Tullius was dead, and Nero had heard his confession.Tullius would no longer threaten Priscus, and I would not be accused of Floriana’s murder.I would eat my breakfast, see that Cassia was comfortable, and we could both sleep.
The well nearest our house sat the bottom of acastellum, a tower that collected water from an aqueduct and sent it via pipes to the public fountains.The basin at the foot of the tower dispensed water through the mouth of a carved-stone Bacchus, stone leaves surrounding his scowling face.
Most people drew water early in the morning, so only one startled woman was there at this hour.She drew back when she saw me, her mouth dropping open, then she jerked her vessel from the spigot and hastened away, water sloshing in her wake.
I set the jar I’d brought beneath Bacchus’s mouth and let him spill water into it.The fountain’s basin sported a carved groove that allowed the ever-flowing water out into the gutter, where it trickled along the street, seeking escape into the sewers.
“You are Leonidas?”
I rose, lifting the full jar, now heavy and damp.
The man who addressed me was perhaps ten years older than I, with black hair in thick curls.He was tall and broad of shoulder, filling out a tunic of fine linen.He wore no toga, but his boots were well made, and a thick gold wristlet proclaimed his wealth.Three burly men stood behind him—his guards.No man wearing so much gold should walk about alone.
“I am.”I suspected he was an admirer of Leonidas the Spartan, and I waited patiently for him to tell me which bouts he remembered.
“I am Sextus Livius.”
I couldn’t place the name for a moment, then I recalled that Sextus Livius was the speculator who’d bought Floriana’s house.
He went on.“I had a message from Gnaeus Gallus, thearchitectus,that you wished to speak to me.”
I lifted my brows.“I sent no message.”
“I believe your slave conveyed the message through him.”Livius reached behind him, and one of his guards slid a thin scroll into his hand.The scroll was tiny, only a few inches long when he opened it.I saw words on it in neat writing.“I thought it best to come to you myself.”
“I already know you purchased the house Floriana worked in.That you make many such purchases.”
“Yes.”Livius regarded me with dark eyes that reminded me of another’s I’d seen.I suddenly realized whose.
My expression must have betrayed me, because Livius nodded.“Is there a place we may speak?”
Without a word, I gestured him to follow.I led the way back to our apartment, balancing the water jar on my shoulder.
“The guards will not fit,” I said as I opened the door from the street.“I can give you my word you won’t be harmed.”
“They will come if I shout.”Livius indicated I should precede him up the stairs.
I entered the apartment and set the jar in its corner, my tunic damp from the water slopping over.Cassia hurried in from the balcony—she’d obviously not taken to her bed as ordered.
“Oh, good.You found him.”She smiled at me, pleased.“I sent a message to Sextus Livius while you slept on the Palatine.”
The three guards had remained downstairs.I’d left the doors open in case they wanted to rush in to Livius’s defense.
I brushed droplets of water from my tunic and faced him.“Priscus is your father.Isn’t he?”
Chapter 26
Livius regarded me in surprise.“Your message said you knew this.”
Cassia would have written the message, which she’d given Gallus to deliver.How she’d discovered Livius’s identity, I did not know, but now it was clear what she’d been trying to whisper to me since we’d left Priscus’sdomus.
I remembered her telling me the story that Priscus had set free one of the boys in his household because he’d seen good in the lad.Priscus had placed him with a family through an intermediary, according to Kephalos and Celnus.
The deed was more understandable if the boy had been Priscus’s own son, perhaps by a mistress.Priscus had spoken of his wife with so much love that I suspected the liaison had happened before his marriage.
“He allowed you to be adopted,” I said.“So you’d have a chance.”
“He was incredibly kind.”Livius spoke with reverence.“I was indeed adopted by a man—Julius Livius—who raised me as his own.When he went to his ancestors, I inherited his wealth and his estates throughout the empire, making me one of the richest men in Rome.”
