Page 47 of Firebird
She nodded, her gaze still devouring my appearance. I couldn’t help but notice that her expression was one of admiration.
“Step farther back, Malina.”
She did.
“Go on and start your prayers.”
She stared toward her friend’s wrapped corpse and began to mutter in Dacian, words I didn’t understand.
I stepped closer to the small bundle, then I inhaled a deep breath and poured out a stream of fire. The impact flicked a flap of the blanket open but I didn’t stop, blowing a continuous flame until she was entirely engulfed. As I knew would happen, the flames licked high, greedily consuming the dead woman.
The flames had barely been lit when the blanket, her clothes, and her flesh had all been burned away, her small skeleton charred and smoldering. I blew a softer flame down the length of her. Then I waited while Malina and I watched her bones, glowing with fire, finally dissolve into ash, orange embers carrying pieces of her away into the night.
Malina continued to whisper her prayers, her cheeks dry now while she seemed to pray with all her heart, holding her palms in front of her, facing up toward the heavens. When there was nothing but a long pile of smoking ash upon the terrace, I inhaled another deep breath but only blew out air to send what was left of Enid over the balcony.
Some ashes fell to the earth while the rest drifted away and upward on a draft. When I’d blown all of the evidence away, leaving behind only a smudge, I turned to her and commanded, “Go to sleep, Malina. I’ll be taking my morning meal in the city. You won’t need to tend to my needs.”
I hadn’t planned on leaving until noon to make my appointment in the forum, but she needed rest. And I couldn’t have her dragging into my room, carrying a tray, with circles under her eyes and grief plain on her face.
She let her hands fall to her sides, still staring past the balcony.
“Malina,” I said with a deeper rumble.
Her head snapped to me.
“Go to bed. Rest.”
She gulped, her expression still full of heartbreak, then she finally nodded. As she walked away, I heard her faint whisper, “Thank you.”
Her gratitude only slid the dagger deeper. I was the cause of her friend’s death. And so many, many more innocent lives. I didn’t deserve gratitude.
My mother’s lovely face flashed to mind. Then my father’s. I couldn’t bear to think how they’d look at me now if they’d seen all the destruction and death I had caused. A son they’d tried to teach better than following the ways of Rome.
I stared out at the city, where only a few lights glowed in windows, the city still asleep.
“It must end,” I hissed into the night. “Itwillend,” I swore. “Soon.”
XII
JULIAN
“Valerius is as much a tyrant as Caesar,” said Gaius, Trajan’s grandfather.
It was early afternoon and most vendors were beginning to close their shops. There was no auction block today and the praeco had already made his pronouncements earlier. I liked coming to the forum this time of day. Most patricians were readying for an evening meal at home, or somewhere else. No one of importance was usually here, no one to wonder if I chatted overlong with a senator like Gaius.
I looked over at him. He was the head of the Tiberius householdand also the oldest dragon of the Sapphirus line still living. It was said his ancestors could be traced back to the first blue dragon, born of a coupling between Romulus’s daughter and the god Neptune. The son begotten on the Roman maiden was named Tiber, giving them their distinguished and well-respected surname.
Their family’s lineage was also why his and Trajan’s alliance in the plot was so important. Together, the three of us lent legitimacy to our planned coup. Our assassinations of Igniculus and his followers would not only free the people of Rome from tyranny but our political positions would also lend credibility and support to us while we formed a new Rome. Or that was what we hoped. For the road in front of us, even after we’d severed the serpent’s head, would be a long and hard one.
“Now that Caesar has silenced Otho,” Gaius added, “there will be no resistance left.”
“Except for you, Grandfather.” Trajan stood to his side eating a date he’d picked off a cart nearby.
“Any public resistance in the senate would be unwise,” I said to Gaius. “We all know Caesar’s tactics to control are cruel at the very least.”
“My grandmother is no longer living,” Trajan said bitterly, “so he couldn’t do to Grandfather what he did to Otho.”
“No,” Gaius agreed, looking regal in his midnight-blue linen robe, his still-black hair cut short, the noble lines of his face setting him apart as a pureblood no matter what he wore. “But I do have two granddaughters. Your sisters.”
