A sigh passed through Wryn’s frame. Horus hadn’t seen enough years to realize it, but Libya and he both knew all too well the gulf that divided them. He did no one any favors by these moments of pretending that gap didn’t exist.
“Please play with me.” Tears rolled down Horus’ cheeks. Real tears.
“I have to write reports.” Wryn looked to the villa.
“I’m lonely.”
“You have your mother.” Wryn took a step down the garden path.
“I want you.”
Horus was just a boy. A boy who’d seen enough disappointment in his short life. Who did he harm by showing kindness to a slave boy? Besides, Horus shouldn’t go to school completely ignorant.
Wryn turned back. “If you put some clothes on, you can practice letters in the tablinum with me.”
“All right.” A bare hand slipped its way into Wryn’s as Horus placed a muddy footprint on the towel that had surrounded his waist.
“Clothes first.”
Libya filled the water goblets as the cook had screamed at her to do. Oh, to taste freedom, or at least to escape these confining gates for an afternoon. In Moesia, she often went to town to purchase food for the tavern and earned the old master’s wrath by tarrying there with Horus as long as possible.
Gwen reclined at the table across from Wryn. Her eyes narrowed. “You forgot to visit Aulia. For the third time.”
“Third?” Wryn stabbed a piece of meat. “I only remember that once.”
His sister’s kohl-tinted eyelashes flicked down. “Trust me. It was the third time.”
“I visited her yesterday. Stayed an entire hour.”
“Visiting her to speak of building sanitation works?” Gwen gestured up so violently her sleeping baby jolted. “Have you no romance in your soul, Wryn Paterculi?”
“Has Aulia complained?” The sunlight lit Wryn’s cheekbones, making his brown hair look lighter.
Libya scratched her finger across the silver pitcher she held.
“Well, no.” Gwen caressed her hand over her baby.
“Then why are you grumbling? I’m not marrying you.” Wryn stabbed another piece of meat. He always took time for Horus. If only Victor had done as much. Aulia’s children could count themselves fortunate to have Wryn as their father.
“Why are you so against making romantic overtures?” Gwen waved her hand across her drink.
Wryn’s gaze fell. “Because I have no idea what to do.”
A cough sounded from the entranceway. The cook, red-faced and fuming.
Libya hastened toward her.
Voice lowering to a whisper, the cook shoved a tray at Libya. “I
expected you to get this a quarter of an hour ago. In this household, we take pride in our work. Though I don’t suppose you’d know anything about that being a prostitute.”
Quidquid. Taking the bronze tray, Libya moved closer to the table. As she bent to place it by Wryn, she let her voice brush his ear. “You lead armies, and you have no idea what to do?”
He jerked his gaze up. “You’re mocking me.”
“Never, master.” A sparkle came to her eyes as her lips curved upward.
He leaned back on his elbow. “Pray tell, what should I do to make a woman’s heart flutter?” His gaze rose to hers as if she were no slave, no prostitute as the cook rightly categorized her, but a person.
“You could write her a song.” Not that Aulia deserved his songs.
“Ha.” Wryn shook his head. “We’re not all gifted with your talents.”
She could offer to compose one for him, but she didn’t like Aulia very much. “Give her the petals of a rose.” Libya fingered the pouch at her throat — Victor’s rose petals. Only Victor had walked away, leaving her with Horus. Wryn would stay with Aulia a lifetime, raise their children together. A heaviness weighed down her limbs.
Wryn groaned. “Her familia’s garden is overflowing with roses. She wouldn’t want mine.”
“Dance with her.” Libya grazed her fingertips across the polished table. Mother had often told tales of the dances around campfires in her home country, Nubia.
“Romans don’t dance.”
“Libya, I am so glad you’re here.” Rising, Gwen caught up her sleeping baby. “You have wonderful ideas. Keep telling them to my impossible brother, because I have to go.”
“I’m not impossible. I just have a Viri plot to forestall, and your husband’s life to protect, and a garrison to run, and plans to make to bring justice to all of Rome through my prefect —”
“Speaking of which —” Gwen tugged a parchment out of her stola. “I drew up another plan for you. I’m almost certain the Mamertime gaol is filled with fraudulent cases. You need to investigate it first thing.”
“Why?” Wryn struck his hand against his forehead. “Why do you choose me? I thought when you married you’d finally use your boundless ideas to pester someone else.”
“Marcellus doesn’t have a political appointment.” Gwen pushed the parchment into Wryn’s hands.
With a groan, Wryn stuffed the parchment in his tunic. “Then make him take one. I’m sure Consul Julius could arrange something.”
Gwen toyed with the fringe of the tablecloth, longing burning in her eyes. “He’d hate it. I can’t ask him to do that.”
“You have no qualms making my ears ache with your unceasing clamoring to meddle in my position. But you won’t ask your own husband to take a political post?” Wryn’s brown-eyed gaze connected with his sister, a statue-worthy level of empathy on his face. Though statues didn’t roll their eyes, and he did.
“That’s how love works. You’ll find out.” Gwen looked as if she’d stick her tongue out at him. “So, you see, you have to let me help you with this prefect post.”
“You chose to marry a man who hates politics. I don’t see why I’m responsible for solving a problem you created.”
With a groan, Gwen walked out of the room.
A breeze blew through the low window. Libya shifted her feet on the tile.
“Sit.” Wryn motioned to the soft cushions across from him.
With an awkward glance to the door, she lowered herself on the couch like a patrician woman.
He smiled at her.
She smiled in return. “What would you do to romance a woman? Give her a lecture about troop movements?”
He jutted his handsome eyebrows down. “Aulia liked learning about the Dacian Legion’s strategic new garrison placement.”
Libya tittered.
“You don’t think she did?” Wryn rested his hand on the couch arm only a few handbreadths from her.
“Horus enjoyed your lecture on troop movements.”
“I dreamt about that child last night. A nightmare where he lit the atrium on fire. I swear I’m sore across my entire chest from wrestling him.”
Libya let her gaze wander to the high atrium ceiling where the sun shone through the opening above the shallow pool. Last night, she dreamed she found Victor and that he wanted Horus as a legitimate heir. Preposterous dream. “Do you think dreams mean things?”
“That Horus will burn down this villa? I certainly hope not.”
She slid her fingers over the silky edge of the cushions, so fine. “Where do dreams come from then, if they don’t have some mystical symbolism?”
“I’m a statesman, not a Hippocrates-bound physician.” He laughed. “The prophet Daniel interpreted a king’s dream and became the third highest ruler in all of Babylon. I wonder what it would feel like to have the power of the prophets, part the Red Sea, call down fire from heaven.”
Hand on her hip, she brought her shoulder up. “A patrician wishes more power than his birth has given him?”
“Ambition, it’s what got Julius Caesar killed and made this empire great.” Wryn’s eyes laughed.
She rested her elbows on the table behind her. “Where does your ambition lead you?”
“Statesmen, consul like my father.”
“The patrician dream.�
�� She clenched the table lip. That’s what Horus would have pursued had he been the legitimate heir as she dreamed when she lay in her bed last night.
“I’m the only one in my familia with any ambition these days. Gwen used to have some. Then she married Marcellus, who apart from pursuing the Viri, has no interest in the advancement of Rome. My twin brother never even cared to try.”
The breeze blew her hair across her face. She brushed it behind her ear. “I’m sure you’ll bring enough glory to the Paterculi name to make up for the rest.” He worked hard enough.
Wryn laughed. “That’s the goal. I’m the eldest son. A certain responsibility.”
“Any progress on the Ides of Junio plan?” Last time in Ostia, she discovered little information, though Wryn had thanked her all the same.
“I met with Marcellus. He said Victor refuses to reveal anything. I fear the ship captains we’re interrogating aren’t high enough up to know more than what you’ve already discovered.”
Tucking her legs up, she hugged her knees to herself.
“Would you go with me if I tried a more daring plan?”
She flickered her eyelashes up.
“Many of the Viri leaders are patricians who mingle with society at dinner parties same as other Romans. Ever since the attempt on my familia’s life, I’ve avoided dinner parties with known Viri members. But Marcellus said much of the Viri business occurs at such parties. I thought if I attended a few I might spot some new suspect. What do you think?”
She nodded.
“I can’t get you an invitation to such an event, you realize. But I could get you a position as a server.”
Her back went rigid as her heart pounded with newfound hope. “Will they pay me for serving?”
He moved his broad shoulders up in a shrug. “Yes, I guess.”
“If I earned the six thousand denarii, would you let me pay for Horus and my freedom?” She dug her fingernails into the table. Some masters allowed their slaves to earn their freedom.
“You couldn’t earn that in decades.”
“I could try.” Her gaze fixed on him, pleading.
He had his finger on Gwen’s parchment as he scanned over what she’d written. “Why bother?”
Because she longed for freedom. Certainly, she and Horus fared well at the Paterculi villa, but how long would that last? Oh, to toil for her own bread, live in a place owned by herself, no longer be ruled by the whims of others. Tears formed in her eyes. “If you would only let me try.”
“You needn’t worry about that.” His gaze on Gwen’s parchment, he muttered to himself as he read over her proposals for Rome. “The six thousand denarii doesn’t matter.”
In other words, “no,” he’d not allow her to earn her freedom. She slammed her foot against the table leg, but even the jolt of the table didn’t make Wryn look up. She’d still attend that Viri dinner, though. Perhaps she’d meet Victor, and she could beg him to pay for Horus and her freedom.
Though if Wryn wouldn’t, why did she expect Victor would? He hadn’t stayed longer than the month it took to get her with child.
Chapter 13
Unbuckling his cuirass, Wryn handed it to the porter. Another night of watch duty closer to becoming prefect of Rome. He gestured to Libya. The sun gleamed on the waves of her hair as she moved toward the iron gate.
The gaze of the guards, who paced these walls day and night, swiveled to her. He’d bet a thousand denarii they didn’t marvel at her intelligence or musical abilities.
A few paces away, the cook shook a tablecloth over sun-warmed cobblestones.
“Don’t let Horus get in trouble while we’re gone,” Wryn called to her.
The cook inclined her head. “Yes, dominus. Where are you going?”
“Finding a school for the child.” Wryn closed his fingers on the gate. He touched Libya’s waist as he held the gate for her. Idiot guards.
“With Libya?” The cook tsked her tongue, a tone he didn’t at all like in her voice.
He turned back. “If there’s something you want to say to me, you can say it to my face.”
“No, dominus.” The cook shook the tablecloth again.
Soon, Libya and he came to a low wooden structure surrounded by ramshackle apartments.
Wryn rapped his hand against the door. “The porter’s son attends here, and he recommended it.”
“Oh, that’s good.” Libya smiled.
The headmaster swung the door open. His gaze ran curiously over Wryn’s patrician tunic. “What can I do for you, dominus?”
Inside the courtyard, a few score boys in brown tunics sat cross-legged in the sun, chanting lessons.
“I wished to inquire about enrolling a boy in my household at your school.”
The headmaster nodded. “Many masters send slave boys here for an education. He can begin any day. The cost is eight denarii a month.”
Wryn scanned the class again. “What curriculum do you start with? Homer or Plato?”
“We don’t teach Greek.”
“What do you mean you don’t teach Greek?” Wryn raised his voice.
“Mainly artisans’ sons come here. They have little need for Greek.”
Wryn gestured up. What kind of a school for fools was this?
“Try the school near the temple to Artemis. Many merchants’ sons attend there. If you wish the boy educated in languages for scribe work, that’s your best choice.”
“I will.” Turning on his heel, he motioned Libya to exit first.
She looked back over her shoulder as she walked. “Did you see all those boys learning? So much education in one place.”
“That school?” Wryn scoffed. “The pedagogue had too many students, and they don’t even teach the basics of knowledge. I wouldn’t send a dog to that school.” He needed to inform his porter that he was being swindled.
Libya looked at him. “If that school’s not good enough, then what do you intend for Horus’ occupation?”
Alleys and backstreets hemmed them in on either side.
“Whatever he wishes.” He had told Libya that he intended to free her and Horus, hadn’t he? “He’ll be free to choose as he desires. I told you that, didn’t I? I mean, as long as he doesn’t choose assassin or fire-setter.”
Eyes sparkling, Libya laughed. Her shoulder brushed his arm as she jostled her body against his. “He’s not as wicked as you think, dominus.”
He caught her hands, tugging her in front of him. He looked down at her face. Her eyes danced as she smiled at him, her lips so deep in hue. Oh, to kiss those lips. “He’s not half as innocent as you think.”
With a flick of her hair, she twisted away from him, as graceful as a goddess and twice as fair.
A shingled building set between shops stretched out ahead of them. The noise of shopkeepers hawking their wares rose loudly all around.
Wryn knocked firmly on the door, and the headmaster appeared in the doorway, all too eager to wax on about his school.
The man smiled, his hooked nose twisting with the motion. “Our school takes boys from the primary grades all the way to the highest levels. Once you choose our school, you will never have to switch. Greek, Hebrew, arithmetic, we cover all the subjects. You’ll not find a better school for this price through the entire city.”
“What age do you start rhetoric?” Wryn narrowed his gaze. “Do you focus merely on Roman military strategy when explaining the course of wars, or also teach the opposing nations’ tactics that Rome has assimilated through the centuries?”
The headmaster’s jaw sagged. “I thought you said you wished to educate a slave boy in your household.”
“Yes, I want the boy to have a basic education. Can you provide that?” He hadn’t even inquired if they taught Arabic mathematics along with Roman, or what kind of athletic drills they incorporated into their curriculum. He should ask about the athletic drills. They should teach javelin-throwing and wrestling at the minimum.
The headmaster crossed thin arms. “There
is nothing basic about the education you want. And no, we don’t teach military strategy or rhetoric to scribes and merchants’ sons.”
“Come, Libya. This school isn’t fit for Coalemus, god of stupidity.” Wryn walked away as the headmaster’s glare followed him.
Retracing his steps, he wound his way through streets he walked a hundred times as a boy. A familiar structure rose high in a large forum lined with magnificent stone architecture.
“What is this place?” Libya ran her gaze over the polished marble and cedar boards.
“Collegium Academy. My brother and I attended one term here twelve years ago. Now, this school, they provide an excellent education.”
No need to knock, as soon as he reached the heavy doors, a porter swung them open and hurried to announce him.
“Felix Paterculi.” The headmaster stepped out. “To what can we account the honor of a Paterculi within our gates?” His gaze touched Libya, a curious look in his eyes.
“There’s a boy in my household, her son,” Wryn nodded to Libya, “who I want educated. Do you have openings in the youngest primary grades?”
“For a Paterculi, of course. The wing your father donated to this school is now where we hold our rhetoric exhibitions. Your son will find himself warmly welcomed.”
Wryn went rigid. “He’s not my son.”
“Of course, of course.” The headmaster smiled. “We are very discreet here. You’d be surprised how many sons of patricians’ mistresses study here along with the legitimate heirs.”
“She’s not my mistress.”
“Whatever you say, dominus.” The headmaster inclined his head. “Shall we expect the boy at the start of next week? Payment for the first month is due before he begins.”
Wryn groaned. The headmaster better prove as discreet as he claimed and not let his fanciful rumor spread to Aulia — or Gwen. “Yes, that will work.”
Turning, he and Libya walked down the marble steps, out of the forum, and through the streets toward the villa.
As the wide streets changed into the bustling noise of a marketplace, Wryn looked to Libya. “I’m sorry about all the…well, that.”
Without Love: Love and Warfare series book 4 Page 14