Page 130 of Vesuvius

‘Funny,’ Felix said flatly. ‘I can’t feel a thing.’

Fistful by fistful, he cleared out the grave, and he didn’t speak again.

Loren sat apart, worse than useless, as a chill crept over the night. He was no medical expert, but his little training confirmed what neither he nor Felix needed to say out loud: Felix’s clever hands were wasted. If he were lucky, he might regain sensitivity in his fingers. Might. But they would forever be clumsy.

For a thief, a fumble was a death sentence.

At last, Felix lowered the helmet into the hole. So much for Rome’s great gift to Pompeii. Once the earth swallowed the helmet, he hauled a boulder over it to prevent anyone from digging it up again. Then he scrubbed his poor hands in the trough, and that was that.

What a pair they made. Loren with his messed-up leg, and Felix with his messed-up hands. Felix the psychopomp, Loren the boy who should have been left dead.

‘You should go inside,’ Felix said when it was done, not looking over. ‘You need to rest.’

‘Will you come with me?’ Loren hardly dared ask it.

Jaw tight, Felix shook his head. ‘Go inside.’

‘Felix—’

‘Please. What Servius said, what my father did, what you knew but didn’t tell me . . .’ His voice cracked. He wrapped his arms around his midsection, keeping himself together by force. ‘We can speak once you’ve healed, I promise that. If you care for me at all, you’ll let me have this space.’

Loren couldn’t deny him that. The best he could ever offer anyone was his absence. He had never bettered a situation by making himselfmorepresent. He collected the sword and hobbled halfway back to theestate. A lantern had flicked on in the servants’ quarters. His escape would be noticed soon, and if he didn’t return, Loren would be forced to find out if he was worth his parents getting out of bed for.

Still, he lingered just beyond the orchard, waiting for what would never come. His thigh burned. His ankle throbbed. His chest was carved empty. He stared at the sky, cluttered with real stars. Precise stars. A waxing moon teased the night but, for once, her return brought no comfort. Whatever rebirth meant to Isis, Loren didn’t want it.

Not now that he knew how it felt.

A measure away but still so achingly close, Loren caught the soft sound of Felix’s ragged breathing and knew he, too, watched the sky through the canopy of evenly spaced trees. But he said nothing. No approach came. Part of Loren was glad for it.

Two boys, each alone in the desperate dark.

A chasm of uncrossable distance.

Chapter XXIX

FELIX

Lucius Lassius’s chief mistake was making himself such a satisfying target to steal from.

When Felix had stolen his expensive reserve wine a month ago, he had already disliked the man on principle for making shit wine, but they had never met. Now that Felix had given the estate three days of his life, dislike morphed into loathing. Lassius had hardly spared a glance for Felix, but Felix picked out enough details by watching – how the man stalked his own halls, nose shoved in a letter, expecting those in his path to move first. He reeked of careless entitlement and excused it as business.

Three days in, he hadn’t visited his son since the night Felix dragged Loren home.

This time last week, Felix would have brushed these details off as unimportant, but he’d since learned that distracting details were often the most vital. And he began to plan.

Late on his final afternoon at the estate, Felix picked the lock on the study door and pushed it open, ready to put that plan into motion.

Lucius Lassius glanced up, irritation creasing his brow. ‘I could have sworn I latched that.’

‘I hoped for a word,’ Felix said. ‘Is this a bad time? Loren told me you’re adept at handling contracts.’

Loren, of course, had said no such thing, and in fact had said nothing at all since the orchard. But the mention of him served its purpose in stroking Lassius’s ego.

‘So you thought to barge in.’ The scroll occupying Lassius’s attention sprang back to a coil. ‘I lost a significant swathe of land this week. Half of Campania is wiped out. My contracts in Herculaneum and Pompeii are forfeited. I haven’t the time for this. I’ll entertain you only as payment for bringing Lorenus back. Speak quickly.’

Felix’s eyes fell onto a folded, dirty sheaf of parchment on the corner of the desk. Target identified. He wet his lips, averting his gaze before it grew obvious. Servants had recovered those papers while undressing a delirious Loren the evening they arrived, pulled from his pocket, and Felix recognised them – though the last time he saw them they were scattered on the floor of Servius’s office, Celsi scrambling to shuffle the sheets together.

How Loren came to have them Felix didn’t know, but irritation twinged at seeing the contract here, clearly untouched by Lassius even days later. Any decent father, upon receiving his child bloodied and unconscious after years of separation, would show at least a bit of interest in the circumstances that had put his son in such a state.

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