Read Online The Raven and the Rose by Doreen Owens Malek - Free Book Online Page A

back again and Verrix had dumped her purchases in her lap.
    The two bearers looked at one another in astonishment and then away, waiting for Lathia’s reaction.
    “What are you doing?” Larthia gasped.
    “What does it look like?” Verrix responded.
    Larthia glared at him, opened her mouth, then remembered the presence of the other servants.
    “I’ll deal with you later,” she said shortly. Then, to the bearers, “Take me home.”
    Verrix walked behind the litter as the bearers wove their way back to the Sejanus estate. Once Larthia was ensconced on a couch in her tablinum she dismissed the other servants and then said to Verrix in a deadly tone, “What was the meaning of that rebellious display in the forum?”
    “My purpose is to protect you from harm, not to trot at your heels like your little dog carrying whatever trinkets might catch your eye.”
    “Your purpose is to do whatever I tell you to do!” Larthia responded angrily. “In Gaul you may have been a prince, my arrogant giant, but in this house you are a slave!”
    “I am very aware of my position in this house,” he replied stonily.
    “I don’t think you are,” Larthia said, rising from the couch. “I could have you flogged for this, or prescribe any other punishment I choose, or even sell you.”
    “You won’t sell me,” Verrix replied.
    Larthia gaped at him, unable to comprehend such insolence. “Oh, no?” she finally managed to croak.
    “My presence is keeping your grandfather off your back. And more than that, you need me. You are afraid.”
    Larthia swallowed, her eyes locked with his.
    “Afraid of what?” she said.
    “Afraid that Casca might be right, and you are the target of his enemies. I have been in Rome some time and I know that these politicians employ gangs of young ruffians to do their bidding. The toughs roam the streets at night and hang about the centers of commerce during the day, studying the habits of their victims. We saw one such group today near the Via Sacra. Were they following you? Did you notice them?”
    Larthia’s eyes narrowed. “You are not the only bodyguard in Rome,” she said quietly. “Every colonial rousted from his homeland by the recent wars is looking for a job.”
    “But I am the only one who has your grandfather’s confidence, and again the only one so highly motivated by the thought of his potential freedom that he would die to protect you,” Verrix responded evenly.
    Larthia stared back at him, silenced.
    Verrix waited patiently.
    “You do think you have me at a disadvantage, don’t you?” she finally observed quietly, forcing herself to hold his cool blue gaze directly.
    “No, mistress,” he replied. “I think I have an accurate understanding of our relative positions, and yours is still far superior to mine.”
    Larthia took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “Just so you understand that,” she said firmly.
    He bowed his head.
    “I am dining with my sister at the Atrium Vestae this evening,” Larthia continued. “You will accompany me there. You are dismissed until then.”
    Verrix bowed again and backed out of the room.
    Larthia resumed her seat slowly, staring at the space where the slave had been.  
    * * *
    “So, did you see her?” Septimus asked, sitting on the edge of the pool as a slave scraped his back with a strigil.
    “I saw her,” Marcus replied, rolling over in the steaming water and pushing his wet hair back from his face.
    “And?”
    “And she is incredibly lovely,” Marcus said.
    Both men were naked. They were lolling in a pool fed by a stone pipe emerging from an exterior wall and heated by a hypocaust extending beneath the floor of the bath. Under his feet Marcus could feel the scraping of coins tossed into the spring outside as an offering to the deity of the baths and then carried inside with the rush of water. The goddess Minerva, depicted holding an owl and helmeted for war in a carving on the bronze dome above their heads, was the target of this