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Romans see him weak. The woman stepped inside and closed the veils of her litter while the men shackled him to one of the poles. The richly dressed man walked round to the other side. She did not treat him with the submission required of a woman to a husband or father in his homeland. And what man would let his wife or daughter buy a slave like Jergan? He must be a friend. The bearers lifted the poles and started out of the market.
    People and litters still crowded the streets. Did Romans never sleep? Jergan was conscious that he was naked. He jutted his chin up. He refused to be ashamed.
    Two women whispered together, then hurried up to him and … and touched him. He growled to frighten them away. It didn’t work. Soon he had a small, clucking crowd following him, touching biceps and shoulder, buttocks—even his privates. The guards only grinned. He stopped ducking away from his tormentors and resolved to ignore them. He would think of Centii: the rich fields, his family eating under the trees of the orchard in the summertime. He couldn’t hold the image. He felt his cock rising. Curse the life of a soldier. If he had been relieving his needs regularly with a woman, they would not be able to tease him so. He strode ahead, gaze stony, willing himself flaccid. It wasn’t working.
    “Halt,” her voice barked out from inside the litter.
    The bearers lurched to a stop. That only gave the chattering leeches clinging to him a better target for their foul caresses. His owner poked her head out from among theveils. This close he noticed that she had a vitality, a force of life that almost hummed about her. A scent of something exotic, spicy and sweet hung around her.
    “Get back, whores,” she said, low but so intensely her words seemed to echo in the air around her. “He belongs to me.” To his amazement the women stepped back, shock in their eyes.
    “You three, keep them away from him,” she ordered the guards. Her head disappeared inside the hangings. “Proceed.”
    The men around him, chastised, drew their swords. The women backed off, murmuring epithets. Several spat upon Jergan.
    Before they could start forward again, a litter squeezing through the narrow street from the opposite direction halted their progress. This litter was wide, its gauzy hangings bordered in purple and embroidered with gold thread. It took eight burly Nubians to bear it by the ornately carved double poles that sat on their shoulders. As it squeezed past, a female voice called on the bearers to halt. A woman with a long nose and close-set eyes pulled back the hangings and raked her gaze over Jergan. Her smile made him feel unclean.
    “Agrippina, look.” The woman beckoned to a companion. Another woman leaned forward and peered at him. She must be nearsighted. Their features said clearly they were related.
    “Oh, my!” the second woman exclaimed.
    “My humble slave draws the attention of the imperial sisters. I am honored.” His new owner’s voice behind him was not obsequious, no matter these women’s status. It held the faintest hint of sarcasm and more, contempt. “How good to meet you, Julia Lavilla, Julia Agrippina.”
    The sisters had the same first name? Ahhhh. They werenamed for the first dictator of Rome, no doubt to display their lineage.
    “We were on the way to the night market to see if there were any slaves left from the victory parade. The one we bought didn’t last, and we have need of new fodder for our … attentions.” They only glanced to his owner. Their eyes drifted back to his naked body.
    “You have saved us the trouble of the market, Livia Quintus. This one suits our needs.”
    “I am desolated, exalted ones.” Her voice was too sorrowful to be truly sorry. “He is not for sale.”
    “Nonsense,” Julia Lavilla snorted. “Name your price.”
    “A thousand apologies,” his new owner mourned. “I cannot think of a sum that would mean more to me than the anticipation breaking this slave raises in my