by Mira Zamin
* * *
She heard their voices before she saw the speakers but her eyelids refused to open. Sand grinding into her legs, she listened. For a moment, she could not understand their words and then she realized that they were not speaking Latin but Gaulish. She had learned the language fluently, for as the daughter of the proconsul of Portus Tarrus in Gaul she knew exactly how important it was to be able to speak the natives’ tongue. Yet, it had remained a skill unused in her arsenal and the words were difficult to summon to her mind.
“Who do suppose she is?” A low, yet girlish voice came from somewhere near Calista’s head. A hand rested on her chest, carefully monitoring the heartbeat. “I can tell you she’s alive though.”
The second voice was quite high-pitched but clearly that of a young boy. “A nymph, or a siren or any number of Roman beasts! Plug your ears sister, lest she bewitch you!”
“I think it is you who have had your ears plugged!” laughed Sister. “Or you would know that women cannot be enchanted by a siren’s song.”
The bantering reminded Calista so forcefully of her relationship with Pyp, that she groaned aloud and then hacked roughly. The shaking aggravated her burned foot...and…she could think no more. She just was. She opened her eyes slowly and saw two fair-haired children with matching dark eyes sitting beside her. They were obviously brother and sister, achieving that similar look that she and Pyp never had. Calista offered up a wordless prayer for his protection to Juno; she was not sure why she chose that goddess.
“Ah, ah, don’t move!” exclaimed the girl as Calista shifted slightly to move out of the slowly rising tide. When she had last awoken, the ground beneath her had only been damp, but now the sea threatened to overwhelm her gasping mouth.
“You need a healer. What happened to that foot? Can you walk?” Seeing Calista’s condition, she answered her own question. “No matter. I will find my older brother and he will carry you up to the healer. Lugurix, stay with her.” The girl dashed through the trembling sand with surprising speed. Once she had disappeared into the trees, Calista sat up gingerly, holding onto the boy’s, Lugurix’s, shoulder for support.
“Are you a nymph?” he asked, his voice breathy with awe.
Tapping her hand in the water, she wiped her face and hands clear of the dark, wet sand and answered truthfully in difficult Gaulish, “Yes…but do not tell…our secret…”
The boy laughed delightedly. “Yes, of course! But why are you here, Lady Nymph?”
“I am…where? Where am I?” Calista asked weakly, but she could feel her voice and mind gaining strength.
Looking past her, at the pockmarked ocean, the boy responded fiercely, “You are in Artiyon, the last free sanctuary from Rome.”
She was surprised, both at his intensity and the fact that this place was not under Roman jurisdiction. Uncertain whether that was a boon or a burden, she did know for sure that on all of the maps of Gaul she has ever seen, she had never spotted such a place, so perhaps the boy was telling the truth.
“Mare Nostrum, or…?” she asked in her rough voice.
The boy looked at her oddly, and then exclaimed, “Why, you’re a Roman, aren’t you? Mare Nostrum. I have heard that is what your lot call this at times.” He gestured towards the rippling water. “Yes, this is it. But are you a nymph, still? I have heard stories of them from the Roman traders who find their way here from time to time.”
“Of course,” she answered. Leaning heavily on Lugurix’s shoulder, she pushed herself upright. Her vision spinning, she would have fallen had it not been for the boy’s quick hand on her back and arm.
“You should wait for Adiega to come and take you. You shouldn’t be standing on that foot, I don’t think. Why, when I broke my foot from falling down a tree, I was forbidden from moving anywhere. This looks much worse than that. Awfully ugly, too.”
She stood on her good foot, but cringed. Her burnt foot still throbbed in time with her heart. The skin was raw and red, and Calista could make out muscle and even bone beneath the white blisters. If that was the top of her foot, she had no desire to see the bottom. It made the scar on her arm from the battle in the attic seem a beauty mark. She closed her eyes. “What is your sister’s name?” she asked, trying to keep her mind off the pain.
“She is Adiega and she is thirteen years old. She is getting married next week! It’s very exciting but she will be moving to a village away from here. Not that I’ll miss her, of course.” He looked offended that Calista would dare insinuate such a thing with her silence.
“And how old are you?” Calista asked through gritted teeth as the world whooshed about her uncomfortably again. Calista put her bad foot down in the sand and regretted it immediately when a million little darts of pain shot through her. She almost swooned at the agony.
“Ten.” The boy continued to chatter. As his stories, concerning topics which were reminiscent of Pyp’s exploits with Maro, began to trail off, Calista prompted him again. However, he exclaimed, “…Look, there is Adiega with our brother Iccaous!” Lugurix pointed to two figures loping in the sand. Calista was thankful for their arrival for she was sure she would have soon fallen down in a dead faint waiting any longer. Suddenly, she felt for her locket, and was thankful to find it secure around her neck with her bulla. For a moment, she thought she had lost them and her heart had dropped through her stomach.
As the man and the girl approached, their relation became evident, yet where the girl had a hardy prettiness about her features, the man was quite plain. Without a word, he gently scooped Calista up.
“We shall take you to the healer,” he said. Calista nodded. She wanted to ask him how long it had been since Atlantis, what had happened there, but she knew it would be foolish. How could he know? Well, she satisfied herself with the thought, at least I am where I need to be. Close enough.
The man carried her to the village healer’s home whom Lugurix eagerly promised was nearly as good as Borvo, the Gaulish god of healing. His sister cuffed his head when he said that. “Careful!” admonished Adiega.
As she was being carried, Calista glanced past the beach and into the town, gleaning information wherever it could be found. It was mid-sized and clearly Gaulish and while it possessed the air of prosperity, the streets remained unpaved. It was a fight against herself to keep conscious.
Iccauos gently lay her down on the bed of hay on the floor of the healer’s home and he and Lugurix and Adiega sat around her, waiting for the woman to arrive. According to Lugurix, she was attending a fevered child. The boy had a surprising store of such knowledge. In that, he was like Pyp who always seemed to have his hands in everyone’s gossip. At the thought of her younger brother pain to surged through her like a tidal wave. She quickly fought it down. She was here and she would take care of him. That was what it came down to. Philyra too had a handy way with gossip. That thought was even worse. She tried to convince herself that they were immortal, Atlantians, and ultimately, all would be well.
“So, what is your name?” asked Iccauos in a surprisingly melting voice which lifted his plain features into handsomeness.
Sitting against the hard wooden wall, she said, “Calista.” Shifting slightly, she loosened her lavender peplos, now stained with water and sand and blood.
“That’s a Roman name?” asked Adiega distrustfully. The girl’s dark eyes glowed fiercely. Calista could understand why she did not want Roman influence on her secluded existence and yet…And yet, Roman culture was glorious and could only serve to improve (roads at the very least) the life of their town. Improve, or eradicate completely. The girl’s expression looked like she was reconsidering her offer of aid.
“Would you believe me if I said it was not?” Calista responded tiredly. Where she was dressed in traditional Greco-Roman garb, albeit ragged and dirty, they wore bright checked wool. Adiega’s gown was tight-waisted and summery yellow while the two boys wore a matching pair of shocking blue knee-length tunics above buttery trousers. The effect was altog
ether different—and jarring—from the Roman look: their attire was square-cut and simple without any Roman flourishes.
“No,” answered Adiega firmly, swinging her long braid over her shoulder. “We wouldn’t.”
The four sat silently and Calista racked her mind for other questions. She knew she had a plethora of them, and yet nothing came to mind. Finally: “What date is it?”
Iccauos said, “Little more than three weeks past the winter solstice.”
Calista’s eyes widened in shock. She had been adrift for almost two weeks. Not even half a year had passed since Avaritus had come to Portus Tarrus. A thread of surprise wove through her. Somewhere in this mess, two weeks after the solstice, she had turned seventeen.
Adiega suddenly lurched up and apologized profusely. “I forgot to bring you water! Tarry a moment.”
She disappeared through the low door, leaving Calista with the two lads who had begun to relax. The three sat in silence until a woman with ebony hair and shimmering blue eyes entered the room. Adiega carried an earthenware cup of water behind her. Iccauos sat a little straighter in her presence and Calista was hard-pressed to hide her smile. Some things were universally amusing.
“The girl tells me that you need my services.” Like Adiega, Lugurix and Iccauos she was dressed in bright woolens but despite the plain clothes an adeptness clung to her. Calista immediately felt comforted by her obvious competency. “Give her some water Adiega. I do not understand how you expect to run your own household in a week if you cannot remember something so simple as water.”
Flushing, Adiega knelt beside Calista and offered her the cup. Calista gulped deeply and handed it back to the girl with a weak grin. “Thank you.”
The woman gently raised Calista’s foot to examine it. Calista bit her tongue in pain and then blacked out. When Calista came to, the healer was clucking her tongue and had extracted herbs from her scrip. She began mashing them into a paste in her wooden bowl. “How’d you burn your foot so, girl?”
Calista shook her head. How could she explain herself without appearing completely addled? The woman applied the green mess to her the wounds. A cool numbness spread through her wretched foot. Calista sighed.
The woman gave Calista a sharp look. “You like that do you? Well, you’re lucky. I cannot see any sign of infection. Adiega tells me they found you washed up on the beach? Aye, well, ocean water is miraculous when used on cuts and burns. Stings, but keeps things clean of infection. Even if your foot will never be as pretty as it once was you’ll be able to walk on it if you keep off it for a few months.” She daubed more salve on Calista’s foot and wrapped it gently in a bandage.
“A few months!” Calista exclaimed. Her legs flailed in surprise.
The healer eyes narrowed. “Now she speaks! Aye, a few months, and I will see to it that you do not move any more than you have to, even if I have to sit on you!”
Calista tried to reason with the woman. “But you do not understand—”
The woman’s eyes widened with anger and she replied hotly, “I don’t care what I don’t understand. What I do understand is that you’re being a fool and that it’s time you realized you’re under my jurisdiction now lass. All you bloody Romans are the same, thinking the world’s at your feet.”
Iccauos lazily reached out and placed a calming hand on the healer’s arm. “Now, now Banonia. She has clearly had a difficult time. Give her something to help her sleep and let’s be on our way about it.”
After a few moments, a calmer Banonia answered, “Of course.” She went to a table upon which crude clay jars rested and turned her back to Calista. All Calista could see was the woman’s yellow and cinnamon plaid cloak as it twitched with her movements. Banonia mixed together a concoction and handed it to Calista. When Calista looked at it suspiciously, Banonia said, “If you do not drink it of your own volition, I will hold your hair and push it down your throat myself.”
Calista quickly swallowed the vile mixture. Had she anything more than a rudimentary knowledge of herbs and spices and such nonsense, Calista would have sworn that Banonia had added something bitter to punish her for not acquiescing quickly enough…