Lamps illuminate the halls at intervals, but it’s far darker down here than on the upper floors. I grab a torch and walk with it in case his body is on the ground.
Gods…he could be on the floor.
My pulse pounds in my throat, but I force myself to breathe, to lose all emotion. I lean on my training. I am nothing more than the Praetorian, searching for a missing person.
I sweep the halls from right to left, looking for the sheen of a blood trail.
“Julian!” I sharply whisper.
No signs of blood or struggle. Nothing at all.
I follow the hall into the thermal baths. As I open the door, I keep my back to the wall and proceed slowly, walking through the entry room, the changing room, and into the tepidarium.
Then my heart stops. I see him.
There, across the lake-like pool, is Julian. Not drowned or stabbed, just searching with his back to the wall, like me.
Relief floods through me, making my chest numb. He’s alive. He’s unharmed.
My heart hammers in my rib cage, and I rush over to him. “Thank the gods.”
“Nice to see you, too.” He laughs. Then he looks me over. “You seem…surprised to see me.” He pauses, his smile fading. “Well, that’s not good.”
I shake my head at his levity, but now that I found him, I’m trembling.
“I finished sweeping the armory, the servants’ quarters, and the smaller rooms of the baths,” he says. “Did you find her?”
I nod. “Kerasea was in the library. It wasn’t her, though.”
His eyebrows rise as high as they can go.
“She swore on her god,” I say. “And the robe belonged to a standard priest—it wasn’t one of hers.”
Julian’s eyes narrow as he stares at me. “And you believe that—despite finding her on the first floor?”
Slowly, I nod because it sounds remarkably foolish. But I have interrogated people for years. I felt her honesty and shock. It was real.
“I never saw who did it.” I sigh.
Julian shakes his head like he’s clearing water from his ears. “Tor, what is going on? You have hated the Vestals for as long as I’ve known you. And now, suddenly, you doubt yourself? You trust her?”
“I am conducting an investigation. It’s too convenient the robe was left there—the same as the weapon in the fountain. She is many things, but she’s not sloppy.”
I try to sound logical, not defensive. His questions are valid and nothing I haven’t asked myself.
“It’s rather convenient itwasn’ta High Priestess robe,” he counters. “Just as the sickle knife was too convenient. And whatever else you found that you haven’t disclosed to me.”
I look away. At times, Julian knows me too well.
He sighs loudly, and it echoes in the space.
“All right, let’s say it wasn’t Kerasea,” he continues. “If not her, then who?”
“I’m not sure yet. It could’ve been any of the senators’ sentries, and I think her servant is hiding something. No…I’m certain of it.”
Julian quirks an eyebrow. “The teenage girl?”
“That one.”
