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bone by bone.’ He pulled his shirt out of his pants waistband. Purple bruising below his right ribs was fading to a dull yellow. He bowed his head, the blond hair falling over his forehead, his face flushed with embarrassment. ‘I’m sorry, so very sorry.’
    He was a normal person caught in an abnormal dilemma. Despising people for not standing up to the threat of extreme violence was easy in theory, but when faced with it, the average person was shit-scared. They wanted it to go away. If pushed, they would run away to survive. Aidan didn’t have that option.
     
    I skipped lunch. Stowing my disguise kits in the field room gave my hands some busy work. Thank the gods Aidan didn’t know Tacita’s and my real names to pass on to his persecutors. A wave of cold fell through me. Tacita surely didn’t disclose them? Well, whatever she’d said, it was too late now. As I pulled my uniform back on, I gritted myself for an unpleasant hour reporting a colleague to the internal security office. I trudged back upstairs but, on my way, bumped into the adjutant, Lucius Punellus.
    ‘Got a minute, Captain?’ That was too formal.
    ‘Of course, sir.’ I followed him back to his office. He favoured a traditional style, eagle and flags in the corner, unit photos, comfortable but plain dark wood meeting table and chairs, all placed with military precision. Yet in his display cabinet, among the various awards and plaques, there were some childish pottery pieces and a tiny ivory finger ring – mementos of his dead daughter.
    ‘Now, Carina,’ he said, giving me an avuncular smile. My heart sank. I knew I was going to make a rude reply. ‘Have you been up to anything you shouldn’t have?’
    ‘Sorry, sir?’ I didn’t remember being especially insubordinate, I hadn’t “borrowed” anything without signing for it, or led recruits astray recently.
    ‘Don’t bullshit me!’ he growled.
    ‘No, really, I can’t think of anything.’
    ‘Hmm. Well, I overheard Petronax in the security office talking into his screen about an internal trouble. And he wasn’t moaning about his bowels. He was saying something along the lines of “I’ll have to rein her in before she causes any trouble”. He clammed up instantly when he saw me but, somehow, I thought of you.’
    ‘Huh.’
    He shrugged.
    Nobody liked internal affairs departments. Ours was staffed by regular military custodes who relished pointing out our faults. I put it down to boredom and jealousy. Unfair, I suppose; they had a job to do. Daniel wanted to take them all out on a rigorous training exercise and give them what he called a “beasting”. I didn’t want to know what he had in mind.
    Their chief, Petronax, didn’t like me. It was personal. He sniped at me in front of others when he could. He watched me all the time whenever we were in the same room, like he was a predator waiting to pounce. Let him try.
    I searched Lucius’s face for further clues. He frowned, the two lines above his nose ploughed deep with worry. He played with an el-pad stylus, scratching little circles into the polished surface of his desk.
    ‘Well, you’d better cut along now. Thanks for confirming.’ He looked relieved.
    I glanced back as I left and saw he was staring down at his desk with a sombre look. Something was going on, but no way was Lucius going to give me a clue. Tempting as it was, I wasn’t going to short-circuit him and ask Conrad. That was an invisible but immovable line we’d set when we started working together. I wasn’t prepared to cross it.
    Yet.

VI
    Drusus and Fausta’s shopping list for the strategy kit-out was now perfect. I signed it off and sent it on its way, marked urgent. I would stop by the quaestor’s office in a day or two and sweet-talk him. With any luck, we might have some of the network in at the beginning of next week.
    I ducked the security office visit for an hour and decided to go for a run. The locker room was deserted. A shower was running in