He very likely would have, in fact, had there not been as many others coming at him from the other side. Twisting away, Scortius saw the glint of daggers, a wooden staff, and then an entirely illegal drawn sword.

They had been planning to sing to her. The idea was to gather in the street below what they assumed to be her bedroom above the front portico and offer music in her glorious name. They even had instruments. The plan, however, had been Cleander's-he was their leader-and when it emerged that his father had confined him to his quarters for the accidental death of that Bassanid servant, the young Green partisans had found themselves drinking irritably and without purpose in their usual tavern. The talk had been of horses and prostitutes.

But no self-respecting young man of lineage could be expected to submit tamely to confinement on a spring night in the very week the racing was to begin again. When Cleander showed up he seemed a shade uneasy to those who knew him best, but he grinned in the doorway as they shouted their welcome. He'd actually killed a man today. It was undeniably impressive. Cleander drank two quick glasses of unmixed wine and offered a definitive opinion about one woman whose rooms were not far from his father's house. She was too expensive for most of them, so no one was in a position to refute his observations.

Then he pointed out that they'd planned to chorus Shirin's undying fame and he saw no reason to allow the late hour to forestall them. She'd be honoured, he told the others. It wasn't as if they were intruding upon her, only offering a tribute from the street. He told them what she'd been wearing at her reception that afternoon when she greeted him-personally.

Someone mentioned the dancer's neighbours and the Urban Prefect's watchmen, but most of them knew enough to laugh and shout the craven fellow down.

They made their way out the door. Ten or twelve young men (they lost a few en route) in a stumbling cluster, variously garbed, one with a stringed instrument, two with flutes, moving uphill through a sharp, cold wind. If an officer of the watch was anywhere about he elected-prudently-not to make his presence visible. The partisans of both factions were notoriously unstable in the week the racing began. End of winter, beginning of the Hippodrome season. Springtime did things to the young, everywhere.

It might not feel like spring tonight but it was.

They reached her street and divided themselves, half to each side of her wide portico where they could all see the solarium balcony, should Shirin elect to appear above them like a vision when they sang. The one with the strings was swearing about the numbing cold on his fingers. The others were busily spitting and clearing throats and nervously muttering the verses of Cleander's chosen song when one of them saw a man climbing down from that same balcony to the porch.

It was an obscene, monstrous outrage. A violation of Shirin's purity, her honour. What right did someone else have to be descending from her bedroom in the middle of the night?

The contemptible coward turned to run as soon as they cried out.

He had no weapon, didn't get far. Marcellus's staff caught him a heavy blow to the shoulder as he tried to dodge around the group of them to the south. Then quick, wiry Darius knifed him in the side, ripping the blade upwards, and one of the twins got him with a kick in the ribs on the same side while the bastard was flattening Darius with a blow of his fist. Darius moaned. Cleander came running up then, with his sword drawn-the only one of them reckless enough to carry one. He'd already killed today, and he was the one who knew Shirin.

The others backed away from the man, who was lying on the ground now, holding his torn side. Darius got to his knees, then moved away. They fell silent, a sense of awe, the power of the moment overtaking them. They were all looking at the sword. There were no torches burning on the walls; the wind had blown them out. No sight or sound of the night watch. Stars, wind, and a white moon westering.

"I am reluctant to kill a man without knowing who he is," said Cleander with really impressive gravity.

"I am Heladikos, the son of Jad," said the bastard lying on the road. He appeared-amazingly-to be struggling with hilarity as much as anything else. He was bleeding. They could see dark blood on the road. "All men must die. Stab away, child. Two in a day? A Bassanid servant and a god's son? Makes you a warrior, almost." He'd kept the cloak about his face, somehow, even as he fell.

Someone gasped. Cleander made a startled movement.

"How the fuck do you know about-?"

Cleander moved closer, knelt. Sword to the wounded man's breast, he twitched the cloak aside. The man on the ground made no movement at all. Cleander looked at him for one instant-then let the cloak fall from his fingers as if it were burning to the touch. There was no light. The others couldn't see what he saw.

They heard Cleander, though, as the cloak fell once more over the downed man's face.

"Oh, fuck!" said the only son of Plautus Bonosus, Master of the Sarantine Senate. He stood up. "Oh, no. Oh, fuck. Oh, holy Jad!"

"My great father!" said the wounded man brightly.

This was followed, unsurprisingly, by silence. Someone coughed nervously.

"Does this mean we aren't singing?" Declanus asked plaintively.

"Get out of here. All of you!" Cleander rasped hoarsely over his shoulder. "Go! Disappear! My father will fucking kill me."

"Who is it?" snapped Marcellus.

"You don't know. You don't want to know. This never happened. Get home, go anywhere, or we're all dead men! Holy Jad!"

"What the-?"

'Go!

A light appeared in a window overhead. Someone began shouting for the watch-a woman's voice. They went.

Thanks be to Jad, the boy had a brain and wasn't hopelessly drunk. He had quickly covered Scortius's face again after their eyes locked in the darkness. None of the others-he was sure of it-knew who it was they'd attacked.

There was a chance to get out of this.

If he lived. The knife had gone in on his left side, and ripped, and then the kick in the same side had broken ribs. He'd had breaks before. Knew what they felt like.

They felt very bad. It was, putting it mildly, not easy to breathe. He clutched his side and felt blood pouring from the wound through his fingers. The boy with the knife had jerked it upwards after stabbing him.

But they left. Thanks be to Jad, they left. Leaving only one behind. Someone at a window was calling for the watch.

"Holy Jad," whispered Bonosus's son. "Scortius. I swear… we had no idea"

"Know you didn't. Thought… were killing just anyone." It was irresponsible to be feeling such hilarity, but the absurdity of this was so extreme. To die, like this? "No. We didn't! I mean Not really the time to be ironic, actually. "Get me upright, before someone comes." "Can you… can you walk?" "Of course I can walk." Probably a lie.

"I'll take you to my father's house," the boy said. Bravely enough. The charioteer could guess what consequences would await Cleander after he appeared at the door with a wounded man. Closeted with his wife and son.

Something became clear, suddenly. That was why they'd been together tonight. And then something else did, driving amusement entirely away. "Not your house. Holy Jad, no!"

He was not going to appear at Thenais's door at this hour of night, having been wounded by partisans after descending from the bed chamber of Shirin of the Greens. He winced at the image of her face, hearing this. Not at the outraged expression that would ensue: the lack of one. The detached, ironic coldness coming back.

"But you need a physician. There's blood. And my father can keep this-"