Rome: The Emperor's Spy: Rome 1 by M. C. Scott

the fringes of the team who would have given themselves to Ajax in a moment, had he but asked.
    He had never asked any of them, and Math had thought that women were not his interest until Hannah had arrived, carrying stillness as a gift that gave ease to the driver and his team in a way no one else could do.
    It was for this, her gift of tranquillity and the way she lit Ajax’s eyes, that the team had loved her first. Soon, though, it became clear that Hannah was a healer of a different stamp from those who customarily served the citizens of Coriallum.
    Not ten days before, she had tended one of the younger colts who had gone down with colic, giving him a drench that brought him right within the day. Since then, the entire team had wooed her, not just Ajax, hanging on her every word, running to answer her every need, in the urgent hope that she might cleave to them and not the other teams, that she might keep their horses and their driver in racing fitness at least until the emperor’s contest had been won.
    They wouldn’t win, of course, they all realized that as soon as they saw the magistrate’s new horses, but they all knew, also, that a good second would do. It was Math’s heart’s dream to race a chariot before the emperor – and win – or it had been before he met Pantera. Now, he needed to think about that, to weigh his heart and its dreams, and to do that he needed to be alone.
    Hannah was there, close and warm and still, like a forest pool on a summer’s river. The barn was lit only by the stars, and those were faint. Math could barely see her; no more than a wave of black hair falling like smoked silk from her high, clear brow, and the straight nose beneath it.
    Her face was near his, peering in the dark.
    ‘Math, what’s the matter? What happened to your cheek? Did one of your men hit you? Did you cut a purse and someone caught you?’
    Hannah was a breath of fresh air in many ways, not least of which was her quiet acceptance of what he did and why. And she was good with the horses, too, nearly as good as his mother had been. Nobody else, except possibly Ajax, could have crouched down now as she was doing, almost between Sweat’s two back feet, to look into the warm nest Math had made for himself in the straw. The colt fidgeted, stamping his foot, but he did not try to kick her head to a pulp, or rip her scalp from her skull with his teeth.
    She was close to Math now, sharing his huddle of straw. Her forefinger had stroked once down his cheek, feeling the wet, and she had said nothing. His mother would have done such a thing; noting the tears but not having to name them.
    Thickly, Math said, ‘You shouldn’t come in here. Your hair’ll smell of horse piss when you go.’
    ‘Really?’ She took his hand and squeezed it and he saw the flash of her smile in the warm, damp dark. ‘I’ve probably smelled of nothing else since I first came to look at your colt ten days ago.’
    She didn’t. She smelled of wood smoke and warm hair, of wool and belt-leather and woman-sweat that was quite different from the sweat of men. The temptation to bury himself in her arms was like a thirst on a hot day. He supposed Ajax felt the same. The thought gave him strength to resist.
    She felt the change in him as he edged away, and the clenching of his fist. Tentatively, her two hands wrapped round his one.
    ‘Math, what have you got? Can I see?’
    After a moment’s hesitation, he uncurled his fingers. She picked up the coin by feel.
    ‘It’s a denarius,’ he said, but she already knew that. She wasn’t rich; she might have hailed from Rome’s breadbasket, but if she had brought any of its wealth with her when she left, it was all in her head. Like everyone in the team, she owned the tunic she wore every day and a silver belt buckle. Beyond that, and the linen sack with its bandages and unguents, dried herbs and the five nested copper bowls for washing of wounds, she had come to the race barns with nothing and