A single lamp burned in a niche beside one of the doors. Were it not for that, the whole house would have seemed deserted. Crossing the courtyard in ten long careful strides, Castus reached the open door. Another lamp just inside illuminated the end of the corridor: painted girls danced and somersaulted along the length of the wall and away into darkness. At the far end, almost invisible in the shadow, a single door stood partly open. Castus could already smell her scent lingering in the air.
He wanted to call out, speak her name, but the stillness of the night and the empty building around him seemed to forbid all sound. He paced silently along the corridor, running his fingertips over the painted dancers, until he reached the door.
‘Sabina?’ he managed to whisper. The word came out as a hoarse croak. He lifted his hand and edged the door open.
Complete darkness inside, or so it seemed at first. Castus felt the prickle of nerves running up his spine. Her scent again, fresh and strong. Then he made out the bed set against the far wall, and the motion in the darkness as she rolled from beneath the covers.
‘Come here,’ she said. He stepped into the room and pushed the door closed behind him. His senses reeled: the awareness of danger, of trespass, eclipsed by the surge of desire. He shed his cloak at the threshold; he unbuckled his belt and it fell to the floor. Pulling off his tunic, he crossed the room, into the field of her warmth. There was a shuttered window high above the bed, but enough grey light seeped between the panels of the shutters for him to make out her pale form as she pushed back the covers. Then her arms were around him, drawing him down onto the bed, and there was nothing in his mind but the feel of her body, the taste of her lips and her skin.
Her thighs were parted, and he eased his body down onto her. He could hear her breathing, loud and rapid. She seemed nervous. For the first time since he had entered the room a knot of alarm twisted at the back of his skull. Sabina had never seemed nervous before, not even in the necropolis. He raised himself on one arm and looked down at her, seeing only the curves of her body in the faint light. He laid a palm on her breast: it was full and round. As he blinked he could almost make out the shape of her face changing from the image in his mind to something else.
‘Gods below, what is this?’ he said from the back of his throat.
He reared up onto his knees, stretching an arm to grab at the shutters. One heave, and the catch burst; the shutters swung open and the grey misty light fell over the bed. The girl beneath him let out a cry and rolled, covering her face. But Castus had already seen that it was not Sabina in the bed with him.
Ice filled his veins, and his heart slammed against the top of his chest. He was gripping the girl by her arm, turning her, hardly believing what he had seen.
‘Don’t hurt me,’ she whispered, with a sob in her voice. ‘Please… this wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t do this… they made me…’
Up off the bed in one bound, Castus staggered immediately and fell to the floor. His breeches were still tangled around his knees, and he hauled them up. Gasping breath, he pulled on his tunic and cloak, then snatched up his belt and dagger from the floor. When he glanced back he saw only the bunched covers, and the shape of the girl hiding beneath them.
There was a figure in the passageway as he threw open the door. The shadow darted across the painted frieze of dancers, but Castus moved faster. One lunging grab, and he had the fugitive by the arm, spinning him and slamming him against the wall. The big knife was already bared in his fist.
‘If you kill me now,’ Serapion said in a choked gasp, ‘others will know of it.’
Castus shoved harder against him, his forearm pressed into the eunuch’s throat and the dagger pricking the skin beneath his jaw. ‘Who will know?’ he hissed. ‘Who arranged this?’
‘I cannot say,’ Serapion whispered. In the glow from the lamp at the end of the corridor his face was sheened with sweat. Castus jolted him by the throat. How had he allowed himself to be so stupid? Desire had blinded him – he had been led by the nose. Or maybe not the nose… Despairing anger burned through him.
‘Who was that girl in the bed?’ he demanded, although in his heart he already knew the truth.
Serapion twisted his mouth into a smile. ‘You really couldn’t tell?’ He almost sounded genuinely perplexed. Animal passion was surely alien to him, Castus realised. ‘I told you,’ the eunuch said, ‘that my mistress was waiting for you…’
‘That was not Sabina.’
‘The domina Valeria Domitia Sabina is not my mistress,’ Serapion said. Castus almost admired his calm self-control. ‘I serve another. I serve the nobilissima femina Fausta, wife of our Augustus.’
The shock of his words wrenched through Castus’s body. He wanted to ram the knife hilt-deep in the eunuch’s throat, but a sickening dread was stealing his anger, stealing his killing resolve.
‘Where’s Sabina now?’
‘Oh, she left in a closed carriage, shortly after noon. She was safely back in Treveris long ago.’
Castus remembered the words she had mouthed to him on the steps: had she tried to warn him? But then she must have known. She must have been aware of what would happen…
‘Believe me,’ the eunuch said, ‘this was not my plan, not my intention. I am a slave, and I must do what I am ordered…’
‘So people keep telling me. Why should I let you live?’
Serapion took a moment to answer. His eyes flickered towards the far end of the corridor. ‘There are three men in the courtyard outside,’ he said, quietly and clearly. ‘They will try to kill you as you leave. If you run, you might evade them.’
Castus slackened his grip slightly; the eunuch sagged against the wall, breathing deeply. ‘Why warn me?’ Castus asked him.
‘You think I’m just a eunuch?’ Serapion said bitterly. ‘You think I’m a clay figure, a homunculus? I am just as human as you, and perhaps you can help me if I help you. We are both slaves in this affair. Perhaps I think you deserve a chance.’
Pushing Serapion back against the wall, Castus stepped away from him.
‘Don’t try to follow me,’ he said.
Outside the air was as thick and still as before, but the night seemed darker. Castus lingered in the doorway, trying to blink the after-image of the lamp glow from his eyes. There was no other way from the building, unless he went back into the bedchamber and tried to force his way out through the window, and that would certainly make enough noise to summon trouble.
He took a breath, then exhaled slowly, feeling the strength mass in his limbs. Drawing up his cloak, he wrapped it around his left arm. In his right hand he held the dagger in a low grip. A slight sound from outside, a shuffle of feet on paving, and Castus threw himself through the door.
Two running strides took him to the fountain, and he turned at bay. There were three of them, just as the eunuch had said: two held shortswords, and the third carried a club that looked like an axe handle. Plainly dressed, but they knew how to use their weapons. Soldiers, Castus guessed; perhaps Praetorians.
He was still disorientated, stunned by the shock of what had happened in the bedchamber. His heart was beating fast, and he willed himself to calm.
The swordsmen moved to either side of him, while the clubman advanced head on with his weapon raised. Crouched, the dagger drawn back in his fist, Castus knew that he could not wait for them to make the first strike: once the first moved, the others would be on him. He considered making a dash for the gate, or perhaps the wall – he could fight with his back to something, at least. But then they would just surround him and use the longer reach of their weapons… His only chance was to keep moving, close the distance and tackle them individually. Three heartbeats, three rapid breaths, then he jumped up onto the stone rim of the fountain basin.