Time was an inconstant thing. Sometimes it passed on the back of a turtle. Other times it fluttered by on winged feet. For Arria, the next two months passed like days. She knew that at any moment she might be summoned to Cal’s cell and feel his arms around her once again.
On Oppius’s orders, she had abandoned the ordinary carpet she had begun to weave and started a new one to feature a design of her choosing. ‘If those imperious patrician tarts want to pay large sums for tasteless carpets, I am no one to stop them,’ he had said.
Arria had no notion of what might or might not strike the fancy of a patrician woman. She could only weave what haunted her mind: a sculpted, scarred man with a shaved head and dazzling eyes.
He was always with her. In the morning when she awoke and stretched her limbs, at midday, when she walked to the courtyard, in the evenings, when she finally set down her shuttle, closed her eyes and dreamed of pleasure.
Cal.
Every time she thought of him, she felt her heart smile. He had wanted to kiss her from the day she had pressed her face to the bars, or so he had said. She was his beautiful sorceress. Had he said that as well, or did she just dream it?
The pattern for the carpet had burst from her fingertips. She had not even sketched an image to help guide her. Each row seemed to emerge directly from her heart: a scarred warrior, rippling with strength, poised to defeat whatever foe should come his way.
On the first day of March she completed it and Oppius practically ripped it from the loom.
‘It resembles me, in truth,’ he said, studying the outline of Cal’s muscular form. ‘But what is this flaw here? This line?’ Oppius traced the long diagonal scar. ‘It makes no sense.’
To Arria, it made more sense than anything else ever had. The scar was special. It belonged to the man who had found her worthy enough to kiss, to hold, to touch. A man who could have virtually any woman he wished for and had for some reason chosen her.
She floated through her days, waiting for his summons, certain he would send for her soon. This is what it feels like to be wanted, she told herself and basked in the feeling, along with the knowledge that he would keep himself alive. He owed her a debt, after all, and she knew he would not rest until he paid it.
But when the summons finally came, it was a command from Oppius to ready herself for the market. ‘Epona, you, too,’ he said, and soon the two women found themselves stumbling behind the cart once again, their metal collars pinching.
‘You should take great care now,’ warned Epona. ‘Your happiness has made you even more beautiful. Men will see you. You must try to make yourself less attractive.’
Epona hunched her shoulders and demonstrated a sneering frown. Arria chuckled softly.
‘You must not get attached to him,’ Epona warned.
‘Of whom do you speak?’
‘Come now, Arria. Since you returned from your night with that gladiator, I do not think your feet have touched the ground.’
‘Is it that obvious?’
‘He is a gladiator. Do you know what that means? You must try to keep him out of your heart.’
‘I fear it is too late for that,’ said Arria.
‘Men are beasts,’ Epona said and spat.
Arria shook her head, but did not take heed. Something had changed in Epona after her night with the tribune. She had lost her tart humour and spent her days studying her spools of thread, as if trying to unravel them with her thoughts.
‘Grandmother says you worship Ephesia,’ said Arria. ‘That she gives you strength.’
Epona smiled absently. ‘I have always loved horses.’
‘Do you know how to ride?’
‘Of course I know how to ride. Every Chatti does. It is our birthright.’
They arrived at an open stall and unloaded their wares, and Arria watched the driver lead the horses to a hitching area.
‘If only we could climb atop those horses and ride away to freedom,’ Arria said. The idea swirled around them like a hot wind. ‘You cannot tell me you have not thought the same.’
Arria glanced around the busy marketplace, aware that any effort to escape would be futile. If the mounted guards did not stop them, then a reward-seeking slave hunter surely would. And she did not even want to think of the punishment that would await them after.
‘Such thoughts can drive a person mad,’ Epona said at last.
‘Must we choose, then? Whether to endure our fate or go mad resisting it?’
‘Shh...’ whispered Epona. ‘When the time is right.’
Arria scowled. Grandmother had said the same thing. And in five years, Arria would likely be saying the same thing to another woman doomed to stand at one of Oppius’s miserable looms. ‘Find your pigeon,’ Grandmother had told Arria, but the more she thought of Cal, the more restless she had become. He had not just given her a sense of hope, he had given her a taste of a joy.
She could hardly pass an hour without remembering the taste of his lips, the feel of his body against hers... She could not even bear the thought that those memories would be all she would ever have, or that she would live out the next ten years waiting for ‘when the time is right.’
The time was now. She needed to free Cal and get her family and depart. Before her soul petrified. Before she quietly accepted her life as a slave.
A small tribe of litter bearers marched up to the stall and stopped.
‘Good day to you, Master Oppius,’ chimed a rarefied voice. Two familiar figures clad in pink and orange linen converged before Oppius, who gave them a sweeping bow.
‘Honourable Ladies. It is a great pleasure to see you both once again.’ His eyes glittered like newly minted coins. ‘I hope you are enjoying your new carpet.’
‘In fact, my daughter and I have returned to see if you have any more such carpets,’ asked the elder.
‘I do indeed, Domina,’ said Oppius. He directed the women’s attention to Arria’s newest creation and Arria watched their expressions change from surprise, to confusion, to something resembling awe. They stood before the carpet for many long moments, their mouths agape.
‘It is a work of genius,’ the younger pronounced at last. ‘The perfection of the man contrasted with the tragedy of his scar. I simply must have it.’
‘How much do you ask for it, Oppius?’ queried the elder.
‘One hundred and fifty denarii,’ stated Oppius. It was an outrageous sum, but the woman did not even flinch. She gestured to a guard, who quickly produced a large coin purse from beneath his toga. He counted out coins into Oppius’s hand until the purse was half emptied.
‘Tell me, Oppius,’ said the elder woman conspiratorially. ‘Who is the weaver? It is worth the rest of that purse if you will give me her name.’
Oppius’s eyes grew as wide as plums. ‘I would be happy to tell you, Domina, for such a generous offer.’ He waited patiently for her guard to place all the coins into the purse, then took it in hand. ‘But I fear that you will be disappointed when I tell you that the weaver is that woman standing right beside you.’ He gestured to Arria.
The young woman stepped backwards in horror. ‘A slave?’
‘It is you who wove the carpets?’ asked the elder.
‘Yes, Domina.’
‘But that cannot be,’ said the younger. ‘This is the work of a master of the craft. An artist.’
Arria bowed her head.
‘How long have you been weaving?’ demanded the elder.
‘Since I was eight years old, Domina.’
‘Under whom did you study?’
Arria’s chest squeezed. ‘My own mother taught me the basics, Domina. The rest I learned on my own.’
The young woman whispered something into her mother’s ear and her mother turned to Oppius. ‘I trust you know who we are?’
Oppius nodded. ‘I do indeed, Domina.’
‘Good. I should like you and this weaver of yours to pay a visit to our domus tomorrow morning for some further business.’
‘Of course, Domina,’ said Oppius and before he could even finish his bow, the women had boarded their litter and were floating back through the curious crowd.
‘Perhaps they wish to hire you to weave a carpet for them,’ said Epona after Oppius had left them. Her words were careful, but Arria could see the flicker of hope in her grey eyes.
‘It is possible. Perhaps they only wish to question Oppius about my origins.’
‘It is possible,’ repeated Epona.
Possible. Another dangerous word. A word so bright that it might as well have been the name of the sun god himself. Neither of them would dare voice the idea that had invaded both their minds. It was possible, quite possible, that Arria might be purchased by a family of patricians.
Epona studied Arria for a long while, then gazed out at the bustling marketplace. ‘Why do you think the house servants ignore us?’ It was an unusual question, though Arria knew Epona better than to think that she ever spoke absently.
‘I think they ignore us because they feel guilty,’ Arria replied. ‘They labour in relative comfort. They are allowed to eat the remains of Oppius’s fine foods and the heat of his hearth warms their bones. I think they see the injustice of our lives and feel badly for us. It is out of guilt they cannot look at us.’
‘Is that really what you believe?’
Arria nodded. ‘Why? What do you believe?’
‘I believe that they do not see us at all, that they have forgotten about us completely. We are out of their sight and out of their minds. They do not have to know us, so they can forget we exist.’ Arria’s mind raced. She feared that Epona was right. ‘When life starts to make sense,’ Epona continued, ‘it is easy to forget when it did not.’
She grasped Arria’s hand. ‘Do not forget about me, Arria, and I promise that I will not forget about you.’
‘I will not, dear friend,’ whispered Arria. ‘I promise.’