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Still, there were others, surrounding us as they had done in the circus. I shot magic toward the men closest to Aurelia and Livia, throwing the Praetors back almost as far as the Pantheon. Despite the danger here, it felt good to use magic again, like I had been crippled and finally could walk again.
I ran to Aurelia and Livia, and said, "You two must go together. I'll find you when it's safe."
Livia shook her head. "Let's all leave together."
"I can't let them take Radulf." Even now, he was shouting curses at them as they bound his hands and feet in chains. "I can't let them win."
"After all he's done to you?" Aurelia asked. "He'd leave you behind if they got you first."
"No, he wouldn't." I was firm on that point.
"You are playing into their hands," Aurelia yelled. "With your mother, with Radulf. You are doing everything they want you to do!"
Which was probably true. But no other choice was acceptable.
Aurelia grabbed my hands and looked down at them as if she could feel the sizzle of magic inside me. When she met my eyes again, she asked, "Let's do what you want, Nic. Let's leave Rome, you and Livia." She swallowed hard. "And me."
I felt her words like a press on my heart, but only because I had to refuse her the very thing I most wanted. "Get Livia to safety," I mumbled. "I'll find you as soon as I can."
Then I lit a line of flame away from us, forcing everyone nearby to back away from it. The fire immediately burned out, leaving Livia and Aurelia a clear path to run from the area. Though where they would go next, I did not know.
I would find them soon. But first, I had a job to do.
More Praetors were arriving now, some of them on horses and one with a wagon of iron bars. That's where they'd p
ut Radulf, and perhaps where they planned to put me. Well, they'd never get me in there. Never.
I whispered to the horses carrying the Praetors and sent it through the morning breeze. Responding to my words, they bucked hard, throwing every man off his horse. The men landed on the stone road, confused at what had caused their animals' disloyalty.
"You all smell very bad!" I shouted to the Praetors. "Perhaps your horses couldn't take it anymore."
Next, I created a shield around me. It was effective, but exhausting, more tiring than I had remembered, and with my next step, I stumbled to my knees. In my short time without the bulla, I had lost most of my strength to use magic.
"Nicolas Calva, we don't wish to fight you."
I looked up and saw Decimas Brutus coming toward me. My hands curled into fists. Maybe he didn't want to fight, but I certainly did.
"Run, you fool!" Radulf yelled, then took a kick to his side for it.
I was nothing if not a fool. He was right about that.
"That girl who just left," Brutus said. "We know who she was before she got her father's fortune. She was a sewer rat, and if you don't cooperate, we'll make her one again."
"You know about sewer rats, then?" I grinned, and used magic to create a hole where the gulf in the road had been. The stench from the exposed sewer rose in the air like a fog.
Brutus stepped backward. "Don't you dare."
Not only did I dare, I was looking forward to it. One by one, I used magic to sweep the Praetors into the sewer, all except for Brutus. Though it was quickly sapping my strength, I held him at the edge of the hole, where he dangled in an uneasy balance. "Where's my mother?" I asked.
Now it was his turn to smile. "What we want is simple. Give us the key to the Malice of Mars and we'll set your mother free. Then you can both walk away and live as free citizens."
That was a lie. They needed me to unlock the Malice, and to use it and the bulla to create a Jupiter Stone. Then they would give it to Diana to succeed in her rebellion against the other gods. That was hardly a simple matter.
Brutus reached his hand toward me. "Give me the key, Nicolas. Give it to me now and be finished with us."
I did not have that cursed key, and my disgust at having to explain that for the hundredth time was punctuated with a blow I sent in a wave of magic. His arms rolled in circles to keep from falling into the sewer gulf.
When he looked up, his eyes had darkened and his anger was so thick that it came at me like a punch to my gut. Still, I held my place and refused to flinch before him.
