“She didn’t. Not at first.” He looked at me, and his gaze sharpened noticeably. “Not until I tried to buy her slave contract from Caesar.”
“You don’t know my sister very well,” I said. “She could never love someone who owned her like livestock.”
“No, and that’s why I love her. But you misunderstand me, Fallon. I could never own Sorcha,” Charon said. “The moment her contract was in my hands, I would have torn it to pieces.”
“You would have?” I frowned at the slave master in confusion.
“Of course I would have.” He snorted. “And so would Caius Varro.”
Up until that very moment, the legalities of Roman contracts had been a bit lost on me. I suppose I’d never even considered that a contract, once it was written into existence, could simply be torn and made worthless by whoever held the paper.
Charon shook his head. “I’m assuming Caius made an offer to buy your contract? Don’t tell me you actually think Caius wanted to own you.”
“I . . .”
But that was exactly what I had thought.
Cai . . .
I blinked hard, remembering the anguish in Cai’s face as he’d begged me to let him buy my contract. I hadn’t understood what he intended to do with it. And he hadn’t understood why I wouldn’t let him grant my freedom. Instead, we had let our tempers get the best of us, never bothering to figure out the true meaning of our words.
I rose to my feet. I needed to find Cai and explain.
Charon stopped me before I could leave.
“One more thing . . .”
He reached into the leather scrip that hung from his belt and handed me a small vellum scroll, sealed with a blob of black wax.
The wax seal was imprinted with a sigil of some kind. I glanced at it and then back up at him.
“I can’t read this,” I said.
“I know.” He smiled and pressed the scroll back toward me. “That’s not for you to read.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s for you to keep. As payment for a kindness done.” Charon chuckled at the expression on my face. “You’ve made me a lot of money, Fallon, and not just on your own sale. The price your sister paid for you will serve to goad others on to pay similarly for my wares in the future. It’s all in the perception of things. You’ve guaranteed me money I wouldn’t have made had you not helped me rescue the trunk that bore your own sword. That was the proof of your identity and the only reason I made that kind of profit on your sale. I’m not blind to the irony of the situation.”
He ran his hand over the lid of the box of armor.
“Once outside the walls of the ludus, you won’t be safe. Cai will do his best to look after you, but the ways of Rome—and Romans—are still foreign to you. And you, Fallon, being you, will draw attention—not all of it benign. You’ll need to be careful, and you’ll need to curb your—what should I call it—your impulsive nature.
“That scroll,” he continued, “is for you to use only if you happen to find yourself in a bad situation with no avenue of escape.”
I plucked at the edge of the scroll’s black wax blob with a fingernail.
“Leave it sealed,” Charon said, reaching to cover my hand with his.
“What is it?” I asked, frowning. “Some kind of magic?”
He laughed a little. “Of a sort, I suppose. It’s a promise.”
“Of what?”
“Money.”
I felt my mouth twist in a sour grimace. “Does it always have to come back to that?” I asked.
“It’s the kind of magic that appeals to most Romans.” He squeezed my hand once and let go. “Keep this safe and hidden, and keep it with you at all times when you leave the grounds of the ludus. And if you ever find yourself in need—dire need, mind—give that scroll to whoever it is that threatens you. Unless they hold the wealth of Caesar himself in their hands, I promise this will save you from almost any peril. It guarantees substantial payment upon the safe delivery of your person to my house.”
I sat there, stunned by the generosity of his gifts. Charon was a man who bought and sold souls. And yet his own soul was a slave to the love he had for my sister. I thought again about Cai’s offer to buy my contract. Charon seemed to almost sense what I was thinking. He reached out and tapped a finger on the iron ring I still wore around my neck.
“When I put this on you, Fallon, I never meant for it to be permanent.”
The slave master stood and nodded a bow to me. Then he turned and left me sitting there in Sorcha’s garden, wondering about the invisible armor—and shackles—that love could bind around a heart.
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