The Forum pulsed like an open wound, its stone veins crawling with merchants, beggars, senators, slaves. The scent of garum, sweat, and scorched bread curled in the summer air. Bronze windchimes clinked like distant coins. Milo moved among it all like a shadow wrapped in iron.

Even in daylight, the guards kept his leash tight—not with chains, but with eyes. He was a spectacle, a weapon on loan from the ludus, paraded before the games tomorrow. Men stepped aside when he passed. Women looked, then looked away.

He hated the Forum. The noise. The false laughter. The way men in silk robes traded slaves like amphorae.

And then he saw her.

She emerged like a secret cut into the chaos, veiled in ivory and flanked by whispering slave girls. The sun struck her hair like it was spun silk. She moved like she’d never been touched by anything unclean. Like ash would never cling to her.

I didn’t believe in Roman gods. But she was Venus herself.

He stood still. For the first time that day—maybe in years—the roar of the city dulled beneath the thrum of his pulse.

One of her slaves glanced at him, then recoiled. But she didn’t. She looked back.