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stood, the most successful merchant in Alexandria’s Emporium, in a decrepit section of Pharos Town, ready to dole out good silver to a soothsayer. Who was the bigger fool? The crow called out again as if in total agreement.
    Jared checked the knife sheathed at his side. Alone, it was a fine weapon, with a hilt of carved bone and a triangle shaped blade honed to a cutting edge. In the hands of an experienced man, it was deadly. He had experience enough, had learned to use it after his mother’s death. At night, when the nightmares came, he envisioned wielding the blade across that bastard soldier’s throat.
    His hand was fisted around the hilt at the recall of the night terrors that plagued him even after so many years. He arranged the folds of his robe over the weapon. It would be hidden from view but within easy reach. He sent a glare to the crow and stepped through the door.
    Pungent smoke from a half dozen oil lamps mingled with the biting stench of filth and rancid wine brought tears to Jared’s eyes. The smell was enough to make a man lose the contents of his stomach. He cupped his hands, and wiped his eyes, drawing his fingers down over his nose.
    It was then he noticed the silence.
    Every wretch in the place was staring at him, suspicion and distrust etched on their faces as if with an awl. This wasn’t unexpected. He was a stranger and any good rat would snap alert at intrusions. He’d chosen a simple knee-length tunic of natural linen, and his outer garment was the plainest of his wardrobe so as to lessen his impact. But within the sea of coarse woolen laid out before him, he stood out like a two-headed centaur.
    “Oh, master, how may I serve you?” The silky question failed to hide the coarseness imbedded in the voice of scantily clad woman who sidled up to him. She may have been a beauty once, but the heavy kohl rimming her watered-downed eyes and red stained lips only accentuated her decline. The whore, oblivious to her decrepitude, insinuated herself against his thigh. The cloying perfume she wore failed to hide her lack of hygiene.
    Jared extricated her scrawny arm from around his waist, pried her dirt streaked leg from his own and set her at arm’s length. She didn’t even seem insulted when he swiped the dirt from his clothes. Instead, she sent him a pouty frown that skewed her worn features into a grotesque mask.
    “I seek Coeus, keeper of this. . .” He looked around with disgust. “. . .establishment.”
    “I am the proprietor.”
    A huge man clothed in a garish robe of bright yellow stood up, rolling out from behind the long wooden plank stretched across the length of the rear wall.
    The riffraff scurried from his path as Jared strode toward the owner. It was not difficult to ignore them, but the reek of the haggard strumpet scurrying alongside of him was difficult. Jared rolled his eyes at the overt looks of triumph she cast to the sullen crowd. He’d cut off his own cock before he allowed her to ply her charms on him. “I have been informed that you provide a certain service here,” he said without preamble.
    “I have the best women money can buy,” claimed Coeus, thrusting out his flabby chest with pride. “Ask anyone in Pharos.”
    Jared felt a sharp pinch near his groin and knocked the trollop’s hand away from his crotch. He sent her a quelling look meant to dissuade her. It worked. Her eager expression dissolved into one of complete dejection.
    “I do not have need of a woman.” Actually, it might go a long way to improving his mood, since he’d not been intimate with a woman since the beginning of the thefts, nearly six months past. It was no matter of pride that Jared ben Gideon had no need to pay a whore, only a fact that he had numerous females eager to serve him. At last count, three promiscuous daughters of business associates, two of his uncle’s willing slave women and, a small smile came to his lips, a wealthy widow who had a gift for using honey in very imaginative