Chapter 8 - THE SECRET UNDER THE PALACE
Marcus explained everything that night.
Nine years earlier, before his arrest, he had hidden the emperor's original will and Cassian's letters inside a sealed chamber beneath the old palace temple.
Only three people knew how to enter.
Marcus.
Darius.
And Varro.
Lucan stared at him.
“Varro knows?”
“He knows the chamber exists.”
“But he doesn't know how to open the final vault.”
“How do you open it?”
Marcus looked at the golden ring Mara had carried for nine years.
“With that.”
The royal seal was not merely a symbol.
It was a key.
Lucan looked toward Rome.
“Then we go back.”
Marcus almost laughed.
“Cassian has twenty thousand soldiers.”
“We don't need twenty thousand.”
Lucan pointed at the documents spread across the table.
“We need the truth.”
Darius leaned forward.
“The boy is right.”
Marcus looked around.
“If we enter Rome secretly, reach the vault, and reveal the evidence publicly…”
“The people turn against Cassian,” Mara finished.
Marcus shook his head.
“Or we all die before reaching the palace.”
Lucan looked at Umbra.
“We already escaped an arena.”
Marcus smiled.
“You definitely got that from your mother.”
Mara raised an eyebrow.
“No, he didn't.”
They developed a plan.
The next morning, Marcus publicly announced his surrender.
Cassian's spies carried the news back to Rome.
But the man traveling openly toward the capital wearing Marcus's armor was Darius.
The real Marcus traveled through old aqueduct tunnels with Mara, Lucan, Elias, and Umbra.
Two days later, they reached the city.
Rome had changed.
Soldiers stood on every corner.
Posters declared Marcus a traitor.
Another proclamation offered a thousand gold pieces for Lucan.
Elias stared at it.
“You're expensive.”
Lucan shrugged.
“I've never had more than three copper coins.”
They entered the old aqueduct after midnight.
Marcus led them beneath the palace.
The tunnels became narrower.
Finally, they reached a stone wall.
Marcus pressed the golden ring into a small eagle-shaped opening.
Something clicked.
The wall moved.
Behind it was a chamber.
Lucan's heart pounded.
Marcus lit a lamp.
A stone chest sat in the center.
“We found it.”
Then applause came from behind them.
Slow.
Mocking.
Varro stepped from the darkness.
Twenty soldiers followed.
“Thank you, Marcus.”
Marcus drew his sword.
Varro smiled.
“I've spent nine years looking for this room.”
Lucan looked at his father.
Varro hadn't followed them.
He had been waiting.
Someone had betrayed them.
Varro's eyes moved toward Darius's absent place in the group.
Then he smiled.
“Did you really think your old friend volunteered to be captured?”
Marcus's face changed.
“No.”
May you like
Varro laughed.
“Darius works for the king.”
