“Guards!” he shouted.
Adel released his bony wrist and turned as the door opened, a rectangle of white light falling on her. Sergius’s fist caught the side of her neck. Pain shot through her skull, bruises throbbing.
Adel gritted her teeth and spun toward him, trying for all the world to smirk. “You hit like achild.”
“What is the meaning of this?” A dark silhouette wavered in the doorway, but Adel would know Felix’s voice anywhere. It carried the dangerous cadence of the previous night.
“Call the guards!” Sergius shouted, then lowered his voice as he turned toward Felix. “She’s violent.”
“And yet, you’re the one swinging.” Felix shouldered into the room and shoved Sergius back. He dropped a rattling bundle next to Berit. “What happened?”
“These two are violent. Tried to assault me. I’m going to Jovan.” Sergius stormed from the room. If he accused her of assaulting him, the last thread tethering her flimsy hope of becoming a magister would snap for good. Adel started after him.
“Do not go,” Berit moaned and gagged.
Felix swung a bowl beneath her chin.
Adel wavered in the doorway, Sergius’s threat and Berit’s entreaty tugging in opposing directions.
“Please, Adel.”
That’s all it took. Adel let out a breath and crossed to her cousin’s side.
“I am here,” she murmured, gently brushing loose strands of hair away from Berit’s face and holding them back as the girl emptied her stomach.
Felix studied them. “When did this start?”
“This morning?” Adel lifted a shoulder. “She is dizzy and weak.”
Berit went to wipe her hand across her lips, but Felix intervened with a rag. “My head hurts,” she admitted in a whisper as he stepped away to fetch a pitcher.
“Rinse and spit.” He tipped a fresh cup of water to her mouth, the careful movement a far cry from Sergius’s rough effort. “And what else?”
Berit obeyed, then took a second drink. “I feel sore.”
Felix raised a hand toward Berit’s face, and Adel caught his wrist, stopping him before he could—
He froze, eyes cutting toward her. “I’m not going to hurt her.”
Of course he wasn’t. Heat prickled her neck. Adel released him and he slowly rested his palm against Berit’s forehead, turned the back of his fingers against her cheek.
Adel chewed the inside of her own cheek as she watched. His were hands that gave, expecting nothing in return. Everything she’d thought about Romans, about men, he’d made a lie. The thought registered slowly, like it had always been there, lying beneath a coating of dust. But what was she to do with it? Trust him? To what end?
“You feel warm.” He pressed two fingers beneath Berit’s jaw and stared somewhere over her shoulder, his lips twitching in silent count of her heartbeat. He gave a nod. “Let’s get you to a bed.”
A shadow fell across the doorway and a guard stepped inside. “You called?”
“No. Sergius was mistaken.” Felix waited for the guard to leave before he tucked one arm around Berit’s back and hooked the other beneath her knees, lifting her off the operating table. He looked at Adel and tipped his head. “Open the infirmary door for me?”
She bolted to comply—only for Berit’s sake. “Can she not go to her room? Jovan will not like two of them here. It makes us look weak. Berit is not weak. She does not need to stay here.” The words tumbled in a waterfall of panic, and she hated that they made her sound selfish. Because was she truly concerned for Berit, or herself? Old habits were like seasoned warriors. Hard to kill.
Felix twisted sideways through the door and angled for a bed next to Ilona, who sat up straighter when she saw them. “I can care for her better here. She’ll be fine with me.”
“What happened?” Ilona asked.
“Is it Tiber fever?” Adel had had fevers as a child, remembered them making her sluggish and heavy. All she’d needed was to rest for a day or two. A wave of homesickness swept over her at the thought, dredging up an old memory of her aipei’s soft voice warbling an off-key lullaby as she sat by Adel’s bed. Why did the memories of good things gone hurt worse than the pain of the present? If the ludus was a place for tears, she might have allowed them now. But it wasn’t. And she swallowed them back.
“It’s not Tiber fever. Wrong time of year.” Felix bent and released Berit onto the bed, ensuring a basin sat nearby before he turned to Adel with a searching look. “But you know that, don’t you?”
