurted. He managed to keep his back straight when he heard Lacerta's command, but his voice shook. He was imagining himself alone on an island. Every time his heart beat, the surf washed the shore a little higher.

"A Roman citizen, merchant?" the tribune said in an amused tone. He gestured daintily toward the big men he commanded. "These aren't, you know. And since the one whose orders we obey is divine, I don't suppose he's going to be much swayed by the fact that you became a Roman citizen when your master struck off your chains."

Amusement hardened into a sneer as frigid as the eyes of the armored Germans. "Don't try my patience, freedman. You've the count of ten to get a horse."

Lacerta leaned slightly forward and tapped the god enthroned on his breastplate. "Our lord Domitian told me to bring you alive. But I'm not sure that he'd really care."

Chapter Six

Lycon's bedroom had a window on the light shaft of the apartment house, but it faced west and was six stories beneath the roofline. Lycon stretched, letting his fingers play in the pool of sunlight that had finally reached the bed. Unlike most of his contemporaries, he was used to night work and its corollary, sleeping by day. As he grew older, he required increasingly longer periods of recuperation-and a day and a night like the recent chase would have wrung anyone to exhaustion.

The door was closed, but Zoe must have heard the bronze bed creaking as her husband stretched himself on it, and she looked in to see if Lycon were awake. She was nursing their youngest, Glauce, who at three months of age was older than either of the couple's three previous daughters had lived to be-or two of the boys, for that matter. Still, they had two sons to survive infancy-Perses, who could be heard bouncing his ball in the next room, and Alexandros, who was as fine a young lad as a father could wish to have.

"Well, don't hang back there, Zoe," Lycon said, bleary-eyed. He thumped the bed beside him. "Come, let's have a look at you and our little one." Glauce had been born during his absence, and the beastcatcher had forgotten her name for the moment.

Zoe flashed a distracted smile as she lay down beside him. There was an aura of nervousness about her, and she half-heartedly returned Lycon's kiss. Now that he was sober enough to recall it, Lycon realized that Zoe had also been acting oddly last night when he arrived home after stopping over in Ostia to reminisce and forget recent events with Vulpes and a few cronies. He continued to smile, while his belly tightened at the suspicion that Zoe might have taken a lover during his constant absences. If she had, he could not blame her-but neither would he forgive her.

"I told the boys to play outside so they wouldn't disturb you," Zoe said, keeping her eyes on the baby. "But Perses came in saying he was hungry, and I thought I'd better feed them. It's midday."

Lycon yawned and caressed her generous hips. Zoe had put on more weight than he had during their fifteen years of marriage-but by Herakles, she still was the stuff of his dreams on nights when he slept in the mud of another continent, and if he had some rival here in Rome for her love, he would soon learn his name-and then there would be no rival.