Finally, Julius was able to sit up and spit out the stalk he'd almost bitten through. He felt as if he had been beaten unconscious. He grimaced as he saw his bladder had released, and thumped his fists into the earth in fury, scattering the flies before they darted back in at his exposed skin.

“I thought it was over.”

“Perhaps that was the last one,” Gaditicus replied. “Head wounds are always complicated. Cabera said it might go on for a while.”

“Or for the rest of my life. I miss that old man,” Julius said, his voice bleak. “My mother used to have shaking fits. I never really understood what it was like before. It feels like dying.”

“Can you stand? I don't want to lose the men, and after your speech they could well march all morning.”

Gaditicus helped the young officer to his feet and watched him take a few deep breaths to steady himself. He wanted to offer words of comfort, but the words didn't come easily.

“You will beat this,” he said. “Cabera said you were strong and nothing I've seen makes me think differently.”

“Maybe. Let's move on, then. I'd like to stay close to the sea, so I can wash.”

“I could say I told you a joke and you pissed yourself laughing,” Gaditicus said. Julius chuckled and Gaditicus smiled at him.

“There, you see? You are stronger than you realize. Alexander the Great had the shaking sickness, they say.”

“Really?”

“Yes, and Hannibal. It is not the end, just a burden.”

Brutus tried to hide his shock when he saw Aurelia the following morning. She was plaster-white and thin, with a web of wrinkles that had not been there when he'd left for Greece three years before.

Tubruk had seen his distress and filled the gaps in the conversation, telling Aurelia the answers to the questions she did not ask. The old gladiator was not sure she even recognized Brutus.

Aurelia's silence was covered by the laughter of Clodia and Cornelia as they tended Julius's baby at breakfast. Brutus smiled dutifully at the child and said she looked like her father, though in truth he could see no resemblance to anything human. He felt uncomfortable in the triclinium, aware that these people had formed bonds that excluded him. It was the first time he had ever felt like a stranger in that house, and it saddened him.

Tubruk left with Aurelia after she had eaten only a little food, and Brutus tried hard to take part in the conversation, telling the women about the blue-skinned tribe he had fought in his first few months with the Bronze Fist in Greece. Clodia laughed when he told them of the savage who had waved his genitals at the Romans, believing he was safe. Cornelia covered Julia's ears with her hands and Brutus blushed, embarrassed.

“I'm sorry. I am more used to the company of soldiers. It has been a while since I was in this house.”

“Tubruk told us you grew up here,” Clodia broke in to put him at his ease, knowing somehow that it was important she did so. “He said you always dreamed of being a great swordsman. Did you reach your dream?”

Shyly, Brutus told them of the sword tourney he had won, against the best of the legion centuries.

“They gave me a sword made with harder iron that keeps a better edge. It has gold in the hilt. I will show it to you.”

“Will Julius be safe?” Cornelia asked without warning.

Brutus responded with a quick smile. “Of course. The ransom has been paid. There is no danger for him.” The words came easily and she seemed reassured. His own worries were untouched.

That afternoon, he walked back up the hill to the oak with Tubruk, each of them carrying axes on their shoulders. They took up positions on each side of the trunk and began the slow rhythm of blows that ate a deeper and deeper gash into the wood as the day wore on.

“There is another reason for my coming back to Rome,” Brutus said, wiping sweat from his forehead with his hand.

Tubruk laid down his axe and breathed heavily for a few moments before replying.

“What is it?” he asked.

“I want to find my mother. I am not a boy any longer and I want to know where I came from. I thought you might know where she was.”

Tubruk blew air out of his lips, taking up the axe again.

“It will bring you grief, lad.”

“I must. I have family.”

Tubruk hammered his axe blade into the oak with enormous power, wedging it deeply.

“Your family is here,” he said, levering it out.

“These are my blood. I never knew my father. I just want to know her. If she died without me seeing her, I know I would always regret it.”

Tubruk paused again, then sighed before speaking.

“She has a place in the Via Festus, on the far side of the city, near the Quirinal hill. Think hard before you go there. It could disappoint you.”

“No. She deserted me when I was only a few months old. Nothing she could do would disappoint me now,” Brutus said softly, before taking up his axe again and continuing to cut at the old tree.

As the sun set, the oak fell, and they walked back to the estate house in the twilight. Renius was there, waiting in the shadow of the gate.

“They've built where my house stood,” he said angrily to Brutus, “and some young legionaries marched me out of the city as a troublemaker. My own city!”

Tubruk let out an explosive shout of laughter.

“Did you tell them who you were?” Brutus asked, trying to remain serious.

Renius was clearly nettled by their amusement and practically snarled, “They didn't know my name. Pups, fresh from their mother's milk, every one of them.”

“There is a room here, if you want it,” Tubruk said.

Renius looked at his old pupil for the first time then. “How much are you asking?” he said.

“Just the pleasure of your company, old friend. Just that.”

Renius snorted. “You're a fool then. I'd have paid a fair rate.”

At Tubruk's call, the gate was opened and Renius stalked in ahead of them. Brutus caught Tubruk's eye and grinned at the affection he saw there.

CHAPTER 11

Brutus stood at the crossroads at the base of the Quirinal hill and let the bustling crowd pass around him. He had risen early and checked his armor, thankful for the clean undertunic Tubruk had laid out. Some part of him knew it was ridiculous to care, but he had oiled each segment and polished the metal until it shone. He felt garish in the darker colors of the crowd, but he took comfort from the solid weight, as if it protected him from more than weapons.

The Bronze Fist had their own armorer, and like everyone else in the century, he had been the best. The greave Brutus wore on his right leg was skillfully shaped to follow the muscles. It was inscribed with a pattern of circles cut with acid, and Brutus had given a month's pay for it. Sweat trickled behind the metal sheath and he reached down to try to scratch the skin beneath without success. Practicality had made him leave the plume of his helmet back at the estate. It would not do to be catching it on lintels inside the house where his mother lived.

It was the sight of the building that had made him pause and take stock. He had been expecting a tenement of four or five stories, clean but small. Instead the front was covered in a façade of dark marble, almost like a temple. The main buildings were set back from the dust and ordure of the streets, visible only through a high gate. Brutus supposed Marius's house had been larger, but it was difficult to be sure.

Tubruk hadn't told him anything more than the address, but as he took in his surroundings Brutus saw it was a rich area, with a good part of the crowd made up of servants and slaves running errands and carrying goods for their masters. He had expected his mother to be impressed by the son who had become a centurion, but when he saw the house he realized she might think of him as just a common soldier, and hesitated.