Read Online A Day of Fire: A Novel of Pompeii by Kate Quinn, Ben Kane, Stephanie Dray, Michelle Moran, E. Knight, Sophie Perinot, Vicky Alvear Shecter - Free Book Online

level of bluntness I do not expect from the mild-mannered Sabinus. I can feel the heat rising in my cheeks. Of course I had no ill thoughts of him those many years—I had no apprehension anyone thought of him for my husband. He was just a family friend who listened to the fanciful stories I liked to make up, and laughed in the right places. Someone who took me to the market if Mother had one of her headaches or my nurse was too tired, and marveled at my facility for doing figures in my head the way Father does. Someone who called me Vesta, jokingly, because of my hair. But Vesta is not merely the goddess of the sacred fire; she is goddess of hearth, home, and family. It ought to have been a clue. I feel a sudden surge of anger at myself for missing it. Also a burst of irritation at Father. If Sabinus was to be my husband, why could I not have been told long ago? Given time to accustom myself to the idea? Would that have mattered once you met Faustus?
    “I will be patient and hope—Did you see that?”
    I am left not knowing what he hopes—not that I particularly care—as Sabinus moves past me, his eyes on the pool. I turn, curious. He stands at the water’s edge, his head tilted to one side. “Yes!” Turning back, he appeals to me. “Do you see the ripples on the surface? Another tremor! Too faint for us to feel perhaps, but the water apprehends what we do not.”
    I stare hard at what little water is left in the pool thanks to an exceptionally hot summer that has left the city short of water. I do see small ridges. “Perhaps something fell into it from above.”
    “No, such a disturbance would create circular ripples emanating from the place where the falling thing broke the surface.” He illustrates by tracing the rings on his left palm with the index finger of his right hand.
    I can hear my father as we dined last evening: “Sabinus, you become obsessed with your earthquake prognostications! You have not heard one word I have said about the new press I am installing in my calcatorium .” And hear my mother’s furious whisper when I snickered: “Aemilia, a proper Roman wife does not laugh at her husband, only with him.” Looking at Sabinus, now squatting at the pool’s edge, I think: not my husband yet . But I think something else as well. However little I fancy him as a groom, Sabinus is by any measure an intelligent man and he is right about the pattern of the ripples.
    The earth begins to shake, hard enough that I cling to the edge of the bench and Sabinus puts a hand on the ground to steady himself. Across the viridarium , a bust falls from a niche and Mother gives a little scream. “Go to her,” Sabinus urges. “I must go to the forum. My conscience will not be easy until I try Gaius Cuspius Pansa again. If those who love me well like your father do not heed me, I have little chance with the aedile who dislikes me deeply. But I must try.”
     
     
     
    SABINUS
     
    “WITH all due respect, Pansa—” Sabinus tried to keep his voice low, for while Pansa had agreed to withdraw with him to a spot between two of the new travertine columns along the east side, one was never truly alone at the forum. The handsome aedile rolled his eyes behind lashes that seemed unfairly noticeable for a man of such fair complexion.
    “—Sabinus, you never show me the respect I am due.” Pansa gave an amused smile. “What would your grandmother think of such behavior?”
    Fine , Sabinus thought, trot out the election graffiti, again . Whichever of his supporters had painted, “Vote for Sabinus, his grandmother works hard for his election” on a wall really hadn’t done him any favors. I am quite certain my grandmother sees you as I do: all corruption and guile wrapped in a pleasing appearance. He didn’t say it, but gods he wanted to.
    “This is not about our personal history, Pansa—”
    “Everything is.” Another smile.
    If he was interrupted one more time, Sabinus wasn’t sure his temper—much as others