Page 66 of Brother at Arms

I rose. “Thank you for explaining.”

Mena lifted a cloth from his desk—silk—and dabbed his sweating face with it. “I have decided to finish with the trade. More fool me for ever getting into it.”

However, he’d been able to purchase a home on the most coveted hill in the city and had clients willing to wait hours to see him. Silk must have been good to him for a while.

Lucius had jolted to his feet with me, and now he followed me from the tablinum.

As we stepped down into the atrium, Mena called out behind us.

“Do send your architectus friend to me, Leonidas. This house is a wreck. I will make it worth his while.”

“Are we going to speak to Mihrdat?” Lucius asked as we strode down the hill.

The tall pillars of the Temple of Castor rose before us, shading the spring before it that was purported to hold healing properties. A priest with a thin cloak draped over his head escorted an elderly woman down into the pool, where she eagerly laved her arms with the warm water.

Without answering Lucius, I turned and headed south, my steps taking me beyond the Circus Maximus and the Aventine to the Emporium. Lucius jogged to keep up with my swift pace.

At midmorning, the Porticus Aemilius was as busy as it had been in the middle of the night. Only after midday did most of the traders vanish, leaving the lowliest workers to finish the menial tasks.

I found the Parthian traders where I had last night, under one of the middle barrel vaults of the building. The man I now knew to be Mihrdat stood surveying his men and the slaves who swarmed around him.

Mihrdat again wore a long-sleeved tunic, this one in flowing blue silk, over wide pleated leggings of a golden color. They were beautiful garments that I wouldn’t risk staining or tearing in a dusty warehouse. The fact that Mihrdat walked among his workers, unworried, meant he could afford to replace any clothes he ruined without a qualm.

One of the Parthian guards spotted me and gestured to Mihrdat. Mihrdat turned and watched us approach, his expression calm.

Before we reached him, a Parthian guard stepped in front of Mihrdat and folded his arms. The man wore a full beard and had long, wiry hair, another sign his home was far from here.

“He’ll not speak to you today,” the Parthian informed us.

“I haven’t come to ask for work,” I said. “I want to talk about Xerxes.”

The guard’s brow furrowed in puzzlement, but Mihrdat went rigid. He barked an order to his man, who now became belligerent.

“Be gone,” the guard said flatly.

I didn’t move. “I need you to tell me where I can find Xerxes.” I directed my words around the bearded man to Mihrdat.

Mihrdat made a stiff-handed signal. Abruptly, five more men surrounded Lucius and me.

Before I could face them, three grabbed me. I instinctively spun, jerking from clutches and drawing my knife, but more guards joined in to subdue me.

This part of the warehouse was filled with Parthians and slaves. None did more than glance up at the sudden commotion and then go resolutely back to what they’d been doing. No help would come to us here.

I fought savagely until Mihrdat barked a command, and I heard Lucius yell.

I risked a glance around and found Lucius pinned by four of Mihrdat’s men. One had yanked Lucius’s head back by his hair and now put a wicked-looking blade to his neck.

“Cease,” Mihrdat commanded me. “Or he will die.”

“I am a Roman citizen,” Lucius spluttered. “You’ll be executed in the arena if you murder me.”

Mihrdat did not look impressed. “No one would find you, Roman. Surrender, gladiator, or watch him bleed.”

I growled under my breath and dropped my knife, which a Parthian picked up and tucked into his belt. Several more men grabbed me and hauled me, the ones with Lucius following, deep into the bowels of the warehouse.

Chapter 22

I thought Lucius and I would be taken into the shed in the corner, but instead we were dragged all the way to the back of the Porticus Aemilia and out a small door. Mihrdat easily kept up with our brisk pace.