Lady of the Eternal City by Kate Quinn Page A

marched as stiff as a little old man as they made their way inside, and Annia glowered at him. She adored these afternoons with her father, especially now that he had finally come back from Britannia. A good many fathers would have had only a curt nod for a daughter, but Annia’s father was always willing to snatch an hour or so from his endless petitioners and Senate gatherings just to take her to the theatre for a pantomime or the Campus Martius to watch the chariots dash. She didn’t want to share this precious time with boring Marcus, who had been shoved off on them because his mother had another headache. As if he were so smart, knowing what an oculus was. Annia knew what an oculus was too; it was a hole in the roof!
    “Titus Aurelius,” a sonorous voice hailed from behind, and Annia groaned inside.
Oh, Hades, not him!
The only person in the world more boring than her cousin.
    Old Servianus came ducking through the scaffolding, raising a gnarled hand. He’d come back from Britannia recently, declaring his bones too old for the northern climes. “What he really means is that the Emperor doesn’t take his advice on anything,” Annia’s mother had hooted, “so why bother freezing in Vindolanda just to be ignored!”
    “I came to inspect the temple,” Servianus went on, and heaved a sigh. “Corinthian columns! The Emperor insisted. In my day a plain Doric column . . .” As he droned on, Annia looked at the boy on whom Servianus was leaning like a staff. He wore a plain tunic like Marcus’s, and the same
bulla
amulet about his neck all boys wore, but there wasn’t anything else the same. This boy was taller, fair haired and stocky, at least nine—he laughed when Marcus offered him a little bow.
    “Fortuna smiles upon me,” Servianus concluded at last. “I wished to call upon you, Titus Aurelius, to discuss the uniting of our families—and here we stand united under the roof of all the gods! A good omen.”
    Annia’s father sounded amused. “Our families uniting?”
    “A marriage. My grandson, Gnaeus Pedanius Fuscus Salinator”—a thump to the shoulder of the stocky fair-haired boy—“and your daughter.”
    Annia’s eyes, which had begun to wander around the temple, snapped back to the stocky boy.
    “My daughter is very young,” her father said mildly. “I hadn’t planned on marrying her off until she was, oh, at least eight years old. By ten she’d be too long in the tooth, of course. But eight seems a reasonable age.”
    Servianus looked at him closely, but her father appeared perfectly serious. Only his eyes danced, the way they did when he laughed inside.
    “A betrothal will suffice until they come of age.” Servianus waved a hand. “Settled now while the children are young and obedient—”
    “Some more obedient than others,” her father murmured.
    “In my day—”
    “When
was
your day?” Annia piped up, even though she knew it was rude. Servianus reared back, and Annia’s father gave her that glance of quiet authority that could stop anyone dead in their tracks.
    “Marcus,” he said, “why don’t you escort your cousins to see the portico?”
    “Yes, sir.” Marcus rotated in place like a little legionary, and Annia found herself marched off on one side while Pedanius Fuscus slouched along on the other. They turned to face each other the moment they were outside among the scaffolding.
    “Gnaeus Pedanius Fuscus,” she said, folding her arms across her chest.
    “Salinator,” he corrected. “That goes on the end of my name.”
    “Doesn’t
Salinator
mean brine?” she asked. “Why are you Gnaeus Pedanius Fuscus Brine-Face?”
    He looked irritated. “It means salt. One of my ancestors instituted the tax upon salt.”
    Annia thought there were more impressive things to be remembered for.
Brine-Face.
“Married,” she said instead, dubious. “Us?”
    He gave a shrug. “Your father’s the richest man in Rome. Or one of them. And my grandfather says I’ll need a