Chapter XXIII Felix
Chapter XXIII
FELIX
T he finality of what Felix had done didn’t crash down on him in the alley. Nor when he watched from the shadows as the horses rode out. Not even when he stepped into the street and stared at the road until his eyes burned from the sun.
It sank in when he turned, nerves raw, to find Darius leaning against a column, arms folded, sword still sheathed because there would be no fight. He wore the smug expression of an eavesdropper who just learned he won.
‘If your intention was to leave an impression,’ Darius said, ‘I imagine he won’t forget you anytime soon.’
‘Good,’ said Felix evenly. ‘Means he won’t return.’
‘Our agreement was that you could see your friends off. Make sure my master upheld his end of the bargain. If you’re satisfied, he’ll want you back now.’ Darius’s hand came to rest on the pommel of his gladius.
No, there wouldn’t be a fight. Felix had made himself valuable. Too much hinged on his life now. Darius couldn’t kill him so long as Servius intended to make use of the helmet. But that didn’t mean Felix had to stop ruining Darius’s day.
He sneered, slipped past Darius and sprinted into the thick of traffic, dragging out his final moments of freedom before he became Servius’s tool for good.
Running felt good. Felt normal in a week of anything but.
Felix wove between carts and stalls, slid between conversations, let himself melt into the buzz of a restless city.
He dodged rubble, leaped over piles of bricks, ignored the shout of a shopkeeper when Felix disrupted his pile of swept plaster.
He ran until his senses cleared, until he hopped onto the kerb and looked back and no longer saw Darius’s flushed purple fury chasing behind.
Any normality running brought was tainted with one simple fact: he had nowhere to go.
More than once he caught himself slipping into history, triggered by passing something he recognised, but these weren’t frayed threads from boyhood.
These memories were ropes, binding him to the city in knots he’d never unpick.
Nonna’s bakery, closed for repairs. The street leading to Livia’s shop.
The crossing stones where Felix had dragged . . .
He bit his tongue, tasted the salty wash of blood. Don’t dwell. That was another of his rules. But he found it increasingly impossible to stay in the moment when the only future he’d ever wanted rode far from Pompeii.
Halfway up the Via Stabiana, he halted his trajectory towards the Vesuvius gate at the far end. Running to it would prove a waste of energy, and attempting escape would break his deal with Servius – the consequences of which would harm more than just Felix.
Static amplified, shaking the inside of his skull – the city’s hum intensifying. He changed course, veering left, and followed the alleys to the only place he had left.
Elias was lounging like a cat on the brothel stoop. When Felix slowed his jog, Elias stretched languidly. Lazy eyes half-lidded, he acted impervious to the commotion gripping the rest of the city, though his shoulders carried an uncharacteristic slump .
‘Welcome home, Fox,’ Elias said. ‘In all honesty, I didn’t expect to see you again. Thought you and Loren left town yesterday.’
The name prodded a bruise. ‘We did. Now I’m back.’
‘Clearly.’ Elias looked him over. ‘And he is . . .’
Impressive how only a few words into the conversation, Felix already regretted his choice to come here.
Fatigue weighed on him. Spending the hours between dawn and the quake negotiating with Servius for scraps had worn him ragged.
Sparring verbal rounds with tricky-talking Elias would shred what was left.
But he needed somewhere to collect himself. Darius would find him here soon enough, but first, Felix wanted proof that any of this had happened at all.
When he made to skirt past Elias, fingers gripped his ankle tight. ‘Where is he?’
Felix kicked free. ‘Why should I know?’
‘Because,’ Elias said, rising until their faces were a fraction apart, and Felix smelled wine on his breath. ‘You left with him yesterday. Now you return alone.’
‘He’s weepy. I grew tired of listening.’
‘Liar.’
‘And he’s easy. I got what I wanted.’
‘Liar.’ A hand landed on Felix’s shoulder, nails digging into flesh. ‘If you wanted easy, you’d have come to me.’
‘You’re expensive.’
Elias snorted. ‘My rates are reasonable. Practically charity.’
‘I ditched him,’ Felix said. ‘Returned the helmet. It’s better this way. For me, at least.’
‘I believe that.’ Elias scrutinised him, but not the way Loren tried to read Felix, as a text worthy of careful study.
Elias read him like a piece of vulgar graffiti, looking for confirmation of what he already knew.
After a moment, he relaxed his grip, and Felix beelined for the stairs. ‘Where are you going now?’
‘Somewhere far from this shithole town,’ Felix called over his shoulder. ‘If you were smart, you would leave, too.’
On the second-floor landing, Loren’s door stood slightly ajar. Felix hesitated before pushing it further.
It swung to reveal chaos, as though a storm had coursed through the newly broken shutters and turned everything over.
Linens were stripped from the narrow bed, mattress slashed, straw scattered in tufts.
The trunk of personal items had been broken into, contents strewn.
Clothes torn, winter boots missing their soles.
Shreds of papyrus, the scrap of The Iliad , stirred in the draft.
This hadn’t been a search. This was a threat. This said, You cannot hide from us .
Felix took a cautious step in, and something crunched under his sandal. Fragments of a jar. He picked up a shard stamped with a familiar emblem, the Lassius crest. Same as the signet ring he’d wrested off his finger and returned to . . .
Clay clattered back to the floor. Why had Felix come here? Sentiment? Had he thought he’d find something to cling to wherever Servius dragged him next?
Fuck that. Felix kicked a pile of straw and it burst into a cloud. It didn’t make him feel better. Emotion swelled in his chest, bitter, bleak grief. Standing in the room made his skin crawl. When he left, he slammed the crooked door.
Elias glowered from the bottom of the stairs. For a moment, Felix considered turning back, testing his luck with the drop from the window. It wasn’t too far. He would survive. Probably.
‘I forgot to mention,’ Elias started before Felix could escape, ‘some intimidating men dropped by yesterday. Wanted to speak to him. ’
‘So I noticed. What did you tell them?’
Elias’s lip curled. ‘That a private room costs extra.’
‘I imagine they didn’t like that.’
‘Neither did the landlord when he shouted at me for spoiling potential business.’ He pulled the armhole of his baggy tunic to the side to show off an impressive purple splotch along his ribs. ‘Worth the bruise.’
So this was what Darius had done after losing the chase in the vineyard. He stalked Loren’s trail around town, bullied his friends and destroyed everything he treasured.
‘Before, when I said . . .’ Felix swallowed hard. The hum pierced now, a spike through his skull. ‘I meant it when I told you to leave.’
‘And go where?’
‘Anywhere.’
‘With you?’
Felix took his time descending the stairs. ‘You wouldn’t like where I’m heading.’
‘If it’s all the same, then, I’ll stay. Some of us have jobs. Another month and I’ll have saved enough to leave on my terms.’
‘Suit yourself.’ He tried not to shoulder-check Elias on his way to the door.
‘It isn’t too late, you know.’ Something in Elias’s tone made Felix hesitate.
Glance back. Elias wasn’t facing him; he was still staring at the landing.
He said nothing for so long that Felix wondered if he intended to speak at all.
Then, ‘He taught me to read. And the little girl who follows him, what’s her name? ’
‘Aurelia.’ It came out raspy.
‘What I’m trying to say is, if you let him go, you’ll never find another like him. So think about that, before you leave. It isn’t too late.’
It is too late , he didn’t say, thinking of Loren’s splintered expression in the alley, when Felix weaponised his own words at him.
He thought of all he’d traded away in the hours before, agreeing to Servius’s calculated terms. He thought of the helmet, and the cataclysmic visions, and the churning in his gut that confirmed – It was far, far too late.
Felix said nothing. Instead, he ran away, like he always did.
Once he’d left the brothel, he didn’t bother keeping an eye out for Darius.
He would catch Felix eventually. Still, Felix ran fruitlessly, dragging out the chase as long as possible.
He almost pretended he was exploring a new city.
Getting to know it from the inside out. Taking it in for the first and last time.
Especially so, in the case of Pompeii.
The Forum bustled with its late-morning crowd, those too stubborn – or oblivious – to have fled after the latest quake.
Felix crossed to the centre and stood still.
Townsfolk parted around him, all with their lives and businesses and priorities.
Repairs were already in progress, workers toiling in the high heat.
Across the way, a shingle, shaken loose, separated from the roof of Apollo’s temple and smashed on cobblestone.
Commotion buried the sound of its shatter.
No one stopped to notice the ragged street boy watching. No one saw Felix at all.
A fight broke out at a shoemaker’s stall, voices shouting and fists flying.
Somewhere, a child cried. Another shingle broke free.
The noises compounded, pushing each nerve in Felix’s body.
From the offices exited a gaggle of councilmen, bickering in their bright white togas.
Taxes, games. One man insulted another, but these were proper gentlemen, and only the lower classes fought.
The men laughed it off, then went their separate ways.