Dark Horse

Five

Drifting on her swansdown mattress beneath a damask coverlet scented with rose petals, Claudia dreamed. She dreamed of thumping great lobsters, of crayfish and, of course, those succulent white truffles from the forests on the Istrian mainland, and there was nothing to interrupt her aromatic slumber. In Rome, darkness signalled the opening of the city gates to traffic, and thus there was a rowdy cacophony of rumbling wagons, cracking bullwhips, shouts from the drivers, tavern brawls, the whinnies and neighs of the dray animals and the constant clatter, clack and bang of loading and unloading. In Arcadia there was only silence, broken, perhaps, by the odd creak of settlement, the muffled sound of a door closing, the faint too-woo of an owl in the pinewoods behind the villa.

Nestled into the dip at the base of Claudia's spine, Drusilla, her blue-eyed, cross-eyed, dark Egyptian cat twitched her whiskers and dreamed, too. She dreamed about big fat spiders, crunchy moths and the mice she would torment in the morning.

Peace. Perfect peace. The night was warm, the air pleasant and, together as always, mistress and cat slept, and the three-quarters moon rose in the sky. Far away, a fox barked, and a nightjar churred on the wing.

Fire!

A sixth sense alerted her, even before her throat prickled with the distinctive tang of burning. Claudia swung her legs over the side of the bed, stubbing her heel in the dark on its bronze foot. Like every room of this single-storey villa, hers had double doors opening outwards. Throwing open the shutters, she saw that, less than a hundred paces from the house, flames were licking through the roof of a small building raised on vermin-thwarting stilts.

Leo's grain store.

With a low howl from the back of her throat, Drusilla shot behind the chair.

'FIRE!' Claudia shouted.

Croesus! Nobody heard! She cupped her hands round her mouth.

'Fire in the grain store!'

No good. People were in too deep a sleep. She drew a deep breath to yell her lungs out when something caught her eye in the moonlight. There, on the steps. Squinting through the swirling smoke, she tried to make out the twisting shape. Wrong. Not one shape. Those were two separate figures, writhing together on the narrow stone stairs. Bugger. That's all we need. A private war while an inferno rages!

Decisions, decisions.

Raise the alarm? Or stop the fight before the fire spreads?

Racing across the flagstones in her bare feet, Claudia covered her mouth against the choking fumes and questioned the intelligence which made two grown men scuffle on the steps while the whole damn corn supply went up in flames behind them.

'Hey!'

They couldn't hear for the crackle of the flames.

'Hey! ' she called, louder. 'Stop that!'

From the corner of her eye she saw movement in the bushes. Praise be to Juno, the cavalry was here!

'Come on,' she called, 'we've got to stop those two and prevent the fire spreading.'

What was this clot waiting for? A bloody medal?

'Well, hurry, then!'

The figure in the bushes backed away. Oh, suit yourself. Spinning round, she raced on down the path. Two seconds later, she heard heavy footsteps thumping behind her. About bloody time! The footsteps were gaining. Even better. Stronger muscles to break up the fight.

'What the hell?'

Shit! The muscles were strong, all right. They'd clamped round her in a bear hug.

'Not me, you idiot. Them.'

But the vice was tightening. Breathing, heavy in her ear. _He tried to wriggle her arms free, but the lock was tight.

'Let me go, you bastard!' Squirming, kicking, Claudia tried to wrestle herself out of his grasp. 'Let go of me!'

The air was being squeezed out from her lungs. She couldn't scream. Could hardly breathe. She tried to dig her elbows back, but there was no room for manoeuvre. What the hell was going on? Was he trying to prevent her breaking up the fight? Or was the motive more personal? Rape?

'I'll kill you for this,' she hissed, kicking backwards with her heels. 'Your life won't be worth a-'

The alarm horn blew then — long, low and piercing — and instantly every dog on the estate began barking. As though this was a signal, the grip broke and she found herself tipping forwards through thin air. She put out her hands to break the fall, yelped as her knee grazed the flagstone. Then a shadow fell across the path. Glancing up, she heard a whooshing sound, caught a faint scent of cinnamon, saw something dark scything towards her.

Suddenly a thousand stars exploded in her head.

And this time, when Claudia Seferius toppled forward, she didn't get up.