Nest of Vipers Read Online Free Page A

several intriguing truths about the noble Aemilia, just as she had about so many highborn women in Rome. This new transgression now made the matron among the most useful people there were.
    Apicata had no use for Aemilia just yet, but would in time. Her only disappointment was that she would never see the look on the patrician woman's face when the nature of this use was revealed to her.
    When the moment came, Apicata would have to imagine it. Blindness had taught her that imagined moments were far often more delightful than reality anyway.
    Nilla and Burrus froze with the rabbit bones still in their mouths. In the glare of the dawn they saw that the man's teeth were white – he was smiling at them. He tucked his sword inside his belt and raised his hand in a wave. Only then did the children remember their nakedness, but they had nothing to cover themselves with. The man came nearer, as huge as a mountain, with shoulders as wide as a giant's. His hair was gold, just like Nilla's, and his brown, freckled skin was laced with dozens of scars. He squatted on the sand beside them.
    'Are you a gladiator?' Burrus asked him.
    The man laughed. 'How did you guess that, boy?'
    Burrus pointed at the scars.
    'My fighting days are behind me now,' he sighed. 'I've got too old.'
    'How old are you?' Nilla asked.
    'Thirty years. I'm the oldest gladiator there is, I think.'
    'You must have won many fights,' Burrus marvelled.
    'I did.' He held out his hand. 'My name is Flamma.'
    Burrus accepted the handshake as a newly made freedman, not a slave. 'I am Burrus. And this is the Lady – '
    But Nilla stopped him from telling the gladiator her full patrician name. 'I'm just Nilla,' she said. 'We're looking for water.'
    'Ah,' said Flamma. 'I can show you where to find some then. There's a stream mouth just beyond the point.'
    Burrus grinned at Nilla. 'See? We were right to head east.'
    She agreed. 'Would you like some rabbit?' she asked Flamma.
    The gladiator's eyes were at the horizon.
    'Would you?'
    He flicked his eyes to her. 'You're very kind.' Nilla handed him one of the charred rabbit kittens and he stuffed it in his mouth. 'Let's eat on the way to the stream,' he suggested, chewing.
    Burrus and Nilla looked surreptitiously at one another. 'Are you our friend, Flamma?' Nilla asked.
    Something caught in his throat, but he swallowed it along with the rabbit. 'I'd be honoured to be your friend,' he said. He stood, towering above them. 'Come on. I'll show you where there's good water to drink.'
    The children rose, and when Flamma held out his huge hands to them it seemed only natural and right, as his new friends, to fall in on either side of him and place their own hands in his.
    'Do you get lonely out here?' Flamma asked them.
    They'd never even thought of it. 'We have each other,' said Nilla. Then, giggling, she added, 'We're in love.'
    Burrus reddened and complained. 'That's our business, Nilla – a great gladiator doesn't want to know about that.'
    Nilla just laughed. But when she looked to see what Flamma thought, his eyes were trained on the horizon again, squinting into the sun. 'Walk faster,' he said. But he had sandals on his feet and the children did not.
    Nilla stepped on a grass thorn. 'Ow!' She tried to pull it out with her free hand. 'It's stuck in my toe.' She waited for Flamma to release her other hand so that she could sit down and pull the thorn out, but he held it tightly. 'The thorn,' Nilla said.
    Burrus suddenly saw why Flamma stared at the horizon. 'Run!'
    But Flamma held their hands in his fists, even when they kicked him and pulled at him and sank their teeth into his flesh. They were less than blowflies to him, less than gnats, but he felt ashamed. He hated himself for so easily betraying children.
    Flamma only let them go when the men with the nets had arrived.
    The nuptials were performed as a confarreatio – the patrician wedding rite – which caused quiet affront to some because the bride was not, in fact,