I knew I’d only be snarled at if I brought up the fee he’d promised me for leading the parade, so I remained silent. Aemil guessed why I was there, however.
“I don’t have time for you right now, Leonidas. And no money for you either. Come back after Saturnalia.”
He turned abruptly away, striding across the blood-soaked floor to stand over the gladiator who’d been stretched out on his back. The young man’s arms were folded over his chest, his eyes closed. Aemil bowed his head, shoulders slumping.
I left him to grieve.
“Are you certain you wish to part with it?” the goldsmith called Decimus asked me.
He looked over what I’d brought him, his practiced eye summing up its price.
I nodded, pretending to be indifferent. I’d been able to smuggle it out of the apartment after I’d returned from seeing Marcianus, as Cassia had been absorbed in her tablets when I’d once more departed.
“A collector will pay much for it,” I told him.
“I agree.” Decimus put the item aside and opened a dark cloth on his table to reveal what I’d asked him to make.
The pin, in the form of a cluster of three small leaves, was exquisite, each leaf hammered to the thinness of silk. The pin would go well with the gold wire earrings Priscus had given Cassia as a reward for her help.
“I must ask once more if you are certain,” Decimus said as my gaze lingered on the beauty of the worked gold. “She is only a woman. She’ll take a gift like this and vanish into the wind, on to the next man who might give her even more.”
Cassia could not legally leave me no matter what she wished, but that was not why I silently disagreed with the man.
She’d go if she truly wanted to. Cassia was clever enough to find a way. But she hadn’t, not in the year since I’d been freed. She could have somehow disentangled herself from the bargain we’d been forced to make with our unknown benefactor, but instead she’d remained to assist me.
Or I might be assisting her. I wasn’t certain anymore.
When she’d gazed at Drusus’s gold and imagined where it could take us, she’d clearly said that whenever we left Rome, we’d depart together.
“If this will pay for it, then I will take pin and go,” I said, gesturing to the item I’d left.
Decimus shook his head as though questioning my wisdom, but he wrapped the pin in the cloth once more and slid it into a pouch, closing and tying the drawstrings.
I wrenched my gaze from the rudis I’d laid before him, making myself take the bag then turn and leave his shop.
It was the only thing I could think of that had any value. There was the bronze hand with the small gemstones Priscus had given me at the same time he’d bestowed the earrings on Cassia, but that had been a gift. Also, Cassia might have noticed if I’d lifted the hand from the shelf where it had reposed since earlier this year.
The rudis was mine absolutely. I wasn’t wrong when I said a collector would pay a large sum for it.
It was a symbol of my freedom, but in truth it was only a wooden sword. It would bring a large price only because it had belonged to the famous Leonidas.
I told myself, as I walked from the street of the gold workers and made my way to the Quirinal, that my actual freedom was symbol enough.
As I neared the wine shop, a group of youths charged down our street.
“Io, Saturnalia!” the leader shouted.
His followers chorused it in response. Passers-by stopped to take up the cry, cheering on the youths.
I stepped quickly into our stairwell, in case one of the young men decided to use the opportunity to lift the pouch from my belt. With what I’d gone through to obtain this pin, I’d have to chase anyone who stole it and pound it out of them.
I shut the door on the noise and ascended to the rooms above. Cassia was just hanging up the drab woolen cloak she wore when the weather was inclement. She poured wine and seated herself, looking pleased.
“Livius sent the wine,” she said. “His man, Junius, brought it, and also told me that Drusus slipped away from the city. Probably fleeing to his villa, or much farther than that, if he is wise.”
“I am glad we were able to stop a murder,” I said, hanging up my own cloak and taking my stool. “But also that there will be no extra executions this Saturnalia.”
I thought of the dead gladiator in the spolarium, amid the blood of other men and beasts who’d lost their lives today, and Aemil, his head bent in sorrow.
