They had traced a semi-circle to the rear of Pompey's Theatre and found themselves facing the old Curia where the original Caesar had met his bloody end a century earlier. The Curia stood purposefully abandoned and left to decay out of penance for its involvement in what the Senate claimed was the shameful murder of the former demi-god. A short distance away from it was an iron gate set within a protective wall that served to shield the theatre grounds from the outside world. To Marcus's stated consternation the gate was slightly ajar, certain that he had pulled it shut behind him when he had hastily left the theatre earlier that evening. Had someone else passed through the gate between then and now, was the brothers’ unspoken question, alarmed by the possible implications if this were true.

  With thoughts of Caesar and the Curia now forgotten, Baecr led the way into an open garden. He knew its layout well, aware that curving paths, rows of shrubs, and low bushes stretched a hundred paces or so to a short flight of steps leading into the theatre-proper. On summer days, he had visited the garden with Vetelia, sheltering together beneath shaded porticos, watching her name and admire the varicoloured flowers arranged in tidy borders running alongside the paths: red and yellow rosa, golden cartha and hyathincus, purple lavendula, and pink acanthus. Back then it had been a place of promenades, parties, and grape-fueled laughter, of other people’s jokes and families with young children—Phoebe included—a prelude to plays and festivals, music and dance. Even he had enjoyed some uncommon happiness there. Now it was sombre and empty, drained of life except their own, its snow-frosted path leading more towards a mausoleum than any place of entertainment.

  Baecr paused in his tracks and lowered his lantern to the ground. Marcus came to stand beside his shoulder. Under a pale light they could make out a series of footprints disturbing the dusting of white, and by their shape appearing to come and go in opposite directions.

  "Curious," Baecr said quietly, seemingly unwilling to disturb the silence around them. "Some of these marks are smaller than the others. Perhaps from a child, or a woman. Why would they be here?”

  "It could be a distortion of the light," Marcus suggested. 

  “I don't think so. See, those prints are larger. From a man's. Yours?” 

  “Whose else?”

  Baecr looked toward the theatre. “The murderer’s obviously. Unless he’s still inside.”

  “Well that’s worrying if he is.” 

  "Or she."

   Raising his lantern, Bacer continued to lead their cautious progress along the path and up the final steps to the building's entrance. Stepping inside they found themselves in near darkness. Marcus led the way holding his lantern out before him. The feeble light glazed over more statues with unmoving eyes, muted witnesses to whoever had passed before. Fortunately for their active imaginations it did not take long to reach the cavea, the usually noise-filled heart of Pompey's theatre, now still and silent as a forgotten grave. Roofless, the cavea lay open to the sky, with moonlight on scattered snow replacing the need for the lantern, its flame dying to a bare flicker. Beneath the white, ethereal glow, they made out rows of stone seats rising upwards on three sides of the cavea. On the fourth side lay the proscenium, a wooden stage for actors to strut upon, giving voice to comedy or tragedy. Behind the proscenium stood the scaena frons, a three-story vertical backdrop with columns, doorways, windows, and pilasters. Within ordered niches, stood the lunar-lit figures of gods, centaurs, nymphs, and other mythical beasts, some in grotesque form, all seemingly glaring down at something unnaturally shaped lying in the centre of the stage. At first, it looked like crumpled sacking left by a careless hand. Closer however Baecr saw it was a strip of faded yellow curtain flecked with white. It was surrounded by a darker stain, haloing what he assumed was poor Hector's shrouded body lying in a ring of violent red.