Chapter 14

Corvus had a strange sense of foreboding as the limo pulled up outside the general's house. The family wing was mostly dark, but the lights were burning in his own rooms. He almost pointed it out to Quad, but decided if there was any hazard, it probably wouldn't be the sort that the big centurion could protect him from.

The reception desk in his antechamber was empty and he called out. "Clover, Rose, is everything all right?"

Rose emerged, barefoot, blinking sleep out of her eyes, and wrapping herself in a black silk robe embroidered with her namesake flowers. She knelt smoothly at Corvus's feet. "How may I serve?"

"Where's Clover?" Corvus absentmindedly stroked Rose's hair. "All the lights are on."

Rose started to answer, but Clover came running out tying on her own robe, this one simple white silk. She went to her knees next to Rose. "How may I serve?"

Corvus gave a relieved chuckle. "Did I interrupt again? Forgive me."

Even without the look Clover and Rose gave each other, Corvus would have realized that couldn't be the case. Rose looked like she'd been awakened from a sound sleep. Clover was the only one who looked like she'd been in the middle of anything.

Then he heard a third set of feet moving around in his receiving room. Corvus wasn't entirely surprised when it was Crispa who emerged, smoothing down an embroidered blue and gold kimono, her hair half out of a loose bun. When she saw Corvus, she ran over and hugged him. "Where have you been? I called your house, but your man said you hadn't been there all day."

"I ... was at the office. I thought I told everyone before I left." It felt like it had been days ago and Corvus was no longer sure if he'd told Clover and Rose where he would be or not.

"He said you weren't there. I ordered him to go look, but I don't think he really did it."

"He ... Malcolm?" Corvus asked. The whole conversation was taking on an odd quality like everyone involved was underwater and communicating through pneumatic tubes.

Crispa nodded up at him. "Yes. I really think you're going to have to do something about him. He's very willful."

Corvus hugged her and kissed the top of her head. "He is, but he was right today. I wasn't at my house. I was at my new office downtown - the one I'll be taking over when I become senator. What's happened?"

"You were ... working?" Crispa blinked in surprise. When Corvus nodded, she motioned her distress with the back of her hand against her forehead and head thrown back. "If I'd known it was contageous, I never would have introduced you to Metallicus."

"In my case, it's probably congenital," deadpanned Corvus. "Has something happened?"

"He's trying to marry me off again," said Crispa. "He met with Atellus Rufius today and they discussed the possibility of a union between the Iunii and the Rufii."

It took Corvus a moment to catch up with the abrupt pronoun shift. "Alyse told you this?"

Crispa shook her head. "He couldn't wait to tell me himself."

Corvus tightened his grip on Crispa and scowled. "I thought my bluff would have given him some pause at least. I can't believe he was out already today looking for a better deal."

Crispa pressed a kiss to the center of his chest. "My father has always been ambitious, but he didn't go anywhere. General Rufius and his son are in the capital for your father's wedding. Atellus came here to call on my father. Plautus doesn't even need to leave his rooms to meddle in my life." She looked up at him. "Have you eaten?"

Corvus sighed and rubbed his temples. "Like ... six or seven hours ago."

"There's wine, fruit and cheese set up in your receiving room." Crispa took him by the wrist and led him through the door. As obvious as the signs of what she and Clover had been up to before he arrived were as soon as he saw them, they were unignorable here - pillows spilled from one of the low couches, an area rug kicked askew and air still redolent with arousal. In case he was blind to all that, as Crispa sat on the couch, she nonchalantly reached down between two of the couch cushions. When she withdrew her hand and placed it quickly in her pocket, there was a definite flash of blue silk that wasn't there when her hand came out again.

"Eat. You must be famished." Crispa indicated the food spread out in front of her.

Corvus didn't sit down. "Clover was ... entertaining you while you waited for me to come home?"

"Consoling me, dear. I was very upset and she's such a comfort. You don't mind. Do you?"

Corvus sighed. If he was going to mind this sort of thing, he shouldn't be friends with Crispa. He sat down and poured himself a glass of wine. "My home is your home. Tell me about this suitor of yours. Is Atellus Rufius the general or the general's son?"

Crispa picked up her own glass. "The son fortunately. The father is a complete prig. Atellus is ... better."

"You know him?"

Crispa popped an olive in her mouth, chewed it up and swallowed before answering. "A little. My first year on the courtship circuit was his last, I think."

"Did he court you then?"

Crispa shook her head. "He and Caeca were all-but-engaged that year. She was a sweet girl." There was a wistfulness in her voice. "She died a few years back during that awful flu epidemic the Legion brought back from Europe."

Corvus sat back, wondering how much Crispa wasn't telling him about her past with Atellus Rufius. "What sort of man is he?"

Crispa laughed, suggesting the question wasn't as simple to answer as to ask. "Ambitious, driven, patriotic. Superficially, you two have a lot in common. He's a senator, too. You might even be political allies.

Corvus shook his head. "I generally prefer to choose my allies from men who haven't shown up on my doorstep to press their case against me."

Crispa's smile was apologetic and diffident. "I doubt Atellus knows you have any claim to me. I don't think he meant to give offense."

Corvus frowned. "Do I?"

"Do you what?"

"Have some claim on you?"

Crispa bit her lip as if to suggest she'd accidentally wandered into dangerous territory. "You do, but it's not the sort of claim you can expect another man to recognize. Nothing's really ... official between us yet. Is it?"

Corvus narrowed his eyes. "So ... if I hadn't been such a prude in the limo that night..."

"You were right to say no," Crispa assured him quickly. "It would have been a bad way to start things between us. But if would have been a start. If I were your mistress, I could refuse suitors like Atellus."

Corvus frowned. It was an easy solution Crispa was dangling in front of him, but even a drunken screw in the back of a limo seemed more romantic than proposing it now. "What are you going to do about him?"

Crispa sighed and ran her fingers through her hair. "He's not a bad sort. I should at least meet with him and hear his case or at least give him a good tongue-lashing for going to my father instead of coming to me directly."

"Do you think he wants to be emperor?"

Crispa raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't everybody?"

Corvus scowled to have his own words thrown back at him, but he could hardly argue with them. "Bring him by the house. I'd like to meet him."

"Why?" Crispa looked suspicious.

Corvus shrugged. "Like you said, we may turn out to be political allies. His father's a powerful general. My father's a powerful general. And there's a one-in-six chance I could end up married to his sister. I imagine it's high time we were introduced."

"I didn't think you liked Vitula very much."

"Who I like may have very little to do with who I marry," said Corvus. In truth, Vitula Rufius had been close to the bottom of his list, but as a matter of form, he would have to call on her at least once. And who knew? Maybe they'd just gotten off on the wrong foot.

"There's that ... dance thing the night after tomorrow," Crispa offered. "I could ask him to join us for that."

"Sounds good." Corvus rose from his seat, leaving the food and wine all but untouched.

Crispa took his cue, rising as well. "Do you think I could borrow Clover again tonight? I could send Sunya over."

Corvus shook his head and kissed her on the cheek. "I promised Alyse that Clover wouldn't leave my rooms until Plautus went back to Europe."

"Shit," muttered Crispa. "I forgot."

Corvus smiled and raised an eyebrow. "There is a solution, you know. You could just stay."

It might be a solution to the current problem, but not to the larger one and Crispa shook her head sadly. "I would love to."

Corvus cupped her cheek and kissed her softly. "So, do it. Forget about this Atellus and come to bed with us."

Crispa shook her head and put on a brave face, but she looked close to tears. "I can't. And you shouldn't tempt me. He would make a lot more trouble for you than he would for me."

And then she kissed him and the kiss seemed to abnegate everything she'd said. Corvus held her close, cupping her head to his, not letting the kiss end, trying to will her to stay and forget about everything but what they should have done at least a little bit sooner. For a time, it seemed like she might. She melted into him and kissed like she couldn't breathe on her own. But in the end she dragged herself away, gave him a sad smile and her kimono a composure smoothing before speaking. "I really do need to go. If I don't make it back before Alyse gives her report, let me know what she says, please."

Clover was kneeling by the bed when Corvus stepped into his room. She'd done some magic to make any sign of previous activity disappear. Her hair was brushed, her face composed and lightly made-up. The white silk robe looked like a wedding night trousseau instead of a morning-after-the-wedding one, more sexy in what she would do than what she had.

With the day he'd just been through - the small triumphs, the missteps, all capped by Crispa's rejection of his too-late proposition - Corvus wanted to fall on Clover and use her body like a musical instrument on which he could play out his joy and his lamentation. He wanted to strip her naked, throw her on the bed, and fuck her until he was too exhausted to keep his eyes open. It would have nothing to do with Clover and, even if she knew that, she would open to him and give him every last bit of herself without protest. Maybe because of that, he didn't. He started unbuttoning his own shirt before she could reach out to help him.

"Get Rose. I'm going to want both of you tonight."

He was naked by the time they returned - his beautiful dark-haired, dark-skinned girl in her pristine white robe and fair, blonde Rose in the black silk with the red flowers. He nodded at them. "Get undressed and get on the bed."

They did, each untying the belt and sliding the robe off the other in a way that managed to be quick without being at all perfunctory. Clover and Rose were slaves and they would comply with what they were told, but there could be a world of difference in how some slaves complied compared to others. Rose had a sly sensuality in the way she ran her fingertips over Clover's collarbones as she drew down her lover's robe. It suggested she was enjoying this as much as anyone else involved. Clover's eyes held Corvus's as she stripped Rose naked and, when he smiled at what he saw, she smiled too, pleased to have pleased him.

They knelt on either side of the wide bed, leaving Corvus to crawl up from the foot until he was between them and drawing them in against his chest. Their arms went around each other's shoulders allowing them to draw closer to each other and to him.

He kissed Clover deeply, then moved on to Rose. He stroked Rose's long blonde hair and looked her in the eyes. "Kneel at the head of the bed, take Clover's wrists, and pin them above her head. Don't let them go."

There was no hesitation. Rose gave one of her wicked smiles and did as she was told. Clover stretched herself out on her back, hands raised over her head. There was no fear in her eyes or worry or anything that suggested Corvus could ever do anything that would make her want to serve him less. He hoped he wasn't violating that promise tonight.

Leaning over Clover, he kissed Rose again, kissed her mouth, her cheek, the crook of her neck. He kissed across her shoulder and down her arm. He kissed across the back of her hands where they held Clover's wrists to the soft, light underside of Clover's arms.

He kept his kisses feather-light, his need a slow burn in the pit of his stomach, fueled by Clover's sighs and the way each breath she took came a little faster than the last. Corvus timed his kisses with each inhalation, working his way down her arm.

When he placed a kiss in the juncture between arm and shoulder, Clover gave a little shiver. Corvus stayed there for the space of five breaths and placed one kiss for each before moving along her shoulder to the crook of her neck. As he honed in there, Clover gave a quiet, little gasp. Each kiss made her body a little more liquid. Her feet shifted like they were slowly seeking purchase on the silken sheets. She twisted her waist, rocking softly from side to side as if she were trying to keep her balance.

"May I assist?"

Corvus raised his head to see desire dancing in her eyes. He hadn't planned to, but heard himself asking, "Tell me where Clover likes to be kissed ... how to touch her to give the most pleasure."

"Sir?" Clover raised her head to look at him. She smiled, but her smile seemed less certain than it usually was. "There is pleasure in all service."

"I know. What I want to know is what feels good on its own - when you take service out of the equation."

The hint of confusion that had appeared on Rose's face disappeared behind one of her trademark wicked smiles. "I could show you."

"Later. Right now, a verbal description will suffice. I want to try it myself first."

The smile faded to what Corvus was starting to identify as "slave-face" - a placid smile that seemed warm and welcoming if you didn't examine it too closely and eyes that didn't really focus on you or anything else. "Of course."

Corvus chuckled darkly and stroked Rose's cheek. "I know what that means. What's on your mind, Rose?" He saw her trying to formulate an answer. "Just tell me. I won't punish you if I don't like it ... First thing in your head?"

"I ... don't understand what you want," Rose blurted out. "I mean ... I know what you're asking me to do, but I don't understand why. Would you like to play at being a slave? I've seen it done."

"Rose..." Clover warned.

"Hush. I'm not naming names."

Corvus wondered how common such class-play was. He might have found the idea odd if the night before he hadn't pretended to be a plebeian again and asked Sunya to act the citizen as well. It had made perfect sense at the time.

He shook his head. "No. I just want us to be us tonight - Corvus the newly-minted patrician learning what pleasures his slave, Clover." He gave Rose what he hoped matched her own wicked smiles. "You're next. But it will have to wait for another night. It's already very late."

"I..." Clover started to say before clamping her mouth shut. When Corvus nodded and ordered her to speak, she asked, "Am I being punished?"

Corvus raised an eyebrow. "With pleasure?"

Clover shook her head. "No. That's not what I mean."

Corvus waited for her to gather her thoughts, but it was Rose who spoke. "We just ... would hate to see you diminish yourself."

"Explain."

"It's a riddle we were taught in the creche: what do you call someone who serves a slave?"

Corvus frowned. "What's the answer?"

Rose shook her head. "There is no answer. The empire serves the emperor. Citizens serve the empire. Slaves serve the citizens. No man or woman can fall so low that they serve a slave."

"So, what do you call it when you're with Clover - just the two of you and you give her pleasure?"

"That's just sex." Rose answered a hint too quickly for it to be the whole truth.

Corvus grinned and kissed Rose again. "And is it permissible for me to have sex with my slaves as I see fit?"

"Of course. Everything is permissible." Rose's smile was real, if still uncertain. "What power you have that the empire doesn't require is yours to spend as you please."

Corvus knew what the phrase "spending your power" meant, but was surprised to hear it from Rose. Hundreds of years ago, near the end of the Northward Expansion, there had been an attempt to get young men to stop masturbating with that phrase. Now it was a punchline.

He laughed out loud, kissed Rose, then leaned down and kissed Clover full on the mouth. "Is that what you two are worried about? Rose, Clover, I promise you that giving you pleasure will in no way make me less powerful or leave me diminished in any way. That's ... religious nonsense. There's no science to it."

They still looked doubtful, so Corvus reached down and slid his hand between Clover's thighs in demonstration. She opened herself to him instinctively and he let his fingertips trace over the entrance to her flesh. She closed her eyes and shuddered. Without speaking, Corvus traced the folds and contours of her flesh, seeking the tenderest place. When Clover's hips bucked, he honed in, tracing and teasing.

"Rose, I want you to tell me the moment you see me start to get shorter."

"Shorter?" Rose tilted her head.

Corvus nodded and continued to tease Clover's sex. "Shorter ... or skinnier, any loss of muscle tone will do. The first sign of diminishment, just call it out so I know when to stop."

"I ... don't think it works like that," ventured Rose as Clover stifled a cry of pleasure.

Corvus nodded thoughtfully as he climbed past one of Clover's legs to kneel between them. "What is the mechanism of diminishment, then? How do I lose power by doing this?"

Rose looked pained and Corvus was keenly aware that he was pushing her comfort envelope. He didn't want to torment her the way he'd inadvertently tormented Clover with Alyse's help. But he didn't want to live with dogmatic absurdity and slave logic either. Finally, she said, "Other citizens won't respect you."

Corvus's eyes flashed as he drew Clover's legs over his shoulders and kissed the inside of one knee. It raised a fresh shudder. "You like being kissed there?"

Clover closed her eyes and nodded, a tear running down her cheek. Corvus looked up at Rose. "Where else?"

"Up the inner thighs," said Rose immediately. "The ... lower belly."

Corvus kissed a little higher. "Do you think they'll be able to see it on me - these other citizens? Will they be able to look at me and tell I kissed Clover there?"

"I don't know."

Corvus kissed higher again. "I don't think they can. I've met a lot of citizens and I've never seen any signs of thigh-kissing." Another experimental kiss and he added, "I've even met Cato Decius, a patrician who lets slave-boys fuck him in the ass and seen not the first sign of it when I look at him."

"Do you respect Cato Decius?" Rose asked.

"Well, no," admitted Corvus. "But it has nothing to do with who he lets put what where. It's how he spends the rest of his time doing nothing but seeking his own pleasure that makes him less than respectable. If he did something worthwhile during the day, I would respect him no matter how he spent his nights."

Corvus switched to the other thigh, kissing higher. Rose said, "Do you know any powerful men who seek to pleasure their slaves? I don't."

"I haven't asked," admitted Corvus. Clover's whole body shuddered around him as he pinched her clit between two fingers. "But even if they don't, I think you have the causality backwards. The powerful men of New Rome have some sort of disease that makes them think that no one below their station matters - slaves, plebes, women - the vast majority of the world, really. Can you read, Rose?"

Rose was taken aback by the question, but nodded. "I can."

Corvus kissed high on Clover's thigh. "There are some things I want you to read - some key works of science and philosophy. You have a good head on your shoulders and, while I think I understand why they teach slaves what they do, but a lot of it is pure nonsense. It may serve most, but you're stronger than most. You should know the truth."

"To what end?"

Corvus raised his head, still drawing his fingers in and out of Clover. "Well, for starters, I've forgotten about half of what I've learned and not thought hard enough about most of the rest, so you could help me review it, but I also want you to understand it."

"Will it help me serve better?"

"I don't think it will help with your duties in this room, but it will help you be my trusted advisor - like Malcolm is to my father, but maybe less ... whatever Malcolm is."

Rose smiled. "I will do as you ask."

"Good." Corvus drew his fingers out of Clover and placed a kiss on her sex, his tongue seeking and finding where his fingers had blazed a path. Clover cried out and bucked against him. As he proceeded, she arched her back and writhed, her whole body winding tighter with pleasure. Corvus couldn't see, but he knew she strained against Rose's hands on her wrists. He felt her pleasure rise and rise and explode, only to rise and rise again. With her thighs pressed around his ears, her cries were muffled, but he knew when they grew hoarse. He didn't relent until his jaw started to ache.

When he finally raised his head, Clover's whole body was flushed with pleasure and her cheeks were wet with tears. She didn't look sad, but she still looked confused, like she wasn't sure why this was happening to her. Corvus glided up her body to kiss her mouth and guided his cock inside of her, sliding smoothly. He gripped Rose's wrists and indicated with her eyes that she was to release Clover. His body slave clung to him with arms and legs wrapped fiercely around him, nails clawing his back and shuddering with each thrust. She came hard and came again before Corvus's own climax engulfed him.

Corvus knew Clover didn't really understand why he'd done what he'd done and Rose probably didn't either - not yet. It would take time. Still, he kissed Clover softly and looked in her eyes. "I care about you - both of you. If someone injured you, I'd be angry. If you got sick, I'd worry. Serving your pleasure serves my own. I care about both of you and that's not a weakness."

Clover seemed to be searching his eyes for something before she raised her head and placed a soft kiss on his lips, then clung to him again, not moving from that position for a long time.

Corvus stifled a yawn and gestured to a seat at the table as Tansy slipped into his receiving room, closing the door behind her. She came to the table, becoming Alyse with each step, sat down and reached for the coffee pot. Corvus gestured. "The coffee's laced with guarana this morning. Drink accordingly."

Alyse poured herself a full cup. "I can use it. Tansy didn't get a lot of sleep last night."

"Neither did I." Corvus saw the question in Alyse's eyes as he sipped his own coffee. "Studying."

It was true enough. He'd dozed off after sex with Clover, but woken again to his two slaves touching each other and speaking in low voices a couple of hours later. He'd again asked Rose to explain what gave Clover pleasure and Rose had complied with words and examples. At first, Clover had accepted it with that same confused-concerned look in her eyes, but something Rose whispered had made her giggle and after that, she seemed to accept it as some sort of game and even answered some of Corvus's questions herself.

Both girls were sleeping so soundly that he managed to slip out of the bed, dress himself, and leave a copy of Brianus Metallicus and Caesar Mauritius's seminal "Principles of Scientific Inquiry" in the small of Rose's back without waking them.

"The Widow Iunius asked me to tell you she wouldn't be joining us this morning and that she would rely on you to tell her any part of my report she needs to know," offered Alyse.

"You talked to her last night?" Corvus asked, surprised.

"She sent one of her slaves to summon Tansy to bring her a sleeping draught." Alyse informed him. Her tone was crisp, but Corvus could hear a little bit of irritation boiling up from underneath.

"I'll ... let her know that was unwise," Corvus promised. "I can't promise she won't do it again, though. Crispa can be unpredictable."

He sipped his own laced coffee. Like most of his peers, he'd tried other stimulants to get him through high school, but settled on coffee with guarana as his means of getting through all-nighters and the long days afterwards. "What did she ask you?"

"A lot of questions about Atellus Rufius and his father Barbatus - mostly questions she could have had any one of her slaves retrieve from the peerage database." Her hands were moving, gathering food to her plate without really looking at it. "Is there some trouble between you and the widow I should know about?"

"Nothing new. Our relationship is the same it was yesterday and the week before that," said Corvus. "Why do you ask?"

"She came home late from your rooms ... agitated."

"Crispa wanted to borrow Clover last night. I had to refuse because of your request I keep her here during the ambassador's visit." Corvus wasn't sure why he didn't volunteer anything about his failed proposition except that he didn't want to. "How was she agitated?"

"Pacing, nervous, asking questions and then taking them back. You didn't ... dismiss her last night, then ... as your mistress?"

"She's not my mistress. She's never been my mistress," said Corvus. "I would have liked her to become my mistress, but she has a suitor to contend with now before we can proceed."

He ate and drank then, giving Alyse time to decide what she wanted to say next, but Alyse seemed to know the same trick and they got through most of breakfast before Corvus broke the silence. "Is there something on your mind outside of what I hired you for, Alyse?"

She finished pouring herself another cup of coffee before answering. "Do you want my opinion on the Widow Iunius?"

Corvus nodded. "I want to know what you know about the whole situation. I hired you to spy on her father, but I have no doubt she's a part of whatever he's up to."

"I think she's taking her courtship by Atellus Rufius seriously - or at least wants me to think she is so I'll report it back to you. The questions she asked me last night weren't about how to get rid of him. They could much more easily be construed to be asking what kind of prospect he was as a possible husband."

Corvus didn't want to believe it, but that hardly meant it wasn't true. He would let it bother him when he had some time to himself. Right now he asked, "Which do you think it was? Is she seriously considering marrying him or was it all an act that she wanted you to report back to me?"

"It could be both. Maybe she wants something from you, but if you're not willing to offer it, she has Atellus as a fallback. She seems interested in whether or not he could ever be proconsul."

Corvus imagined the questions she would have asked about that and knew how easy it would be for the answers to those questions to help answer as well how high Atellus could rise and if he might one day be emperor.

"Thank you for letting me know ... and for your counsel. Let me hear your report on Plautus Iunius's movements and contacts yesterday."

Nearly as soon as she started talking, Corvus had questions. "Who arranged this meeting - Plautus or Atellus Rufius?"

"If either did, they did it before Plautus returned to the capital. We've been watching him the whole time. They had no contact until Atellus showed up on the front step and requested a meeting."

"And who suggested a marriage between Atellus and Crispa?"

Alyse gave a faint head-shake. "Neither. Atellus asked for Plautus's blessing to court Crispa. Her father can't really compel her to marry again. She's done her duty to the empire.

Corvus didn't bother to educate Alyse on the complicated financial relationship between Crispa and her father. He'd called his solicitor from the office yesterday to investigate its nature and while he'd gotten an answer, he didn't understand it entirely himself. "Did they talk politics?"

"In general terms - catching up on news. Plautus complimented Atellus on his father's rise to the military governorship of the upper and lower interior, but otherwise it was just current events. Both of them speak like men who are accustomed to assuming they're always under surveillance, so it's hard to know when they're passing subtext between them."

Corvus nodded and filed the information away. "Proceed."

"After their meeting, Plautus Iunius called his daughter to arrange to have lunch together. When she arrived..."

"They had lunch together?" Corvus frowned. "What was that like?"

"Awkward. Mostly, Plautus brought up topics and Crispa refused to talk about them. When he brought up Atellus Rufius, she accused him of trying to ruin her life and he was quick to explain that he hadn't approached Rufius and was only passing along a message, but that he approved of Atellus Rufius. There's not a lot of warmth between father and daughter."