Virgin Territory by Marilyn Todd

describing frantic parabolas overhead.
    ‘Tsee!’ Selfish creatures. Totally disinterested in other people’s problems. ‘Tsee!’ They swooped and soared and flew on.
    Tuesday, the morning after the alleyway incident, Claudia made the rounds to see who might be sailing west and secured eight passages on the Pomona, a merchant galley prepared to drop them off at Fintium. With Syracuse bursting at the seams with army veterans, Fabius had been as happy as a pig in a ditch and she’d had to prize him away in the end.
    ‘I thought you wanted to mark time,’ he’d said petulantly, trying to fathom out why his belongings were sitting in a heap at the bottom of a gangplank.
    ‘What on earth for?’ The mast was being stepped, it wasn’t long now.
    ‘Why didn’t you wait for their eyes to open?’
    Another good sign, the oarsmen were boarding.
    ‘Fabius, they’re animals. One doesn’t “mark time” for animals. Do have a care!’ A stream of indignant feathers flew from the bars in the crate his toe had stubbed. ‘Those are our chickens.’
    What have I let myself in for? she wondered. Dammit, they didn’t even feed you on these poky little coastal tubs, you had to provide for yourself!
    Fabius nursed his injured toe. ‘Yesterday you said…’
    Claudia moved to let a stevedore past, his back bowed with the crate on his shoulder. ‘Yesterday I wasn’t expecting to be raped behind the storehouses,’ she snapped.
    ‘You did say only eight places?’ His eyes rested on the red fireball and her pet gorilla haring down the wharf towards them, their progress impeded only slightly by the burden of bedding and provisions. ‘What about Tanaquil?’
    Claudia stepped daintily into the bow and shrugged, her face a picture of innocence as she asked, was it her fault the Pomona was full?
    With Sabina having difficulty negotiating the rail, she offered to hold the blue flagon, but the make-believe Vestal declined with her usual infuriating politeness.
    ‘A talisman, is it? Your good-luck charm?’
    Distracted momentarily, with one foot on the deck boards and the other on the gangplank, Sabina produced one of her rare frowns. ‘Claudia, dear,’ she said in the sort of tone you’d use to a backward child, ‘I keep my soul in it.’
    Such was the impact of the statement that Claudia nearly missed the interchange on the quayside. Fabius, clearly untrustworthy, was in the middle of having a quiet word with the captain, man to man, or in this case coin to coin. Within seconds, Sabina’s new-found friend and her big, ugly brother were hopping merrily aboard. Which, of course, they would, seeing as how the ship was only half-full. Claudia heard teeth gnashing as the oars began to lap, and wasn’t surprised to find they were hers.
    Now, across the Sicilian countryside, yellow and parched from the summer heat, Claudia was watching Collatinus’s workforce making their weary way to the outhouses for their evening meal. She leaned down and pulled on her own sandals. Why did nothing go according to plan?
    Contrary to what she told Fabius, her real reason for leaving Syracuse quickly was business in Agrigentum, and once they’d cleared harbour it was her turn to have a quiet word with the captain. It was at this point she discovered Gaius’s old ox-hide map was less than accurate. Agrigentum, the captain said apologetically, was not on the coast. He could drop her off at the nearby port of Empedocles? Instant calculations decided there might be mileage to be made from Eugenius Collatinus and so as the merchantman struggled against the prevailing headwind, Claudia squinted into the distance, barely able to make out Agrigentum’s honey-coloured walls perched high on the hill.
    Damn!
    The coaster, manned by oars and therefore less impeded by westerlies than ships relying solely on sail, took barely three days to reach Fintium. More, and Claudia might well have been tempted to jump overboard, what with Tanaquil’s incessant chatter