“Don’t I?”
“No. You don’t.” He reached out suddenly and took me by the wrist, lifting my hand so that he could examine my upturned palm. “But you have the hands of one.” He ran a fingertip over the places where my skin had toughened like rawhide from hour upon hour of holding swords and spears and the reins of a chariot. “That is how you got those calluses, isn’t it?”
I pulled my hand sharply from his grasp.
The Decurion shrugged and then pointed toward the horizon.
“That is the island of Corsica,” he said.
I didn’t know why he thought I cared. I squinted against the sunlight sparkling off the water, straining to make out details of the shoreline. I could see hills and, farther to the south, cliffs. Beaches. No houses or docks.
“Who lives there?” I asked finally, when it became clear that he wasn’t leaving.
“No one, really.” He grinned. “Sheep. Bees. A few ill-tempered natives too intractable even to be useful as slaves.”
“It sounds ideal.”
“For you, I imagine it would be.”
I couldn’t quite untangle the meaning of his words. Was he disdainful? Amused? I felt my temper flaring. Why was he even speaking to me? Was it just a perverse desire to remind me of my place, among the ill-tempered natives?
I smiled acidly as I tilted my head and regarded him. “And here you’ve only known me for such a short time to form such strong opinions of my character. How very wise and insightful you are, Decurion.”
“I know nothing of your character,” he said, deftly ignoring my sarcasm. “Not even if you have one. All I know about you—really know—is that you’ve got a bit of skill with a sword. Maybe even some training, judging from those calluses. But you drop your leading shoulder too much when you stand in a defensive posture.” He adjusted the leather bracer on his forearm, tightening the buckle. “And your wrist is weak. You’ll need to work on that.”
“Because I’m sure Charon will sell me to a master eager to enhance my skill with a sword,” I said bitterly. “You and I both know I’ll be sold to a brothel or a fishmonger or a salt mine. But I thank you for that flight of fancy, Decurion. It’ll sustain me in my miserable servitude, I’m sure.”
He looked taken aback, but I didn’t care if I’d offended him. I was about to be sold. And if it amused this pampered son of a senator to tease a slave in her last moments of relative freedom, well, it didn’t amuse me.
It angered me.
“I did not think to offend you,” he said slowly.
“Why would you even think of me at all?” I said. “What does it matter to you if you offend me or wound my pride? I’m a slave.”
“So it seems.”
“What do you mean by that?”
He paused before answering me. “What I think . . . is that appearance and reality don’t always agree with one another. And I think Charon got more than he bargained for when he plucked you by the roots from your native soil.” He pushed back from the rail. “But I also know that even a weed, cultivated with care, might eventually yield a wildflower.”
“A wildflower in a garden is still considered a weed, Decurion,” I said quietly, then turned to leave. I felt him watch me as I walked away.
? ? ?
Rome.
And I had thought Massilia was a place of wonder.
We sailed inland, up a wide river called Tiber from the bustling port of Ostia on the coast. As we approached the capital itself—the so-called beating heart of the civilized world—the river traffic increased until it was almost impossible to see the water for all the boats, and the galley captain steered toward what looked to be a private wharf on the west bank of the river just inside the city walls. Looking east, I could see hundreds and hundreds of thin gray plumes—smoke from multitudes of cooking fires—rising up into the still evening air like ghost souls. The sun reflected off the hills and many-tiered terraces of the city, clothing her in a soft, blushing glow. Temples and public buildings stood adorned with marble figures and sculpted scenes floating atop colonnades carved of white marble veined with gold and pink and silver.
From a distance, Rome was serenely majestic.
Close up, it was a starkly different story.