Her last statement was the one that finally rubbed him the wrong way. He wasn't sure whether it was the implication that Ellory, a family member and someone whose opinion ought to count for something, thought poorly of him, or the more direct comparison of himself and Claudius, but it didn't sit well with him.

"Claudius has known Ellory for her entire life, and it never occurred to him to marry her until his father arranged it," Tiberius pointed out. "So I should hardly think she has gained a particularly amorous or devoted husband." Those were the sorts of things that mattered to women, weren't they? Tiberius failed to see what other points of comparison might have come up in which he could possibly be viewed as inferior to Claude. They had exactly the same career, and they were both heirs and independently wealthy, from the same family. The fortune Claudius stood to inherit may have been larger than Tiberius' (may have been; Tiberius wasn't entirely sure how the estate was set to be divided, if at all, between Lucius' numerous children), but that was rather offset, he thought, by the fact that Tiberius already had his fortune, whereas Claudius would be waiting quite a long while before he properly inherited his.