Daughters of Fire Read Online Free

if he doesn’t review it everyone will want to know why. Either way I’m sunk.’
    ‘Then you’ll have to fight him.’ Cathy grinned amiably. ‘Come on, lady, where is that feisty female who stormed in here just now spitting nails? And you know as well as I do,’ she added, ‘being completely cynical about it, that the more controversial the book is, the more you two row in public, the better it will sell. When are you going to give me a copy, by the way?’ With a rueful laugh she slipped down onto the floor to be on the same level as her guest and topped up both their glasses once more. Pablo stood up, stretched and stepped carefully across the table to sit instead on his mistress’s knee. ‘So, remind me. Why is this book so controversial?’ she went on. ‘What is so shocking about it that it has wound him up like this?’
    Apart from the facts that weren’t facts, you mean. The details I have tried so hard to weed out which shouldn’t be there because they are not part of the historical record. The ‘fictional twaddle’ which Hugh had spotted at once! Viv didn’t say it. Instead she shook her head adamantly. ‘The only shocking thing is that I have had the temerity to finish it ahead of the book Hugh is writing himself!’
    ‘Yours is about Cartimandua and the Celtic tribe called the Brigantes, right?’
    ‘And it turns out that Hugh’s is about Venutios. Her husband!’ Viv scowled. ‘Two different views on Iron Age Britain around the time of the Roman invasion in AD 43.’
    ‘But surely,’ Cathy took a sip of wine thoughtfully, ‘that shouldn’t matter, should it? Won’t people be interested in the two different stories?’
    ‘You’d think so.’ Viv sniffed. ‘And they are very different.’ That much at least she would admit. ‘I’m coming from a woman’s point of view, writing about a controversial queen. The antithesis of Boudica. A gutsy, clever Celtic queen, yes, but she cosied up to the Romans and because of that she is - was - regarded by many, including her husband, as a traitor. A quisling.’
    ‘Ah.’ Cathy eased the purring cat into a more comfortable position on her knees. ‘And Hugh takes the opposite position to you.’
    ‘In everything. He is writing about a man who is regarded as a patriot because he opposed Rome, and about war and military tactics and stuff like that.’
    ‘I still don’t see why that should matter. Surely both points of view are valid?’
    ‘In a rational world, yes.’ Viv grabbed the bottle of wine and poured herself a refill. She stood up and walked over to the window. ‘I’ve blown it. He used to respect me. He was impressed by my research. He encouraged me to do my first TV show. We used to get on so well.’ She heard the wistful note in her own voice and frowned, despising herself for it. He used to like me. That was what she had been going to say. And I used to like him. A lot. Why was she so angry that he had seen through her? Had she really expected him not to react to that article? And when - or if - he read the book, had she really thought he would give it his seal of approval? She took another swig from the glass. ‘He’s jealous, of course.’
    ‘Of your success?’
    ‘Yes. Of my success. He hates it that I’ve appeared on TV more than he has. And that they’ve profiled me in the Sunday Times magazine with the article based on my book. And that I’m going to be in another programme- a discussion programme on Channel 4 -’ She broke off abruptly and glanced at her bag, lying on the coffee table. The box with the two-thousand-year-old brooch inside it was in there, lying in the bottom somewhere amongst the litter of her possessions. She hadn’t taken it out since she had thrown it into the bag; hadn’t been able to believe what she had done.
    ‘You have to stand up to him, Viv.’ Cathy was quietly insistent as she sat stroking the sleeping cat. ‘You can’t go on letting him get to you like this.’
    ‘No.’ Viv