Horatio said, “Aurelia is your friend, correct?”

I didn’t respond. Not because I refused, but because I wasn’t sure how to answer that question. Was she still my friend? Had she ever been?

Ignoring my silence, he said, “She’s a remarkably stubborn girl, just like her mother. Maybe you noticed.”

I smiled a little. “Yes, I might’ve noticed that.”

“I loved her mother more than I’ve loved anyone or anything. But she died giving birth to Aurelia, and that released a poison inside me. I was a senator, in the greatest empire the world had ever known. But it was not great enough to save her.”

“That’s why you exposed Aurelia?”

“She was a thorn in the wound opened by losing her mother. And I thought that by giving Aurelia away, the wound would heal. But all these years later, it’s only worse. I will give Radulf the key because I want him to destroy the empire that could not save my family.”

“Valerius will stop you,” I said. “He will kill you before that happens.”

“Valerius has no such power.” Horatio reached over and patted my cheek. “You seem like a smart boy, for a slave, but not smart enough. I have the key with me at all times, and tomorrow, it will belong to Radulf. Once he finds the Malice of Mars, all of Rome will be his. What can Valerius do about that?” He motioned toward the door. “Run now, if you wish. I know that I can’t stop you.”

I shook my head. “Tomorrow you’re taking me into the arena to fight Radulf. Well, that’s what I intend to do.”

He stood to leave and brushed off his clothes from the dirt in this room. “You have the heart of a gladiator. It will be a glorious fight. I’m almost sad that you won’t survive it.”

Very late in the night, I received one other visitor. I had been asleep on the floor, grateful for the warmth of the bulla against this cold concrete, when the door opened. I sat up and glared into candlelight.

It was set on the floor, allowing me to see Aurelia’s face behind it. “Why are you still here?” She never wasted time in becoming angry with me. “There are no guards here, and your door isn’t locked. I thought I was coming to free you, but now I see you won’t even free yourself!”

“Go back to your father,” I said tiredly.

“I’ve been talking with him all night. Here.” She handed me a thick slice of bread, which I gladly took. Then she added, “He said he had often watched for me, and wanted to bring me back home, but never knew where to look. He never remarried, or had any other children. Lately, he’d begun to worry about dying without an heir.”

An interesting worry, considering the warning I had given him only hours ago. “Congratulations,” I mumbled. A part of me meant that. Even if she had lied about him, I knew that getting back to her family was as important to her as Livia was to me. Would I have lied to Aurelia if it meant I could recover my sister? Yes, I probably would have.

She leaned against the wall with slumped shoulders. “However, he’s not who I thought he would be.”

Her tone was blank, not quite disappointed, or angry, or even sad. It was just stating a fact, I supposed. I stared back at her, completely unsure of what to say. Finally, I came up with a question. “Why?” It seemed safe enough.

“He told me that a war is coming between those who support the empire, and those who support Radulf. He called it the Praetor War.” She sighed. “Then he said that if I am to be part of his household, I must support Radulf.”

“What did you expect? Valerius already told you all of that.”

“But I didn’t believe him. I never really trusted Valerius, so I thought he was lying to you.”

I paused, and then said. “He told plenty of lies. Just not about that.”

She pushed the door back. “Come with me, Nic, but we have to hurry. We’ll leave Rome tonight. Go anywhere else that we want.”

“What about my sister? I’m supposed to leave her in Radulf’s control?”

Aurelia brushed a hand through her hair, obviously frustrated. “Do you know what Horatio has planned for tomorrow? It would be awful to leave Rome without your sister, I agree, but at least you’ll leave alive.”

“I have a bargain with the emperor. Tomorrow in the arena, I will take Radulf’s magic, and when I do, he will grant Livia and me our freedom.”

“It won’t work.”

“When I leave Rome, I want to go as a free person, not a fugitive.”

“Nic, you’re not listening —”

“Neither are you!”

“They intend to kill you in the arena!”

“And I intend to live!” I exhaled a slow breath. “There’s no other choice for me now. Either you’ll stand by me and support what I have to do, or you’ll get out of my way.”

She turned toward me, as her face slowly pinched into something resembling pain. “I can’t help you destroy yourself.”

“Then this is good-bye.”

She tried again. “I was wrong to lie to you about my father, and wrong to want to bring you to him before. I will admit to both of those. But this time, you are wrong. If you go into that arena tomorrow, something terrible is going to happen.”

I didn’t look at her to ask, “How do you know that?”

“Because I can feel it. Because we’re friends, Nic. So you have to believe me now.”

I scoffed. “Well, that’s the question, then. Whether I still believe that we are friends.”

“Do you?”

I held out my hands to her, remembering several days ago when she had slapped chains on them. “Are we equals, you and I? Or do you see me as a slave?”

I must’ve turned enough for her to see the dried blood on my tunic from where I’d been cut. She gasped and cried, “What happened to you? They told me you weren’t hurt!”

My eyes darted behind her as Horatio filled the frame. “Ask him what happened.”

Horatio eyed Aurelia cautiously, and said, “It’s time, Nic.”

“Don’t go into that arena,” Aurelia said.

Horatio pushed her aside. “If you are living in my home, you must obey my orders.”

Aurelia’s eyes went from me to him, and she said, “Then I will not live in your home.” She removed the crepundia and hung it over my shoulders instead. “Maybe Nic should’ve been your child. He seems perfectly willing to obey you.” Then she pushed past Horatio’s guards and was gone.

Horatio briefly stared at where she’d been before his face hardened again. He turned to me. “I expected you’d have run in the night. Surely you were warned about the arena today.”

“Many times,” I said as I walked out of the room. “But my bigger worry is that you weren’t warned enough.”

As I had done days earlier, we entered the amphitheater beneath a tall arch and walked down the ramp that would take us into the hypogeum. The smell assaulted me far worse than it had the first time. Had I already come so far from the pits of slavery that I could see this place as a free person? Because although I had disliked it before, I had also felt like a part of its filth, used to being chained like an animal. But now I wasn’t that slave boy anymore. I remembered freedom again and could never go back to this.

We passed Caela’s former cage, now occupied by animals with black and white stripes. Horatio called them tiger horses. I thought of how enraged Caela would be to know they were here, and wished she were here with me again. There were several lions today and one very large black cat that paced anxiously in his cage. I understood his restlessness, which filled my veins as well. I paused long enough to whisper that there would be no death in the arena today. He watched me, and even dipped his head as I passed by. If that cat were a human, it would’ve been a bow, a thought that amazed me.