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Rab could almost hear the Roman man’s bones splintering as the camel’s heavy foot pounded against his shin. He collapsed to the ground, his toga tumbling into the dust. ‘Father!’ the woman shrieked. She glanced up at Rab. ‘Please get help!’
Rab staggered to his feet only to find two sets of hands seizing him by the shoulders. A fist crashed into his jaw, followed by a foot into his stomach. A throng of Roman guards was pouring into the circle and Rab watched in horror as several other guards wrenched his nephew from atop the white camel. ‘Zaidu!’ he cried, then felt a heavy blow against his side.
‘Take them to the fort!’ he heard a man shout. Rab could not find his breath. ‘And somebody call a litter! The Governor has been injured!’
* * *
At first, there was nothing but pain—sharp, mind-splitting pain and the memory of blows. Then there was the taste of blood inside his mouth and the hardness of stone beneath his head. A silken voice split the silence. ‘Awaken.’
Rab opened his eyes to find himself surrounded on three sides by walls. Before him stretched the thick iron bars of a prison cell. Beyond the bars stood a figure bathed in torchlight—a vision of curves and white linen. A woman.
She turned and he knew her instantly. It was the woman—the one from the camel races. He would have recognised her anywhere—her soft curves, her auburn hair, her strong, determined nose, so like his late mother’s. Her shadowy profile sent a strange pang of nostalgia through him, though when she neared his cell and squatted low that nostalgia quickly transformed into an unexpected lust.
She pushed a water bag through the bars. ‘Drink,’ she said.
‘What is it?’
‘Water. You have been asleep for many hours.’
He sensed a lie lurking behind her words, but he was too thirsty to refuse her. As he reached for the bag, her fingers grazed his. He nearly recoiled: they were as frigid as a corpse’s.
‘You are very cold,’ he remarked. Without thinking, he removed his head tie and pulled off his long white head cover. ‘Wrap my ghutrah around yourself,’ he said, pushing the garment through the bars. ‘It will warm you.’
He seemed to have forgotten that she was Roman and thus did not deserve his charity. Still, her fingers had been terribly cold and her cheeks were bereft of colour.
She gave the voluminous white headscarf a long, suspicious stare. ‘It is just a head cover. It will not bite you,’ he said.
As a gesture of goodwill, Rab grasped the water bag she had offered him and took a long quaff. The liquid tasted vaguely of flowers.
He held out his ghutrah once again. ‘Come now, you are obviously cold.’
‘How could I be cold?’ she clipped. ‘It is the middle of August in Arabia, by all the vengeful gods.’
The absurdity of the comment struck them both at once and for a second their voices mingled in laughter, bouncing off the prison walls like two parts of a song.
Her lips returned to frowning. ‘I am not cold,’ she repeated. She sprang to her feet and placed her hands authoritatively on her hips.
‘Why do you gape?’ she asked.
‘I do not gape.’
‘You are most certainly gaping.’
‘Hmm,’ grumbled Rab and looked away. He reminded himself that it was folly to engage with Romans. Their manners were bad, their greed never ending and their moods as changeable as the desert winds. Romans were, in a word, savages, no matter how lovely their frowning lips and curving hips.
He returned the ghutrah to his head and fixed it into place with his head tie. He brushed the arms of his long grey robe and folded his legs beneath him. ‘Where am I?’
‘In a holding cell beneath the Roman fort at Bostra,’ she said, and when he did not respond, she added, ‘In the Roman Province of Arabia Petraea.’
‘Arabia Petraea,’ he echoed.
As if he needed reminding. Despite over a dozen years of Roman occupation, the words still tasted vile on his tongue. Whatever name she wished to call his homeland, to Rab it would always be the Kingdom of Nabataea, with its capital not of Bostra, but of Rekem, that great southern city of stone.
‘Why do you keep me here?’ he asked.
‘Do you not recall? Your camel injured the new Governor of Arabia—a man who happens to be my father.’
‘That man was the Governor?’
Curses, he should have guessed it. The bejewelled hand, the purple-trimmed toga, the imperious demeanour. Of all the confounded ill fortune.
‘It broke his leg,’ she said with indifference, ‘though the break has been splinted and we are told it will heal normally.’
‘I did not intend—’
‘It does not matter what you did or did not intend,’ she said. ‘What matters is what my father believes.’
‘And what does your father believe?’
‘That you commanded the kick.’
‘That is impossible. Where is my nephew?’ Rab started to stand, but his legs seemed to be growing weaker by the moment.
‘Why is it impossible?’ she asked.
‘Where is my nephew, by the gods?’ Rab demanded.
‘He is in another cell not far from here. Why is it impossible that you commanded the kick?’
‘Is he injured? Has he eaten?’
She pursed her lips together. ‘He has been treated in the exact same manner as you have. Now please answer my question. I am trying to help you.’
‘So you beat my nephew and hold him in a cell and tell me you are trying to help me? He is only eleven years old!’
‘I had nothing to do with your nephew’s beating or his captivity,’ she said. Then, in a whisper: ‘And I was able to sneak him a corner of bread.’
Rab paused, feeling a strange gratitude, then reminded himself that there was no room in this conversation for such a sentiment. ‘I demand that you release us both,’ he said.
She stiffened. ‘You are not in a position to make demands.’
‘And you are?’ Rab craned his neck to observe the empty hallway in which she stood. ‘You approach my cell all alone, a beautiful woman without any protection... On whose authority do you question me?’
She appeared confused. She glanced around the prison as if she believed him to be referring to someone else. ‘On my father’s authority, of course,’ she said at last.
He struggled once again to stand, but this time the effort made him dizzy. ‘Do you know who I am?’
‘No,’ she replied carefully. ‘Who are you?’
He bit his tongue. By the gods, what was wrong with him? Had he really almost revealed his identity? ‘I am my nephew’s only protector.’
‘And I am your only friend,’ she added.
‘Why do I find that difficult to believe?’
‘Just answer the question,’ she pressed. ‘Why is it impossible that you commanded the kick?’
‘Because a camel is incapable of learning such a command.’
‘My father will investigate the veracity of that claim. If it is a lie, you will lose your life.’
Savages, he thought. Every last one of them. He shook his head and studied the floor.
‘So it is a lie,’ she said.
‘Why does the Governor care whether the kick was commanded or not?’ he asked. Better she discover the second lie than the first.
‘It amuses my father to discover the truth,’ she replied. ‘And I can assure you that he always does.’
‘Does he not have more meaningful sources of amusement? Roads to build, riches to plunder, slaves to drive?’
She would not take the bait. ‘Your story must match your nephew’s.’
‘And what does my nephew claim happened?’
She looked away. ‘I cannot tell you that.’
‘I thought you said you were my friend.’
She sighed. ‘Everything you tell me I am obligated to tell my father. Now please, answer the question.’
Rab measured out his words. ‘Yes, it is possible for a camel to be trained to kick on command.’
‘And have you trained your camel in such a skill?’
Rab paused. ‘I have.’
He had not. He knew very little about training camels, in truth. Or racing them, for that matter. The camel races were simply a ruse—something to distract attention from Rab’s more important activities. Still, Zaidu loved the races and had been working with the camel for some months now on a variety of commands.
‘Did you order the kick?’ the woman demanded.
No, he did not, but he feared that Zaidu had. He needed to protect the boy. ‘I did.’
‘Why did you do it?’
‘Because your father pushed me,’ Rab explained. ‘I was merely defending myself against him. I was unaware of his identity.’ At least it was mostly the truth.
The woman nodded thoughtfully and seemed satisfied. ‘You may have just secured your nephew’s release. And saved your own life.’
‘Am I supposed to thank you?’ he slurred. His head had begun to spin. She did not answer him, though she was watching him like a shepherd observing a doomed sheep. All at once he understood why. ‘It was not just water you gave me, was it?’ His vision blurred.
‘No, it was not,’ she admitted.
‘And you are not my friend.’
‘No, I am not.’
Chapter Two (#u85ab3ff7-4d66-5940-be0d-c34aa7fb2cbd)
Atia stopped to smell the roses. They had been placed in a vase on the shelf outside her father’s tablinium by some well-meaning slave. She paused with her nose enveloped in petals. What a strange compulsion, she thought. She had stopped smelling flowers years ago—back when she had begun to count down the days until her own death.
She breathed deeply now and was rewarded with a sweet, subtle scent. Even more rewarding was the rose’s lavish hue—like the ruddy burn of the sun through smoke. It reminded her of the colour of the tie the camel man used to hold his ghutrah.
The ghutrah he had offered to keep her warm.
She had been so shocked by the gesture that she had not even been able to properly decline it. What prisoner offered to aid his own interrogator? Even more startling had been their reaction to the gesture: they had laughed together like thieves.
Laughter? It was another strangeness. She had hardly recognised her own voice. How many years had it been since she had laughed? Ten? Fifteen? Back before her mother had died and delight had still seemed possible.
Now, at the advanced age of thirty, Atia had learned to view delight as suspect. Obviously the camel man had been trying to endear himself to her—to trick her into trusting him.
Still, something in the way his dark, sun-flecked eyes had smiled down at her had made him seem sincere. Even now, as she thought back upon those eyes, it was as if they were warming her very thoughts.
She knew that warmth could not be trusted. And when he had called her beautiful? That had been a trick as well: a sly attempt at flattery designed to gain her sympathy.
Because beautiful she was not—not with the terrible protrusion occupying the middle of her face. Well dressed, yes. Properly coiffed and painted, certainly. Rich. Powerful. Connected. She was the daughter of a Roman Governor, by the gods—one of Emperor Hadrian’s most trusted men. But beautiful? It was a gift that Venus had declined to grant.
Still, there had been something resembling sincerity in the way the man had spoken the compliment. You approach my cell all alone, a beautiful woman without any protection... It was as if he were not talking about her, but some fantasy version of herself—a bold, attractive woman who explained herself to no one. It amused her to think of herself in such a way.
Then there had been the strangeness of his expression after he had spoken the compliment. The tight lips and pulsing jaw. The eyes narrowed dangerously in something resembling hunger. It was quite possibly the best imitation of desire she had ever seen.
Of course, what he really desired was to be released from his prison, just as all prisoners did. Still, he had spoken the words—a beautiful woman—and, however false, they had had the effect of buoying her spirit, such that she had caught herself smiling all afternoon and, apparently, stopping to smell roses.
‘Come forward,’ called her father from inside his office. Atia returned the rose to its vase and entered her father’s sparsely decorated tablinium, pausing before his sprawling ebony desk.
He appeared to be reviewing some official scroll. Beside him, a stony-faced scribe stood sentinel, his eyes flitting across the parchment in time with her father’s.
‘Sit down, Atia,’ he commanded without looking up. As she made her way to one of her father’s client chairs, she caught the gaze of her father’s first officer, Plotius, standing in a corner just behind the desk. The fleshy, thick-muscled military man took his time assessing Atia’s figure and Atia wasted none in volleying him a sneer. He replied with a just you wait look.
Seating herself, Atia nodded her gratitude at a boy operating a palm leaf in another corner of the room, though its small wind did little to alleviate the midday heat. It was August, after all—the sweltering month—and even the cool marble and high ceilings of her father’s villa were futile against the Arabian sun.
Trying to resist the heat was useless. In that way, it was much like her father himself.
‘You are looking well, Daughter,’ said her father, finally glancing up from his scroll. ‘Unusually so.’
Atia thought of the camel man and felt a small trickle of sweat trace a path down her cheek. ‘I should say the same, Father,’ she said. She glanced beneath the desk at his bandaged leg. ‘Only two days after your injury and you are already at work.’
‘The business of Empire waits for no man,’ he said. It was Emperor Hadrian’s favourite aphorism and her father recited it like a prayer.
