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‘Move,’ Felix said to Castor, nestled on Loren’s rib cage.

Castor’s large yellow eyes blinked once, and Felix feared he’d have to fight the animal off, but he stretched, yawned and padded to curl on the goddess’s sandals.

Cat-free Loren somehow looked more pathetic.

Felix pursed his lips and knelt, shaking Loren’s shoulder until he stirred .

‘You’re drunk,’ Felix asked, ‘aren’t you?’

With all the grace of a newborn fawn, Loren hauled upright. His eyes drooped, cheeks tearstained. Strands fell from his mussed braid, framing his face. ‘If you came to tell me off, don’t bother. Can’t take being called a fool by you tonight.’

‘I’m not here for that.’ Felix held out the shoe.

For a long moment, Loren only stared.

‘It’s yours,’ Felix said.

‘I know,’ Loren said, still struggling. ‘Why d’you have it?’

‘Because you threw it. At the kitharist. A good hit, but shitty for him.’

‘I know . But why do you have it?’

Of course this couldn’t be easy. Felix dropped the shoe and sat beside Loren on the dais. ‘I looked for you after your speech.’

Loren snorted. It sounded all wrong. ‘Generous to call it that.’

‘Your only pair of sandals, right? I’d want it back if I’d been up there.’ Which wasn’t precisely true, given that Felix nearly ditched his own sandals days ago, but it seemed a reasonable excuse.

‘Wouldn’t have been you.’ Loren screwed his eyes tight. ‘You understand, don’t you? Only I’d lose control like that. In front of everyone. I’m ruined.’

Felix couldn’t help it. He rolled his eyes. ‘You think Patroco . . .’

‘Patroclus.’

‘. . . never embarrassed himself? You aren’t the only fool in history.’

‘I’ll never be in history,’ Loren insisted. ‘I threw all my ambitions in the gutter tonight. And Patroclus died when he made a fool of himself.’

‘Should I use Achilles as an example?’

‘Also a fool. Also died.’

‘I can leave, if you’d rather.’ Felix shifted to stand, but Loren flailed in protest .

‘Don’t. I would rather listen to you talk poetry than be awake with my thoughts.’ Fumbling with an amphora, Loren squinted at the maker’s stamp, then passed it to Felix. ‘I was under the impression wine was meant to help.’

‘How much did you drink?’ Felix said, sloshing it around. Nearly dry from the sound.

‘Opened it new.’

‘Jupiter, Loren, what were you thinking? You’re supposed to water this anyway, not drink it straight.’

‘I was thinking I didn’t want to think. But it only made everything louder.’

Felix took a draw from the jug. Sickly-sweetness washed over his tongue. ‘Horrible. Who made this? Lassius?’

That startled a pained laugh from Loren. ‘You have no idea, do you?’

‘I don’t care what you rich folk say. Lassius wine is swill.’ A smirk curled Felix’s face. ‘I stole from his villa once.’

‘No.’ Loren still giggled, a drunken babble. His whole body shook with it as he pressed his forehead to Felix’s shoulder, and Felix felt the burst of each laugh echo warm and sharp down to his fingertips. ‘Tell me that’s a joke.’

Strangely proud, Felix nodded. ‘He owns the big vineyard south of here, a day’s ride by the main road. Has more property than he knows what to do with, so I took as many bottles as I could. Doubt he noticed them missing.’

‘Felix.’ As abruptly as it started, Loren’s laughter died. ‘You can’t tell me these things.’

‘Why not?’

Weight retreated from Felix’s shoulder. Not that he cared.

‘Because Lassius is my father. ’

Felix waited for the joke to drop. And waited. But Loren fished under the neckline of his toga-tunic-abomination and withdrew a gold ring fastened to a cord. With a sharp tug, he snapped the leather.

He dropped the ring into Felix’s palm.

‘I didn’t want to tell you,’ Loren said, which Felix took to mean I’m only telling you because I’m drunk out of my skull. ‘But Julia knows, so. Fuck it.’

Felix’s mind melted. ‘Julia knows?’

‘You didn’t hear her?’ Loren’s pretty mouth twisted into a grimace. ‘Not a soul in Pompeii should know my real name.’

‘Your real name.’ Not melted. Disintegrated.

‘Lucius Lassius Lorenus. Ridiculous, isn’t it?’

Neither laughed. Felix stared at the signet ring, emblazoned so clearly with the Lassius family crest. Reversed, so when pressed to damp clay or puddled wax, it would face correctly. For a long moment, Felix found he couldn’t make any sound at all.

‘Say something, Felix. Say you were right all along, that I’m some rich boy choking on privilege. I know you think it already. May as well air it. Or tell me—’

Felix slipped the ring on. Loren cut off with a strangled cough.

‘Keep it,’ Loren choked out. ‘I don’t need it. Don’t know why I kept it this long. Figured I’d flash it someday to get myself out of trouble, or into trouble, but obviously this was a mistake. I’ll crawl back to them. I’ll leave tonight.’

The thought came over Felix, in a slow spread, that for all he thought he and Loren were different, perhaps those differences linked them. After all, weren’t they both searching for a place to belong? Where rules didn’t matter?

‘No,’ Felix said. ‘You aren’t going back there. Pompeii is your home.’

The chamber fell eerily silent. Felix dragged his eyes from the ring, turned to look, and —

Loren kissed him.

And, oh. Oh . Dry at first, then soft. Soft and clumsy and uncoordinated.

Loren tasted of sweet and sticky wine, but the sugar was tempered, somehow, honey left to caramelise in a simmering pot.

Felix cupped Loren’s jaw in his palm, guided him to a better angle, and pushed his fingers back into braided hair.

He ached to unpick the twists, let dark strands fall free, so he could comb through it, all the way down.

He wanted to kiss Loren until he went cross-eyed.

He wanted to slip into this boy and not resurface.

He wanted to unwrite all his rules.

Loren’s hand settled somewhere on Felix’s chest, his touch a thousand tiny sparks. Felix’s whole body lit, and he trembled with overwhelm, and their mouths slid together. Sugar-wine faded, and all he could taste was Loren, Loren, Loren.

When Loren sighed hot against his lips, Felix jerked back. ‘We can’t.’

A crease appeared between Loren’s brows. He still leaned in, even as Felix pulled away. Blown pupils swallowed his cinnamon eyes. ‘But . . .’

‘We can’t.’ Felix’s heart pounded against the fingertips grazing his collarbone. Suddenly the pressure suffocated him.

‘But.’ Loren blinked. He straightened, noticing Felix’s discomfort, and dropped his hand to scoot away. Even in the low light, Felix caught his face flush deep. ‘Oh. You don’t like me that way. I assumed. Read you wrong. Or is it . . . you prefer women? I’m so sorry, Felix, I—’

This boy needed to stop talking. Felix searched for a place to touch him that wouldn’t imply something improper, but his shoulder felt patronising, and his waist was more intimate than he could stand. He settled for Loren’s knee.

It worked. Loren, indeed, stopped. Not just stopped talking. Stopped everything. He stared at Felix’s hand, lips parted. The signet ring winked beneath the lantern, heavy on his finger.

‘You’re very, very drunk,’ Felix said.

Nor was Felix drunk enough, but he didn’t dare reduce Loren to a distraction.

‘I’d kiss you sober,’ Loren breathed, and gods if that didn’t send a bolt of lightning down Felix’s spine. ‘It isn’t the wine.’

‘But you’re drunk now. I won’t take advantage of you when your mind isn’t clear.’

Loren’s fingers hovered, feeling out their welcome, then tangled with Felix’s own. Touch was a careful, convoluted conversation that Felix wished he didn’t need to constantly negotiate.

‘I trust you,’ Loren said. ‘I’d let you do anything you wanted to me.’

‘That’s why I’m concerned.’ Felix frowned and stood. ‘Come on, I’ll walk you home.’

With uncoordinated fingers, Loren strapped on his recovered sandal. Felix pulled him up, catching him when he promptly tipped back over. Cat eyes glimmered from the shadows, Castor and Pollux scrutinising, almost like they didn’t trust Felix half as much as Loren did.

Maybe the Egyptians had that right: cats could see what humans couldn’t.

Silent streets accompanied their walk to the brothel. The city had tired of its festival at last, or at least moved it indoors. Loren leaned heavily against Felix, but the weight wasn’t such a bother.

Some god in charge of small mercies had sent Elias away, off to kiss some stranger or procure more hemp. Felix shoved Loren upstairs in a mess of limbs. Finally, after an awkward pocket search while Loren teetered and gazed at his hair, Felix unlocked the door of their room. Loren’s room. Whatever.

Loren wasted no time flopping into bed, fully clothed.

‘You’re a wreck,’ Felix muttered. He reached to remove Loren’s sandals, but Loren’s hand shot out. Grabbed his fingers again. Felix froze.

‘You aren’t who I thought you were,’ Loren confessed .

It could seem casual, a reference to strangers and first impressions, but Felix remembered the look of recognition haunting Loren’s eyes moments before the bowl crashed down. The mutterings of his name in sleep. Felix had known Loren for two days.

But he wondered how long Loren had known him.

‘I want to understand,’ Loren said, brow furrowed over shut eyes. ‘You. Want to help.’

‘There’s nothing to help,’ said Felix.

‘What Julia said,’ Loren started as though he’d only just remembered, here on the brink of wine-sleep. ‘’Bout. Smuggling ring. Temple. Servius. D’you think . . .’

Felix gently broke the hold as Loren mumbled into unconsciousness.

Do you think . No, thinking was one activity Felix strove to do as little of as possible. Thinking only complicated his life. Especially when it came to temples and smuggling and memory. Besides, he suspected what Loren meant to ask. His mind had gone there, too. Of course it had.

But this Felix knew with certainty: no matter how shrouded his other memories were, Servius was a man he wouldn’t have forgotten.

Chasing coincidence was a waste of time.

Felix discarded the thought. Forced it down, even as it threatened to bubble back up.

Now he only hoped Loren’s impending hangover would erase it from his mind, too.

Felix jiggled the latch of Loren’s trunk until it popped to dig for the spare blanket tucked at the bottom.

But when he pushed back the lid, he stilled.

The laundry bag had drooped open. Silver glinted in the dark of the room, reflecting nothing.

Delicately, Felix scooped up the helmet, cradling it in his palms.

Such a strange thing for Pompeii to prize and fear in equal measure – and such a strange thing to have pinned Felix in one city for the longest stretch of time since fleeing Rome.

Yet there was something familiar about the helmet, a beckoning he couldn’t name.

Wasn’t sure he wanted to name. Loren called it Mercury’s helmet.

The shape, the weight, the style . . . but the harder Felix considered it, the further the answer seemed, flitting away on swift, winged feet.

And now he itched to follow.

His thoughts returned to the questions he’d considered on the docks, all those impossibilities he hadn’t allowed himself to wonder about before. That he had been drawn to Pompeii for a reason. That he was meant to pursue an answer here – one he had been too afraid to face.

Felix had no family name. He had no vineyard to return to, no heirship waiting. But he had the helmet. Something all his own. Something that understood what it meant to be untouchable.

Something to run to, instead of from.

Under the press of his fingers, Felix could have sworn the metal hummed.