“Well, yes.” Livia Plurabella's laugh was a long way from carefree, too. “But we have to try. The men expect it from us. They say they want us all quivering so they can protect us, but they go to pieces if we really act like that. Haven't you noticed the same thing?”

Amanda didn't know everything there was to know about how things worked in Agrippan Rome. She thought back to the home timeline. Things weren't so openly sexist there, but all the same… She found herself nodding. “I think you have a point, my lady.”

“Of course I do.” The banker's wife took her own lightness for granted. “Now show me these hour-reckoners again, if you'd be so kind.”

“Sure.” Amanda held them up, one after the other. “These are the three most popular ladies' styles.” One was metal-flake green, one was eye-searing orange, and one was hot pink. Like the men's pocket watches, they all had gilded reliefs on the back. Amanda had never decided which one was the most tasteless. She wouldn't have been caught dead with any of them.

But Livia Plurabella sighed. “They're all beautiful.” Amanda only smiled and nodded. If her drama teacher at Canoga Park High had seen her face just then, he would have known she could act. “Which one costs what?” the local woman asked.

“This one is two hundred denari.” Amanda pointed to the green monstrosity. “This one is two hundred ten.” She pointed to the orange catastrophe. “And this one is two hundred twenty-five.” She pointed to the pink abomination.

As she often did with customers, she guessed which one Livia Plurabella would choose. She turned out to be right again, too. The banker's wife picked up the pocket watch with the hot-pink case. “This is so elegant, I just can't say no to it. Two hundred fifteen, did you say, dear?”

“Two twenty-five,” Amanda answered. Again, what she was thinking didn't show on her face. Livia Plurabella wasn't the sort of person to make slips by accident. She'd wanted to see if Amanda would call her on it. Knowing that, Amanda enjoyed calling her on it twice as much.

“Two twenty-five.” Livia Plurabella's voice drooped. But she nodded anyhow. “Well, all right. We can do that. Draw up the contract.”

The cannon kept booming as Amanda wrote out the classical Latin. She hardly looked up from what she was doing. Life went on, sure enough. She couldn't do anything about the Lietuvans outside. Since she couldn't, she tried to pretend they weren't there.

“Here you are,” she said, and handed the contract to Livia Plurabella. The matron read it, then signed both copies.

She gave one back to Amanda and kept the other. “I'll send a slave with the payment,” she said, as she had before. “And if a cannonball doesn't squash him to jelly coming or going, I'll have a fine new hour-reckoner.” She laughed. “One thing-with the Lietuvans outside the city, I don't have to worry that he'll run off with the money.”

“Er-no,” Amanda said uncomfortably.

Livia Plurabella wagged a finger at her. “That's right. You're the one who doesn't approve of slaves. Well, my dear, if you like working like a slave yourself, that's your affair. But believe you me, the better sort of people don't.” She got to her feet and swept out of the house. All by herself, she made a parade.

“The better sort of people.” Amanda spat out the words. Then she spat for real, on the dirt in the courtyard herb garden. The idea of slavery disgusted her. Having to put up with it here disgusted her more.

If she were a slave and her mistress gave her that much money to buy something, what would she do? I'd be gone so fast, her head would spin, she thought. But it wasn't that simple. Agrippan Rome had slavecatchers, just like the American South before the Civil War. Whenever you went into a town, you had to show who you were and what your business was.

The records would go into a file. That made things easier for anyone who came after you.

You couldn't even run across the border to Lietuva, not in peacetime. The Lietuvans gave back runaway slaves from the Roman Empire. That way, the Romans gave back runaway slaves from Lietuva. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. And the poor slaves who wanted nothing but the chance to live their own lives? Too bad for them.

There were bandits in the mountains. Some of them were runaways. But that was no life, not really. Few lasted long at it. Army patrols did their best to keep banditry down. And crucifixion had never gone out of style in Agrippan Rome. Amanda shivered. It was an ugly way to die.

Another cannonball crashed into Polisso. Somebody shrieked. Amanda shivered again. Were there any ways to die that weren't ugly? She didn't think so.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Before the siege of Polisso started, Jeremy would have said the big iron knocker on the front door made noises like gunshots. He knew better now. The only thing that sounded like a gunshot was another gunshot.

He went to the door and opened it. The man standing there wasn't someone he knew. “Yes?” he said. “May I help you?”

“You are Ieremeo Soltero, called Alto?” The stranger was somewhere in his thirties. He was lean and dapper, and had a sly look that said he knew all sorts of strange things. By the way one dark eyebrow kept jumping, some of the things he knew were either funny or none of his business.

“Yes, that's me,” Jeremy answered. “Who are you?”

“Iulio Balbo, called Pavo,” he said. He didn't look like a peacock, but he might be proud as one. He went on, “I have the honor to be one of Sesto Capurnio's secretaries. The most illustrious city prefect sent me here to remind you that your official report is due in two days' time.”

“Did he?” Jeremy said tonelessly.

“He certainly did.” The secretary smirked. He enjoyed seeing other people in trouble.

“Doesn't the city prefect have more important things to worry about right now?” Jeremy asked. “Will he read the official report while the Lietuvans knock down the walls and break into the city? Will he take it with him when they drag him away to the slave market?”

That wiped the smirk off Iulio Balbo's face. “If you are trying to be funny, Ieremeo Soltero-”

“Funny?” Jeremy broke in. “I'm not trying to be funny. I'm only trying to find out whether the city prefect cares more about keeping Polisso safe or about making sure all the forms get filled out at the right time.” There was a lot of bureaucratic foolishness in the home timeline. He'd seen that. No one who went to a public school could help seeing it. But here in Agrippan Rome bureaucracy wasn't just foolish. It was downright idiotic. And the people who ran things didn't seem to notice.

Iulio Balbo's eyebrows rose. No matter how sly he was, he was a gear in this ponderous bureaucratic machine. He wasn't likely to see any humor in it, and he didn't. In a voice like winter, he said, “The report is due. It is expected. It is required. If you do not submit it on or before the due date, you will suffer the penalties the laws on the subject lay down. Do you understand this formal notice?”

“Oh, yes, I understand it,” Jeremy answered. “Do you understand you're liable to go off to the Lietuvan slave market along with the most illustrious city prefect?”

“Defeatism is a crime,” Iulio Balbo said. “Defeatism in time of declared war is a worse crime. Defeatism while besieged is a still worse crime.” As usual, the locals had precise distinctions between one degree of what they thought crime and another.

Jeremy was too angry to care. “I am not being defeatist. The city prefect is. He is paying attention to these things that are not important when he ought to be doing nothing but defending the city. If you asked the garrison commandant about it, what would he say?”

Maybe Annio Basso and Sesto Capurnio were working well in harness. If they were, Iulio Balbo would just laugh at that crack. But he didn't laugh. He scowled and turned red. “Do not try to stir up quarrels between the prefect and the commandant,” he warned. “That is also an offense.”