The scribe positioned himself and his supplies on a rickety stand in the corner while the tribune circled Valentine slowly—a cat sizing up his prey. Titus’s pulse hammered in his ears as he pretended to study the wall of instruments. Whips of varying kinds, long knives, tiny spikelike blades made for nonfatal but extremely painfulpunctures, pliers for extracting fingernails and teeth, scissors, hooks, branding irons, scourging rods ranging in size from a pinkie’s thickness to a club the approximate size of a gladiator’s thigh, saws, and several other things that looked terrible but had no real use other than to frighten with sheer imagination.
For the first time, Titus stared at the instruments of torture out of habit rather than planning the approach that would gain the quickest results. This time he wanted no results. He’d received a message from Iris consisting of two words that made him hurl the tablet across the room when he read it.
We stay.
If Titus was successful, Valentine would give away the two people Titus loved most. If Valentine remained silent, the fallback would be on Titus. If Iris knew what he was about to do to the man she claimed to love, she would hate him forever. If she didn’t already. He was damned no matter what he did.
“Liberare!”
Titus snapped to attention and turned around. “Yes, sir?”
The tribune settled into a chair, folding one knee over the other and shaking a bag of pistachio nuts into his lap. “I’m rather disappointed at the look of him.” He tilted his head toward Valentine. “I thought he’d be taller. More... heroic-looking.” He cracked a shell and popped the nut into his mouth, crunching with anticipation. The shell clicked against the floor. “Start with the number two rod. We’ll warm up slowly, have a bit of sport.”
“Yes, sir.” Titus reached for the thumb-sized rod. When he turned around, Valentine’s eyes were trained on him in an expression Titus couldn’t read. The calmness of the look sank into his gut and churned up unease, guilt, and something like fear. He shouldn’t be doing this.
Titus tightened his grip on the rod to mask the sudden shaking in his hand.Don’t be foolish.Valentine had broken the law. On purpose. Again and again. He deserved a good beating forthatat least. Yet something inside told him this was wrong. He pushed the doubts away and waited for the tribune’s cue to begin.
Chewing, Braccus lifted a finger, looking at Valentine. “You’re a leader of the Christians, are you not?”
Valentine gave a single nod but said nothing. Titus twirled the rod between his fingers.
Tribune Braccus cracked another nut. “There is no badge of honor here for silence.” He popped the nut into his mouth and chewed as he spoke. “Death is inevitable. But you can speak now and spare yourself all this.” He wiggled his fingers at the torture devices on the walls.
Valentine shut his eyes and mumbled something under his breath.
The tribune jerked forward in his seat. “What?”
“A good shepherd gives his life for the sheep,” Valentine repeated in a louder voice.
The scribe’s pen moved across his scroll, recording every word. Valentine’s eyes snapped to him, brows flickering with interest.
The tribune laughed. “Likening your people to a bunch of filthy animals?” He paused, considering. “Then you’ll also know that sheep will scatter without a shepherd.”
Valentine gave a slight shake of his head. “Strike me down.” He spoke as if he didn’t care. “Someone else will rise and lead them.”
The tribune changed tactics. Any other time, Titus would be annoyed with the tribune for taking overhisinterrogation. Not today. Today the man could do the whole blasted thing.
“You think the people love you because they call you The Cupid? Do you think they’ll call for your life to be spared when they see their hero in the arena?” The tribune smiled and shook his head. “The crowds are capricious where blood is concerned.” He gestured toward the door, where the sounds of the gladiator training filtered through. Crashes of wood and steel. “With one breath they cheer their favorite fighter, and with the second, call for his demise.” He let the words sink in. “Your silence will not spare you or your friends, nor will the people. I’ll track down every one of your friends and lead them like lambs to the slaughter.” He smiled at his own cleverness.
Valentine blinked and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. The chains creaked above his head.
“Impatient to begin, are we?” Braccus dumped a handful of nuts down his throat. “Me too.” He waved Titus forward. “Proceed.”
Valentine’s eyes flicked from the tribune to Titus and his Adam’s apple bobbed.
Titus stepped forward, avoiding Valentine’s gaze, and instead narrowed his focus to the fleshy part of Valentine’s side where the number two rod would elicit the most pain with the least damage. Any hope for Iris’s forgiveness crumbled as he swung the rod as hard as he could.
Titus wiped a hand over his forehead, sluicing away the sweat. It ran down the sides of his face and dripped from his jaw. He smeared his hand on his thigh and looked at the tribune, still seated in the folding chair, one knee over the other, cutting his nails with a knife he’d snagged from the wall. He’d lost interest long ago.
“Did he say anything good?” Braccus looked at the scribe.
“Mmm.” The scribe scanned the document. “You called him weak. He said, ‘God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty.’ You told him to shut up.” He rolled and unrolled the scroll further down, scanning and reading the lines of scrawl.
Valentine sagged in the shackles, his body covered in cuts and welts that were quickly purpling. His head hung forward. The pain had finally sent him senseless, but it had taken hours. His stamina had surprised Titus and he wished he would have started with more pain earlier, sparing Valentine wounds that would only incriminate Titus further if Iris ever saw them.
The scribe paused. “You asked him how much longer he wanted to suffer. He said, ‘Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy... does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil.’”
Titus remembered those lines. The words had cut him deeper than the blades had cut Valentine. He might have thought he loved Iris, but his actions had not shown it. He’d envied her love for Valentine, lost his temper, sought the advancement of his own career over herdesires, and he’d wavered between pleasure and revulsion as he’d beaten Valentine. Love? No. He was despicable. He’d been relieved when the tribune told Valentine to shut up again.
