Read Online Savage City by Sophia McDougall - Free Book Online

finally, breathless, ‘Marcus, I’m sorry. Because the Sibyl told me this would happen, and if I’d understood I could have been patient, I could have let you be. I didn’t know.’ Still he didn’t stir, crouching low over Marcus, eyes fixed on his impassive face, knowing there was something else that needed saying. He flexed the hand Marcus had smashed, months ago. His bones cracked and ringing once again, it was easy to remember lying powerless at his cousin’s feet. At last he added, ‘And I forgive you.’
    He lifted the wreath very slowly in both hands, and in a strange way he was glad his arm was broken, because it seemed right that this should hurt him, as he raised it to his own head. His eyes closed against the pain, and stayed shut as he felt the unfamiliar weight settle over his hair, the metal cool against his forehead. He released a long breath, almost a moan, as if something clenched in his lungs all his life could be expelled at last into the air. Then he took Marcus’ hand, finding the fingers chilly but not yet rigid, and the ring slid off easily. It was loose on his own finger too.
    He laid Marcus’ hands back, one over the other, and clasped them both as a kind of farewell, because of how it had looked when Noriko had done it. As he did so he noticed something that didn’t belong: under the folds of the robe, where it closed at Marcus’ breast, there was something made of cheap-looking dark blue wool lying against his skin. It had been hidden by the wreath. It looked strange and unfittingto Drusus, but it must have been placed there with some meaning that did not concern him and he did not touch it.
    He gritted his teeth, wincing as he got to his feet, but it was easier to rise than it had been to bend down.
    Hesitantly, Sulien turned on the longvision. Of all things, they were showing a pink-and-white legion of girls performing some traditional dance in Fennia before smiling officials: a celebration in honour of Faustus’ recovery that was, apparently, still going on. Meanwhile a rolling subtitle across the bottom of the screen admitted that there had been an incident at the Colosseum, and that General Salvius had called a session of the Senate for early tomorrow, after which there would be a further announcement. Citizens in Rome should listen for instructions from the Praetorians or vigiles. Una lifted her head a little from the table-top and stared; the music jigged briskly and Sulien turned it off.
    Una pressed her cheek back against the surface of the table. She was gripping the edge of it with both hands, as if she thought she could drive her fingers right through if she kept at it long enough. Her lips were pulled back a little, showing the teeth, her eyes wide and red, like a dead fox’s. The bloodstains all over her glared darker as the rainwater dried and Sulien suggested cautiously, ‘Do you want . . . Do you want to change your clothes?’
    Una shrank back slightly in the chair and looked up, her expression changing slowly from uncomprehending to almost pleading. She whispered, ‘Later.’
    Of course the feeling of Marcus’ blood against her skin was unbearable, of course she knew she would have to wash it away like so much dirt, put on clean clothes, equip herself to meet the advance of the next day, the next minute even— but oh, she could not begin yet. The time that had passed was so short that she could hardly believe it was not possible to smash a way back through to the moment she’d seen Dama in the street, to try again.
    And now she couldn’t tear her attention from the blood, as horrifying as if she’d only just realised it was there. She stood up, the chair skidding back across the floor, and she could hardly tell if she was trying to breathe, or trying not to breathe. Either way she felt it might have been easier if she could have hurt something, and Sulien loomed there mournfully, his anxious face sweet and oppressive, he seemed to sway like a mast in front of