Page 13 of Firebird (The Fire That Binds #1)

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 household and 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.”

Trajan froze, his dark eyes instantly sparking bright blue with his dragon, the air sizzling with the energy before a shift. “I’d kill him if he touched my sisters.”

“Trajan,” I said in the cool timbre I would use on the battlefield.

His gaze snapped to mine. Immediately, he came back to himself, closing his eyes and blowing out a breath.

Gaius put a hand on his grandson’s shoulder. “Need to control that temper, my boy. We must all be very careful. The emperor may act the monster, but he is cunning and perceptive.” He patted him. “No wayward looks or flares of temper. And certainly never allow your anger to bring out your beast.”

One of the many laws enacted since my uncle’s reign was that shifting into half-skin or dragon in Rome was illegal. Only military personnel had the legal right to shift into dragon form in order to leave the city to join their campaign.

“Perhaps Junia and Marilla should leave the city for a while,” said Trajan.

“They’re visiting their great-aunt in Ravenna at the moment,” added Gaius.

“That’s not far enough.” Trajan’s mood had soured quickly.

“It wouldn’t matter,” I said, surveying the crowds in the forum. “If Caesar finds offense, he’ll do everything necessary to make that person pay. So we simply won’t offend him.”

“Until we take off his head,” murmured Trajan.

“The senate is powerless,” Gaius stated flatly, a sense of somber finality in his tone. “I’m glad my own father isn’t alive to see what it’s become.”

He heaved out a sigh, his gaze sweeping across the forum to the Wall of Traitors.

“When I was a young boy, in my grandfather’s time,” he continued, “we were a proud state, content within our boundaries. We didn’t murder indiscriminately. Even slaves had the right to earn their freedom and find a better life. But now”—he shook his head—“Rome is no better than the rotting heads mounted above our city.”

He waved a hand to the corpse in half-skin that had been staked to a wall near the hall of justice. A noble of the Amethystus house, his purple scales were so dark they were almost black.

“We’d never find a criminal punished in such a shameful, morbid way. If a man was sentenced to death, he was at least allowed his dignity or to fight for his life in the gladiator pits. Now, all Igniculus wants is blood and rot. The city reeks of it.”

There was no telling what the Roman had done to be staked through the hands and feet and chest, exposed to the elements and jeers of onlookers. No one looked at him now, his tongue swollen and hanging grotesquely from his gaping mouth, a pool of blood nearly black in the cobblestones at his feet. A man leading a steer past him didn’t even turn his way.

“True, Gaius,” I agreed, holding Gaius’s hard gaze. “And that is why our plan is so important. You say the senate is powerless, but this is only for now . It will not be forever. We need those of you who stand against the emperor to remain in office.”

He sniffed. “Even if we have to vote against our own conscience to protect our loved ones from the emperor’s wrath.”

“Even so,” I agreed. “Trust me. I’ve been leading campaigns for too long, murdering clans who weren’t even our enemies but only trying to make a life in their own lands. I’ve given countless slaves to Rome to appease my uncle when it galls me,” I spat, my gut tightening at the truth of it. “When the tide turns—and it will—we will need loyalists to give their honest votes on new laws to come. Righteous laws for a new Rome.”

Trajan crossed his arms, huffing out a breath. “The picture you create seems impossible, Julian. He isn’t just well guarded. He’s surrounded by sycophants and powerful men who agree with his laws. Who agree with wielding power by the sword and claw.”

“They may not all agree with him,” I offered. “They may be pretending, just like I am, just like you are.”

Gauis grunted assent. “We won’t know who is truly on our side until we strike.”

I was well aware that killing Caesar alone would be much like cutting the head off a hydra. There were plenty more to take his place in a heartbeat. We had to take many more down with him, once we could determine who truly supported Igniculus and his tyrannical Rome .

“The timing must be right,” I said calmly. “The plan must be solid before we strike. I don’t want any of Caesar’s followers fleeing to other provinces and gathering their armies.”

“Perhaps Caesar should be our final target, rather than our first,” said Gaius thoughtfully.

I stared at him, taking in this strategy. “That’s an idea. Weaken him by removing his allies first.”

“Caesar has no allies.” Trajan watched the dwindling crowds. “He has only lapdogs seeking his favor and brutal men who relish the playground of blood and sex he provides.”

“True enough,” I agreed. “His new pet Ciprian grates me to no end.”

“Ciprian Seneca?” Gaius asked.

“Yes. Do you know his family well?”

“Not well.” He shook his head. “He’s from a branch of the black dragons most don’t associate with. They’re not of the quality of most patricians of their dragon lineage.”

I remembered the foul way Ciprian treated the women at the emperor’s feast, the way he spoke of Malina. Slave or not, most patricians didn’t speak of others with such vulgarity, especially in public. Except my uncle.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” I added.

“So who do we take out first?” asked Trajan, having turned his back to our small circle. He was anxious for action.

“Don’t be in such a hurry.” Gaius scratched his chin. “Let’s think on it.”

“I’m tired of planning. It’s time to act,” growled Trajan, his frustration apparent.

“I understand how you’re feeling,” I said, the need to act building inside me.

I’d been wanting to kill my uncle for years, ever since the day I found out he’d dragged his sister, my aunt Camilla, from the Temple of Vesta. All my aunt had ever wanted, my father once told me, was to devote her life to Vesta. Aunt Camilla was born a white dragon, a Vicus, after all, and from a high noble house. Only white dragons could serve as priestesses in the temples. She’d been a priestess at the Temple of Vesta ever since her fifteenth birthday.

But within the same month my uncle took the throne, he hauled his sister from the temple and back to his palace. I didn’t want to know what he did to her there, but I could imagine well enough. Whatever it had been, it was awful enough to make her transform into her dragon and never shift back.

All I knew was when I returned from the campaign I’d been on with Legatus Titus, I was told my aunt Camilla now resided in a dragon pit with a chain around her neck to keep her from escaping. Caesar had built the pit near his palace, where he kept her prisoner to this day, to keep her from escaping.

That was so many years ago, and yet she remained in dragon form. My only solace was that my own father had died before that had happened. It would’ve broken his heart to see his sister that way. He would’ve fought my uncle, and he would’ve lost and died trying to free her.

“But your grandfather is right.” I returned to the conversation. “I believe switching tactics to go for his supporters first is smart. However, if my uncle catches even a whiff of insurrection, he’ll go to ground to plan a counterattack. And he’ll have plenty of forces to gather around him.”

“Agreed.” Gaius shifted his toga higher up his shoulder. “We’ll meet again when you both return from your campaign. I hope it’s a short one.” He gripped Trajan affectionately by the back of the neck like one would a child, even though Trajan stood a foot taller than his grandfather. “Be safe on the battlefield, my boy. Come back whole.”

“Yes, Grandfather.”

Then Gaius nodded farewell to me and melted into the shadows along the edge of the forum. Trajan and I stood in silence for several minutes, watching the vendors pack up for the day and a few women getting water from the public fountain. A young girl dipped her pitcher in the fountain and tried to balance it on her head like her mother, following in her wake.

“Otho has taken a leave of absence from the senate,” I told him. “He’s taken his new bride on a trip to the southern shores.”

“Smart man.” Trajan snorted. “I imagine he might set his young wife up in a villa far from Rome for quite some time.”

“I tried to warn him that night. The hubris of senators. Have they learned nothing?”

“Unlike you, they don’t read nearly as many philosophy books.”

Growing weary of the topic and thinking of Otho’s idiocy, I heaved a sigh. “I’ll see you tomorrow in Moesia. Be sure to lead your legion out at dawn. I’ve already spoken to the other tribunes and given them orders.”

Trajan was frowning while watching something over my shoulder.

“Did you hear me?”

“Isn’t that your witch over there?”

I snapped my head in the direction he was looking, instantly spotting her dark hair, braided into the long rope she was accustomed to wearing. She was on the far side near the circle of temples. Ivo loped along behind her as she disappeared into one of the white marble buildings.

“See you tomorrow, Trajan.” Then I was gone, snaking through the forum to discover what Malina was doing.