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“He’s vulgar as Hades.”
    “Oh, surely not. He has exquisite taste. Not one of our friends or relations has anything to match his house, or his collection of statues, or his wine cellar.”
    “Yes, and that’s my point. Freed slaves should live modestly, not flaunt themselves higher than their birth.”
    “Well, he has been very helpful to us,” Cornelia murmured. More than helpful, really—Lollia’s grandfather was extremely generous with gifts, and there was no denying that his assistance in other areas had been invaluable. Piso’s family had been hard hit under Nero’s suspicious eye, and even Claudius’s before that—she and Piso would never have kept their house and assets if not for a few timely loans. . . .
    “It’s still not fitting.” Piso frowned, and Cornelia tactfully changed the subject. Her husband, she knew, liked things in their place—patricians of good blood and family in the Senate, equites to serve them, plebs to serve them, and freed slaves who showed proper appreciation for their station in life. Freedmen as rich as Midas who had to be applied to for loans had no place in Piso’s orderly vision of Rome. Cornelia patted his arm brightly and turned to the maids. “Leda, Zoe, did you arrange the ivy and the larkspur in the box as I showed you?”
    “Yes, Domina—”
    Cornelia had been up by dawn, flitting to the Circus Maximus to set her slave girls to work on the Cornelii family box: an enclosed marble space perched high in the tiers with a breathtaking view of the track’s hairpin turn below. The arena attendants had been raking the sand of the track, and pale fingers of sunlight stretching over the top of the tiers, when Cornelia set the slaves to work. Flowers, swags of ivy, silver platters and gold wine cups—she’d give her guests more than just a good view. She’d give them a bower, a last breath of summer in the pale blue coolness of autumn. The slaves had been flying about the box like bees by the time she raced back to the house, her hair coming down and her cheeks pink with excitement, to prepare herself and her husband for their grand entrance.
    “What a general you are, my dear,” Piso said as she rearranged the folds of his toga over the shoulder. Of course he didn’t lean down and kiss her, not with slaves present, but his eyes crinkled approvingly. “And a beautiful general at that.”
    “I wish I didn’t have to wear red,” Cornelia said ruefully, looking down at her dark-red gown with the jet beads at the hem. “Diana swore she’d behave herself today if I just wore red for her precious team. Not my best color— why couldn’t she support the Greens instead?”
    “Nonsense, red suits you. Do sit down, my dear, you’ve been sprinting about since dawn.”
    “I want everything just right. The Emperor may drop by, after all.”
    “Doubtful. He dislikes festivals.”
    “But he likes you .” Cornelia reached up to smooth a stray strand of her husband’s hair. “Perhaps he’ll make the announcement today.”
    “Why today?”
    “He’s made himself very unpopular lately with all the new tax levies, that’s all.” All Rome knew that Galba’s stern-faced accountants had swept up the jeweled butterflies of Nero’s court and were squeezing them for every sesterce they had ever sucked away from the treasury. There was a great deal of complaining, of course, as people watched their houses, their jewels, their slaves and estates flowing into Galba’s eager, wrinkled hands—but Cornelia approved. Everyone knew Nero had spent the treasury empty. Had no one thought the account would ever come due?
    But still, people were inclined to mutter resentfully now when they heard Galba’s name. He’d want to soothe the crowds, give them something new to talk about.
    Like an Imperial heir. A young, handsome, able, and vigorous heir.
    “You look very handsome, Piso. Very distinguished.” Very Imperial . “Shall we go?”
    They came from the atrium to the