Search the Seven Hills by Barbara Hambly

you to say what God can and cannot do or be?” yelled the other woman, who up until this time had sat in her black corner saying nothing. “Telesphorus says...”
    “Arete!” roared Arrius in his best parade-ground voice. And when the babbling rose louder around him, he bellowed,
    “Be silent, all of you!”
    To Marcus’ surprise, they were.
    “Arete, widow of Simeon the baker?”
    Marcus saw the woman’s face turn chalk-white in the gloom. The shrill-voiced little man sprang to his feet and shrieked at her, “Fry in hell, you Gnostic whore!”
    She whirled on him. “You scabby dung-picking monkey—” She lunged for him, hands opened to claw. Arrius reached her in a stride and seized her wrists, forcing them down behind her while the little man ducked behind the other woman.
    “What have you done with Telesphorus?” he cried.
    Arrius spat out a stray trail of hair; the woman had begun to struggle like the Old Man of the Sea, kicking at his booted shins with her bare toes. As he shoved her toward the door he answered viciously, “I fed him to the lions!” Marcus’ last glimpse of the Christians, as the prison door closed upon them, was of the little man with his palms upraised in prayer, and all the rest of them arguing furiously around him.
    Once outside the cell the woman Arete ceased to struggle, but as she stumbled along in the iron grip of the centurion’s arm, Marcus could see the rim of white that showed all around the pupils of her eyes, like those of a frightened horse. She was saying, “Haven’t you rotten pimps of Caesar got anything better to do than to persecute the Lord’s anointed? Aren’t there criminals enough in Rome without... ?”
    “Be quiet, woman,” sighed Arrius.
    “Because in the long run the Lord will look after his own. You don’t understand that when the sheep are separated from the goats—”
    “I said be quiet.” He pushed her ahead of him into the interrogation room. She whirled, as though she would try to flee, when she saw the rack there, waiting. But Arrius filled the narrow door, with bone and muscle and mail; Marcus had the impression that she did not see himself at all. Her breasts heaved with her thick frightened breathing; her dark eyes shifted, seeking a way out. Arrius kicked the door shut behind him. “Your name’s Arete; your husband’s name was Simeon. That right?”
    She nodded and swallowed hard.
    “Formerly an initiate of the rites of Cybele, formerly a worshiper of Isis, formerly connected with the cult of Moloch. When’d you turn Christian, Arete?”
    “Can you blame a traveler who has found the right road for straying down many paths? This entire empire has come to grief because—”
    “How long have you been a Christian?” he demanded, and her eyes flashed briefly with anger.
    “Does it matter... ?”
    “Yes, it matters.” Arrius’ voice was harsh. “When I ask you a question it’s because I want an answer, not because I want to hear a bunch of drivel about the Christ.”
    “You speak of drivel when you talk of the One True Word!” she protested furiously. “I know the true path, the true knowledge, and I shall never recant it!”
    “That’s good,” purred the centurion. “Because I’m not going to ask you to recant.”
    Her eyes widened with shock. “What?”
    He stepped over close to her and rested his big hands on her shoulders. Though she was a tall woman, and strong, the mail-clad body with its crested helm seemed to dominate her, as inhuman and faceless as the implements of torture that surrounded them. His voice was soft, intimate, and utterly without warmth. “I don’t personally care how much incense anyone throws on Caesar’s altar, or who you sing your hymns to. It won’t keep you off the rack.”
    Her eyes were huge, pits of horror staring into his. “You can’t do that,” she whispered. “My husband was a Roman citizen...”
    “But you’re not, are you?” he murmured. His gripping hands turned her,