My dear Son, this matter aside, I cannot tell you how pleased with you I am, and how proud at the name you are making for yourself in an ancient and honorable service that has been our family’s tradition since the days of the Republic…
The rest had been affectionate and congratulatory but had done nothing to alleviate the utter fury which his father’s orders about Freita had roused in him. As for his mother, Appius’s pampered slave and mistress, Correus knew perfectly well that Helva wanted only what would advance her son to a status that would ensure her continued ease after the old general’s death. The thought of Freita growing over the years to be the same woman as his mother appalled Correus. When Freita had told him she was pregnant, Correus, practically frothing, had gone off to see the civil magistrate at Glevum about a marriage.
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?” Correus, arrangements for an unobtrusive civil ceremony in hand, returned to the house he had taken outside the fortress at Glevum to find Freita sitting placidly by the hearth with the cat on her lap and an expression as stubborn as a pig’s on her beautiful face.
Correus stomped the spring snow off his boots and turned his backside to the fire – the house was too small to boast a furnace and hypocaust. He stood, steaming damply, while she shook her head at him.
“My heart, if you marry me, you will ruin your career. I have learned enough of Rome in the last year to know that. And you won’t thank me for it ten years down the road.”
Correus took a deep breath and got a grip on himself. Freita had an unsettling effect on him. She was a tall woman, big-boned, with a crown of gold hair and sea-green eyes like tide pools, and a white, milky skin touched on throat and shoulder by the fading marks of an old burn, the price of defending her chieftain’s flaming hold on the Rhenus border against Correus and his kind. How they had come to love each other with such a beginning was a mystery to them both but they accepted it gratefully. She was the other half of him now, he thought, looking at her, and he was damned if their child was going to be born with the same mark on him that he himself had had. It was a mark that was going to follow him for the rest of his life. Freita knew it, but she wouldn’t budge.
“You can adopt the child, you know. I don’t think your father would balk at that.”
“It’s not the same.”
Freita sighed and pushed the cat off her lap and held out her arms to him. The cat gave her an indignant glance and curled up on the warm hearthstone, while Correus regarded the pair of them in exasperation. She was as infuriating and single-minded as that damned cat, which he had dragged all the way from Germany to his father’s house near Rome, to the new posting in Britain – howling all the way in a wicker basket. He didn’t understand either of them.
“I thought that once we were clear of Germany, everything would be right,” he said finally.
Freita took his hands and pulled him down beside her by the fire. “I’ve known since you took me to your family in Rome that you couldn’t marry me. But we’re together, aren’t we? And we’re going to have a child. I’m so pleased about that, you would think no one had ever done it before.” She ran one hand through his hair and smiled at him and drew his head down on her breast. The fire spat and leapt up and died back again to a friendly glow; and Julius, the young slave who looked after the household when Correus was on duty, came in with an armload of logs, looked at the two of them, and left again forthwith. Correus sighed and gave up, abandoning himself to the feel of Freita in his arms. Tomorrow, he thought, kissing her, tomorrow he would insist.
But then tomorrow hadn’t come for five months. In the morning the Second Legion was ordered out to dig a toehold on the southern plain above Sabrina Mouth to force the Silures into the Roman province of Britain once and for all. Freita and Julius followed as they could. When they reached the new campsite at Isca, Freita stoically pitched a tent and set about charming wood for a floor out of the Centurion of Engineers, while Correus was drafted by Governor Frontinus for his own form of reconnaissance. He hadn’t seen her since the day he rode out of Isca – trailing two dejected-looking pack ponies and an assortment of copper kettles, amber beads, and knife blades – to locate Bendigeid and return to the governor without finding a spear in his back on the way as well.
Correus passed out through the lower gates of Isca Silurum, fully built now of timber and banked turf, with a sentry walkway along the top and deep V-shaped ditches outside, lined with “lilies” – sharpened stakes set slantwise into the dirt. He gave the sentries the password of the day and strode down the dirt track – past the parade ground and baths and cleared space where the amphitheater would be at such time as the legion had leisure to build one – to the cluster of huts and ramshackle structure that was the beginning of the civil settlement at Isca.
A boy of about fifteen was currying a gray horse outside one of those dwellings as Correus approached. There was an empty wooden bucket on the ground, and the horse’s mane and tail were still damp.
“If you spent as much time on the household as you do on Aeshma, we might show a better face to the world,” Correus said, glancing at the half tent, half wattle-and-daub structure behind him. The walls behind the tent leaned drunkenly to the left.
The boy looked up, his gray eyes lighting with pleasure. “Centurion! We didn’t know you were back!” He bowed his head dutifully, but his eyes were dancing. “I’m that glad to see you! And if you think it’s easier to wash this horse than build a house, you just haven’t tried, sir.”
Aeshma, whose name meant “demon,” and who lived well up to his name with all but his cronies, whickered and butted his head against Correus’s lorica. “No, I don’t have anything for you, you fool. Back off.” He rubbed the gray nose.
“And it hasn’t been as easy as all that anyway, sir,” Julius pushed a shock of mousy hair back from his eyes. “She’s as crabby as an old sow, just like all women. You’d think no one had ever had a baby before.” The boy glanced darkly at the tent. “She has a cold, too,” he added.
Correus chuckled. “It comes of living with a cub with no respect for his elders, I daresay,” he said mildly. He pushed back the double leather flap that formed the door and almost collided with a round figure wrapped in a cloak who came hurtling through it.
“Correus!” Freita flung her arms around him and hung on.
“Careful. You’ll hurt yourself.” He pushed her gently away and looked down at her. Her nose and eyes were red, and she was as round as a wine jug, but she was his beautiful Freita, and his heart turned over as he kissed her.
“No, no. You’ll catch my cold.” She smiled at him and tucked her arm through his. They turned through the doorway together, Julius forgotten, until Freita broke off coughing, a deep, racking sound that caught Correus up short.
“What are you about, to leave her in this condition in this damned, drafty hole?” He glared over his shoulder at Julius.
“Just try to make her leave before you came home!” Julius said indignantly.
“I’m all right,” Freita gasped. “Julius did try. Correus, don’t look like that. Now that you’re here, I’ll do well enough.”
“Why in Mithras’s name didn’t you go to Aquae Sulis when you first got sick? And how am I going to send you there now in this condition?”
“I will be all right,” Freita said firmly. The gray cat trotted across the plank floor and chirped at her inquiringly. She bent down to pick it up and began to cough again.
“You sure as Typhon will, because you aren’t staying here!” Correus said. “Now sit down, put another cloak on, and put some more coals in the brazier. I’ll be back in an hour.”
* * *
“Is the governor free?”
The headquarters clerk looked up from his supply lists and blinked. The governor sent for his officers as a rule. Most didn’t voluntarily come looking for him. “I will, uh, ascertain, sir.” He poked his head through the dividing flap into the partitioned office quarters at the rear.
In a moment he emerged and nodded to Correus. “The legate is with him, sir,” he said, as if he thought the centurion might change his mind in the face of all this gilt and purple. “But you’re to go in,” he added as Correus stood his ground.
“Thank you.”
He saluted Domitius Longinus and Governor Frontinus, who regarded him with curiosity.
“I would have expected you to be using that leave you pried out of me, Centurion,” Frontinus said.
“That’s just the problem, sir,” Correus said. “I meant to use it to take Freita to Aquae Sulis, but she’s too sick to travel. It’s just a cold, but she doesn’t look good. Not so near her term.”
“I see,” Frontinus said gravely. “And, uh, how may we help you?”
“I need a place for her to stay, sir,” Correus said firmly. “Just until she’s over her cold.” It was not a request that even a senior officer would ordinarily have the nerve to put to the governor of Britain, but Correus didn’t care. Not when it concerned Freita.
“I’ve seen that dump that passes for a civil settlement,” Longinus put in, watching the exchange with sympathy.
“So have I,” Frontinus said. “Best that you put her in my quarters for a few days.”
Correus blinked. “I beg your pardon, sir?”
“Well, she certainly can’t be expected to stay in that hovel, not with a chest cold, Centurion. The Praetorium’s the only place that hasn’t got mushrooms growing on the floor just now.” He grinned at Longinus. “Though strictly speaking, that’s yours, too, Domitius, although I happen to be occupying it at the moment.”
“Far be it from me to deny what you see fit to give, sir,” Longinus said, amused. “And, uh, where were you planning to sleep?”
“I’m not so grand that I can’t sleep with the legion for a few nights,” Frontinus said. “I’ve done it before now. You’re doing it at the moment.”
When Correus had saluted and left, still mildly stunned, Longinus turned to the governor with a questioning eye.
“I like that girl,” Frontinus said. “I like her a lot, although I agree with young Julianus’s father – with whom I have had some correspondence on the subject, which you will not mention to him – that he can’t be allowed to marry her. But she’s a good girl, and she’s got more guts than most. Also” – he tapped the lengthy report which Correus had submitted along with his oral one – “Centurion Julianus has earned some peace of mind.”
* * *
“Correus,” Freita whispered, unwrapping the outer of her two cloaks and draping it over the carved back of a chair, “he can’t have agreed to this.”
“Well, he did,” Correus said firmly, “and we’re going to take advantage of it.” The Praetorium, the commander’s private quarters, was timber-built and stone-floored, with plastered walls upon which some legionary artist had begun a hunting scene of tigers and hippopotami and other unlikely prey, pursued by huntsmen mounted upon elephants. The artist was evidently a townsman who had taken his ideas of the chase largely from the Circus at Rome. The floor and walls were channeled for hot air from the hypocaust which would be built later, and in the meantime the room was heated with three iron braziers glowing warmly in the dusk.
Freita sank down on the bed, which was ornamented with carved claw feet and inlaid with thin rods of bronze around the frame. It boasted a pile of woolen covers that must have been the governor’s personal property, and there was a small shale table beside it with a pottery lamp shaped like a duck. The lamp was lit and splashed a pleasant pool of light onto the blue and green blankets and the native rug that warmed the stone floor by the bed.
“Oh, Correus, this is paradise.” Freita sneezed and bounced gently on the bed while Correus rummaged in the small clothes chest which Julius had deposited at the foot of the bed.
He pulled out a warm night shift. “Here, get into this, and get into that bed.”
Freita got up and shucked off her mantle and gown near one of the braziers while Correus watched her appreciatively. Strange how beautiful a big-bellied woman could be. He had never noticed that before. She pulled the night shift over her head gratefully and wrapped the mantle around her again. “Oh, this is so warm. I don’t think I’ve been warm since we left Glevum.”
“The more fool you,” Correus said. “Why didn’t you go to Aquae Sulis when you got sick?”
Freita smiled and snuggled under the blankets. “I wanted to wait for you. And it’s done no harm. I’ll be fine now. The only trouble will be making myself leave this lovely room for Aquae Sulis.” She giggled. “I mustn’t stay too long. It wouldn’t do to have a baby in the governor’s bed.”
Correus chuckled and kissed her. “No, that might be more than he’s prepared to cope with. But you will stay until that cold is gone.”
She put her hand on his wrist. “Correus, can’t you stay with me?”
He hesitated. “I was going to send Julius to stay with you, and I’ll stay in the tent to keep an eye on Aeshma. He’s jumpy as a tomcat. I think there’s a mare in season somewhere.”
“You ought to have that horse gelded.”
“My father’s horseman would have my head. You should have seen his eyes light up when he saw Aeshma. I should have left him in Rome, is what I should have done, and let him make himself useful with my father’s mares. I only brought him because you like him, sweet. And I’m not sure Julius can manage him when you aren’t around. If he kicks his stall down and goes looking for love in the cavalry barns, we will be in trouble.”
“Julius will have to manage him when I’ve gone to Aquae Sulis,” Freita said practically. “And Julius and I have had quite enough of each other’s company lately. Stay with me, Correus.” She grinned. “Then Julius can sleep in that cold tent instead of you.”
“A telling argument.” He sat down on the bed beside her, and she slipped her arms around him. “Mmmm, you feel nice.”
“So do you. Come to bed and hold me. It’s been so long.”
He nuzzled his face against her hair, breathing in the warm smell of her. “Too long. And before you go to Aquae Sulis, you’re going to marry me.”
“Hush. We’ll talk about it later. Just get into bed, for now.”
* * *
It was black-of-the-moon, a still, inky blackness that blotted out shadow and open space alike, when the shadow came over the wall in a cat-footed scramble and dropped to the ground in a hay rick behind the cavalry lines. The mailed sandals of the sentries clicked past on the catwalk above him, their lanterns cutting through the darkness where the shadow had been. He crouched, holding his breath, and when they had passed, he hurried silently into the darkness. Behind him a cavalry horse whickered and was quiet. The shadow froze and then moved on. He went silently through the night, and no man crossed his path. As the bulk of the place he sought loomed up, a blacker shape against the black night, he saw the faint gold glow of a lamp somewhere within, and his knife blade winked coldly in its light.
Inside, past the guttering lamp, he paused at an inner doorway and eased the oiled hinges open. The room was lit with the embers of a glowing brazier, almost as light as day to eyes that came in from the night. The man in the bed was deep in sleep and snoring softly, the sleep of a man who knows himself safe. Beside him there was a fall of pale hair on the pillow, but it made little difference to the shadow that his quarry had a woman with him. It was the man he wanted. The man whose death might mean the saving of his tribe.
The shadow shifted his grip on the knife hilt carefully and darted across the stone floor. His foot hit the rug by the bed and he stumbled, and the woman sat up, eyes open wide. The shadow hurled himself at the sleeping figure on the bed, and the woman screamed and threw herself at the man to waken him. The shadow’s knife came down between her ribs.
II The Shadow with the Knife
Correus was awake and on the man as Freita screamed. His sword and dagger lay forgotten on the governor’s clothes chest, blotted out by blind rage and the picture of Freita�
��s hunched body in the bed with blood coming up through her white shift. He caught the man by the throat and drove him down onto the stone floor, oblivious to the flailing knife blade. The knife came down and slashed along his forearm, and he let go of the throat long enough to catch the man’s wrist and snap it with a sickening crunch. Sprawled on top of the attacker, he slammed his head into the stone floor, his long hands closing again about the throat. He had nearly killed him by the time the sentries came pounding through the door.
It took three of them to pull him off by main force.
“Let go now, sir! Grab his hands, Glaucus!”
“I’m trying! Typhon! No, sir! We’re trying to help you!”
Correus lashed out in a fury as the sentry’s hands pried at his fingers. He returned to the attack, this time driving his fist hard into the tribesman’s face.
“Stop it, sir! Damn you, we’re on your side!”
“Someone see to the woman – she’s hurt!”
“Where’s the governor?”
“Leave off now, sir, you’ll kill him!”
“Centurion Julianus!” Governor Frontinus strode into the room, barefoot, with his purple cloak wrapped hastily around his undertunic, barely two steps behind another contingent of sentries.
“He got over the wall, sir!” one of them gasped. “We found where he came over.”
Domitius Longinus was behind the governor, dark hair standing on end, a short sword in one hand and trying to push home the pin of his cloak with the other.
“Mithras god! Julianus!”
Their voices came dimly to Correus through the red haze in his head. Another sentry scrabbled at his hands, now tight about the tribesman’s throat again, and slowly he began to loosen them.
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