The Defiant (The Valiant #2)(73)

I would not let that happen.

And neither, I knew in my heart, would Sorcha.

I looked toward the bow of the ship and saw that Charon had gone to speak with her. I admired his courage. And, to be perfectly honest, his selflessness. Because what he was trying to convince my sister of, in that moment, carried with it a great risk to himself. To his heart, his honor—and strange as it seemed to me, Charon was not without his own particular honor—to his one impossibly slim chance at the kind of happiness he’d craved for years.

I watched him lift a hand as they spoke—not quite touching the side of Sorcha’s face that still bore the scars of the chariot accident that had ended her gladiatrix career—and I saw her own hand come up to meet his, to push it away . . .

But she didn’t.

Whatever Charon was saying to her, Sorcha was listening—not relenting, maybe, not yet—but listening. They stood there, hands clasped between them, and she did not turn from him. Not immediately. When she finally did let go of his hand and walked away, he stood there for a long moment, his hand still lifted as if he caressed my sister’s face. As if she stood there letting him.

? ? ?

Later, I didn’t ask Charon what had passed between them, and he didn’t seem inclined to tell me. But he carried on as if our scheme was still set in motion, and to that end, there was a great deal to be accomplished before we made landfall. Not the least of which was figuring out how to smuggle not just the Achillea gladiatrices but a band of Amazons—all hardscrabble warrior girls dressed in little more than rags and bad manners—into the city. The first of many hurdles. When Cai expressed that very concern as I sat plotting and planning with Charon outside the captain’s tent, the slave master smiled at him benignly.

“Don’t fret, decurion,” he said. “These girls won’t be attracting the attention of the legions or Rome’s vigiles.”

“They won’t?” Cai raised an eyebrow at him. “We’re pulling in to a smaller port, then?”

“No.” Charon took a deep breath, seeming to sniff at which way the wind was blowing. “I’m going to drop anchor in the same place I always do. The wharf on the west bank of the River Tiber. Inside the very walls of Rome herself.”

Cai followed the slave master’s gaze to see his men pulling down the sail with its subdued, faded colors and replacing it with a bright-striped one. I recognized the colors from the very first ship I’d sailed on with Charon. With that, and the shields removed from the side rails and stowed belowdecks, even I had to admit that it looked like an entirely different craft. It looked like one of Charon’s fleet of slave galleys.

“I see.” Cai nodded. “And . . . then you have a plan to get the Amazons through the city unmolested by Rome’s authorities.”

“I do.” Charon nodded, pushing himself to his feet as the crew hustled about the deck. “But they’re not going to like it very much.”

He flashed us a jaunty, slightly feral grin and went to confer with his men.

Cai turned to me, and I shrugged apologetically for not having had the chance yet to confer with him. But I’d needed to be sure, first, that what I’d had in mind with Charon was possible before I could slot the next piece of the mosaic into place. And the shape of that next piece was up to Cai himself.

“And the rest of you and your Achillea cohorts?” he asked, one eyebrow raised. “I trust there’s a plan for that too?”

I nodded and, beaming up at him with the best, brightest smile I could muster, said, “You once told me your father was rather fond of his wine?”

? ? ?

The mainland loomed ever larger on the horizon, and for one brief moment, I found myself alone on the deck, watching the port of Ostia creep closer across the waves. I felt as if I was standing in a field, bathed in sunlight, watching the sky darken as thunderclouds advanced over the horizon. The calm before the storm.

Cai and I had discussed my plan, worked through the potential pitfalls and contingencies, and arrived at the best course of action that either of us could come up with—even though it meant imposing on Cai’s father’s hospitality in his absence. With the senator away on his trade mission to Brundisium, there was a great empty marble palace right in the middle of the capital available to hide a contingent of rebel gladiatrices. Getting us there was simply a matter of logistics—the kind I’d left up to Charon, who’d grinned his nefarious grin when we told him, along with Quint and Aeddan, my idea.

Quint was onboard from the outset. Aeddan’s brow had furrowed, and I could sense him brewing storm clouds, but he’d declined to offer a dissenting opinion in front of the others, and I left him to his brooding. For my part, my only reservations about the plan were that I didn’t want to do anything to implicate the senator if we were caught.

“If my father was here, Fallon,” Cai had assured me, “I know—in my heart—that he’d be the first to speak up about these nonsense charges of ‘rebellion.’”

“Even if it put his career at risk?”

“It wouldn’t. But yes, even then.” Cai leaned out over the railing, gazing east. Toward his home. “He’s my father.”

I stood beside Cai and closed my eyes, and memories of my home—of Prydain, and Durovernum, and my own father—flooded my mind.

For a moment, as I stood there, my mind wove a daydream.