Slave Princess

by Juliet Landon

  ‘Murdered? Nonius?’ Quintus murmured. ‘Well, we should be able to guess the reasoning behind that, I think. Come on, Princess. I’d better be seen to be sticking to my timetable before we go off investigating. Bring that boot, Florian. And take that rotten-vegetable look off your face. It’s only a boot.’

  There had been no chance to mention the possible fate of the Lady Helena’s offering, but Brighid had a question to ask. ‘Who is this Alexius you’re so concerned about?’ she said as they left the cool atrium now thronging with departures and arrivals. ‘Is he one of your men?’

  ‘A very close friend,’ he said. ‘I intend to find him.’

  ‘Ah. Things you have to pursue. You believe he was here?’

  ‘That’s his boot. He was here, Princess.’

  ‘So you think the thefts of gold, and the making of coins, and the disappearance of men from the temple are somehow linked, do you? And where does Helm come into all this?’

  ‘He needs men and money, lass. It’s obvious. He’s involved, and I have to find out exactly how before I take him.’

  ‘But surely you realise, my lord, that now he and Valens know who you are and why you’re here, your life is in grave danger? And Tullus and Lucan, too? And me? If Valens can get rid of his friend Nonius simply for suggesting we ought to come here, then …’

  Quintus stopped on the pathway and took her by the shoulders, halting her rhetoric in mid-flow. ‘Yes, I do realise that. That’s why I have to work fast before Valens returns. But Nonius did not recommend Watercombe to me, remember, it was one of the young clerks who did that. Valens was made to believe it was his friend who sent us here, knowing what we might uncover, but it was Helena Coronis who’s responsible for that little mix-up. She’s scared of what her husband might do to her and her daughters, but she’s also trying to give us some leads. And you must take extra care not to be alone. Do you hear?’

  ‘Yes, I hear. But surely I can be of some help, can’t I?’

  ‘I told you, you already have been. You’ve got Helm worried enough to do something desperate.’

  ‘He’d have gone straight back home if his wife had not gone into labour,’ she mused, looking across at the building that housed the birthing room and the gymnasium, ‘but now he’ll wait to see how big a favour he has to repay. Boy or girl.’

  His hands dropped from her shoulders, his gaze following hers. ‘Well, I think,’ he said, quietly, ‘that Helena Coronis is being rather optimistic.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘I mean, Princess, that if I were a man of Valens’s sort with a daughter and a stepdaughter, I would certainly not be giving my newborn son away to a man like Helm, favour or not. If Helm is dependent on Valens for something, he’s not in a position to object, is he? Perhaps that’s why he was so eager to forge a tie with your father, chieftain of a powerful tribe. He needs all the friends he can get. And all Valens needs is another twenty years or so for his son to inherit Watercombe. If he gets a son, that is.’

  ‘That’s a bleak picture, my lord. Where will I be in twenty years’ time, I wonder?’ She hoped her rhetorical question might prompt a more considered reply, but the one he gave her was as ambiguous as ever.

  ‘We’ll deal with that problem when it comes,’ he said, dismissively, starting off down the slope to the white-plastered porch.

  Stung, she felt her anger rise yet again. ‘The problem is in the present, my lord, in case you were not aware of it, and if you do not deal with it soon, I shall have to deal with it myself.’

  His sandals scrunched on the gravel as he slewed round to face her so abruptly that she almost cannoned into him. ‘And what exactly do you mean by that? What is this problem that cannot wait, that you’ll have to deal with alone?’

  She wanted to take the rash words back, but it was too late. This was not a discussion one could have in the middle of the pathway in someone else’s garden with Florian standing by. ‘Nothing,’ she whispered. ‘Nothing you’d understand. Please, let us go on.’

  ‘You credit me with a lack of understanding I’m unaware of having done anything to deserve, Princess. I understand that your future has not been fully discussed, so far, but that’s because the time and place for deciding it has not presented itself. It’s enough for me that you’re here. It should be enough for you, too, while there’s so much else to think about.’

  ‘So much else for you to think about,’ she retorted. ‘My experience of men is limited, I agree, but I do know how their minds run along only one track at a time, and that women are capable of handling myriad problems at once, especially when their own future is one of them. Don’t concern yourself, Tribune. I’m not as helpless as I’ve led you to believe. Carry on with your important task, but don’t be surprised if, when next you turn round, I’m not following in your footprints.’

  ‘Ah!’ he groaned. ‘You talk in riddles, woman. Have I not told you that you’re mine? Have my kisses not convinced you?’ Impatiently, he took her again by the shoulders, pulling her roughly towards him before she could dodge his embrace. His kiss was not the quelling kind she anticipated, but soft and beguiling, and against all her pent-up emotions and confused plans to go her own way, she found that her mind was blotting out everything but the security of his arms and the need within her heart to become his for ever, as she might once have been Helm’s.

  ‘Wait a while longer, lass,’ he whispered so that Florian could not hear. ‘I shall take you to bed as soon as we’re back in the room, and I’ll leave you in no doubt then what your future will be. Can you wait that long, or shall we go now? Eh?’

  With dignity, she removed herself from his arms and brushed a hand down her gown to smooth it. ‘I can wait indefinitely, Tribune, I thank you. Shall we go on?’ He had not understood, as she had known he would not. She would have to make her own way, once this business was cleared up. Her heart ached, sending a hard ball of pain into the base of her throat. If only she had not loved him so desperately, her path would have been much smoother, she thought, holding back a sudden rush of tears.

  Chapter Twelve

  The message that she was needed in the birthing room did not come, yet Brighid could not help but assume that, if she were to appear uninvited, they would hardly refuse her offer of support. It was the thought of being no help to anyone that she found hard to bear. So when the sight of Quintus heaving at a pulley began to pall, she quietly excused herself and slipped further along the building, expecting to discover the right door by sound, if not by sight. She stood still to listen. ‘Princess?’

  She jumped, hand over heart. She had heard no one approach, but then saw that, in a deep alcove near the door, a man had just risen from a footstool. Behind him, a lamp burned before a shrine to the goddess of childbirth, and Brighid guessed he had been communing with her, Sulis-Minerva. ‘Helm!’ she whispered.

  ‘What …?’

  Out of the sun, he appeared smoother and less grizzled, his sandy hair brushed straight, his beard trimmed. The white tunic had been exchanged for brown plaid trousers, an undyed linen shirt and a leather belt from which hung his scabbard, tribal-style. It was how she had first seen him, weeks ago in her father’s hall, wearing a heavy gold torque around his neck. ‘I hoped you might be here,’ he said, glancing at one of the doors. ‘We should talk in private, Princess, before Valens returns.’

  Brighid drew her woollen scarf around her shoulders, though not against the kind of stare to which Valens had subjected her, even though he was clearly appreciative. ‘Should we?’ she said. ‘I don’t think it matters now, does it? You’ve made a choice and you must stick to it, though I’m not at all impressed by your negotiating skills, sir.’

  ‘Neither am I. Your father was a hard man, Princess. I was getting nowhere. Then it went badly wrong, didn’t it? It would have been foolish for me to stay any longer, once they’d taken you.’

  ‘It was foolish of you to go there in the first place.’

  ‘My father sent me. But
now I’ve found you again.’

  ‘Er … no, sir. You did not find me. I was not lost. And when I gave you the chance, you preferred to deny you’d ever visited my home. You can hardly expect me to show any interest in you now, especially as you already have a wife. We really don’t have anything to discuss.’

  ‘We have your brother to discuss. If you want him returned to you alive, you’d do well to grant me a few moments of your time, I think.’

  ‘My … my brother?’

  ‘I knew that would change your tune.’

  ‘You have him? Is he safe? Where?’ This was something she could never have expected, that Helm still believed Math was a captive. Could she find out more? Could she act her way through this giant misconception? She saw his eyes light up at her concern, and she thought she knew what he was about to offer her in return for Math, who was hiding in Lucan’s room.

  ‘He’s safe enough, at the moment,’ he said, smiling in satisfaction. ‘Hungry, I expect, but he’ll live. Look here, I have his dagger.’ He drew the hilt up out of the scabbard and lay the weapon across his palm, the pommel decorated with gold and enamel, the blade a piece of the swordsmith’s art. Brighid recognised it.

  ‘I hope he injured you with it, sir, before you stole it from him.’

  ‘He did. That’s why I’m wearing my trews. Now, shall we talk?’

  She glanced along the corridor. ‘Make it quick.’

  ‘My plan is to take your brother to join my tribe, the Dobunni, if you agree to come too. If you should decide not to, your brother will belong to Valens to do with as he does to other healthy young males.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Ah, that’s for him to tell you, not me. Your brother would join my forces, be trained with my men, toughen up, fight for Britain, eventually. A good life for any man, Princess, but I would want you to come, too. You could keep an eye on him.’

  ‘May I remind you once again, sir, that you have a wife?’

  ‘But my father does not.’

  ‘Your … your father? What does he have to do with it?’

  ‘What do you think I went to see your father about? Did you think it was … oh … hah! You did, didn’t you?’ Hands on hips, he grinned broadly with white even teeth, showing his pink tongue. ‘You thought I was bidding for you … nay, lass, you were intended for the chief, my father, not for his married son. Think of that. You have a second chance now, to be the Dubonni chief’s wife and live in style. We don’t live in wooden huts as your people do, Princess. We live in a villa as big as Watercombe. Your father appears not to have kept you informed about your future.’

  No one keeps me informed about my future.

  ‘I was not the only one to misread the situation,’ she said. ‘My brothers, too. They would not have agreed to your proposal.’

  ‘They don’t have a say in it now, do they? You can make your own decisions. Valens believes you’re the Tribune’s slave, but I know different. A tribal woman like you will never be anyone’s slave. Think about it, Princess. Is it better to follow him around to catch the crumbs he throws your way, or to be the chief woman of our tribe, revered and honoured, able to sit at her husband’s side and advise him? That’s what I call a future.’

  ‘Are you speaking the truth?’ Guiltily, she savoured his proposal in an attempt to be realistic, self-seeking. Surely this would answer at least one of her problems.

  ‘I swear it, before Sulis-Minerva. I shall take my wife home as soon as she’s ready to move, and I urge you to come, too, or you and your brother will belong to Valens.’

  ‘That’s not likely, Helm. The Tribune is aware of the danger we’re in and he’s prepared. He protects me well.’

  ‘Really?’ he scoffed, smiling over his shoulder into the empty corridor. ‘He didn’t manage to protect your brother either, did he? I, however, know how to keep a woman safe. I shall get my wife away from Valens; I could get you away too. Believe me, he uses his women hard and has his sights on you, Princess.’

  ‘Thank you for the warning. I thought you and he were bosom friends.’

  ‘We have the same political interests, that’s all.’

  ‘But not the same scruples?’

  ‘Let’s just say that my scruples are more transparent than his. He’s a very clever man, but he needs my help. It won’t last for ever.’

  ‘I need some time,’ she whispered. ‘Give me more time. Another day.’

  ‘It’s running out. Valens moves fast. As soon as—’

  A sound from behind the nearest door flattened Helm like a shadow into the recess from where, as the door opened, he became invisible.

  ‘Ah, Princess,’ came the voice of Helena Coronis. ‘I was just about to come for you. Would you care to add your opinion to ours? She’s getting close.’

  The door closed behind them, and the shadow slipped along the wall, unseen.

  The birthing room was stark, functional and not large enough for the three midwives, Helena Coronis, Brighid, and the long table upon which Dora lay to be examined. There was also an unusual chair with a cutaway seat on which the mother would sit to give birth, gravity being the obvious accomplice. Piles of towels and bedding were stacked on shelves next to bottles and jars, metal instruments, bowls and beakers. The scent of lavender and mint mingled with the tang of body odours. A perfumed candle burned on the window-sill to keep the air sweet and, from the table, Dora’s cry rose to a crescendo with her latest contraction.

  The hum of chatter stopped as Brighid’s hand was caught in a painful grip that she bore without flinching, keeping hold of the hand as the contraction passed. Dora seemed not to mind whose hand she held, simply nodding when Brighid asked if she might take a look. She had not expected the birth to be imminent. In her experience, first babies usually took their time to arrive, but Dora’s infant was not inclined to wait, and Brighid could see that it would not be long before it made an appearance. Between contractions, there was little for her to do but help Dora onto the birthing stool, massage her back, and keep her feet warm.

  If Brighid’s head had not been teeming with the information Helm had just passed on to her, and with the critical situation she was witnessing, she might have found a convenient time to take Helena Coronis to one side and warn her to go and retrieve the piece of jewellery that might still be in the workshop, the one she had offered to the shrine. But the thought went from her mind as Dora’s infant slid into the world, and in the rejoicing at the birth of a lusty boy, all other matters faded into insignificance. Then, there was much to be done for mother and child, and Brighid’s exit went unnoticed by anyone.

  Pausing at the small shrine to give thanks, she leaned against the wall to think. It would have been easy to dismiss Helm’s unexpected offer as absurd, but the growing concerns about her future had left an empty space where any offer, however extraordinary, could take root and live, if only for a short time. It was not, as it happened, as extraordinary as all that for, if her father had decided that this was to be her future instead of playing cat and mouse with them all, she might by now have been installed as the wife of the Dobunni chief, Helm’s stepmother. Such things could and did happen. And whether she liked the idea or not, it was a viable alternative to an uncertain future as the Tribune’s ‘healer’. The issue of her virginity had not been raised, so she could only assume that Helm and his father cared little one way or the other, as long as she was not already pregnant, as his wife Dora had been. There would, however, be a brutal solution to that problem which she knew these men would have no qualms about putting into practice. She had seen a dozen or so tiny graves to prove it.

  Much as she disliked the idea of leaving the Tribune, the facts were not far from the way Helm had described them, and no matter how hard she tried to be optimistic about her chances of remaining with the one she had grown to love, the stark truth was that he had not taken her out of love, but as a shrewd calculated move against her marriage to the Dobunni man they were both pursuing. The Tribune would not
even consider her future, but was more concerned with finding the friend who had been one of the prime causes of this journey to Aquae Sulis. She herself was no more than an appendage, as she’d been from the outset. Better to take matters into her own hands now, she thought, than leave it until it was too late. Time was running out, for when Helm discovered that he had no Math to bargain with, he might withdraw his offer. What was equally interesting, though, was that Helm needed young men for his revolt against the Roman occupation, and Valens needed them for something else, as yet unspecified.

  Peeping into the gymnasium, she saw that Quintus had left, probably assuming that she was still helping with Dora’s birthing. This was her chance to go up to the workshops to find the one where Math had discovered her bracelet. If she could find the Lady Helena’s piece and return it to her, it might encourage her to co-operate in the exposure of her husband. She did not agree with Tullus that a woman should not be told what her husband gets up to. The Lady Helena had a right to know.

  From the garden, her route up the rough slope was unobserved by those on the pathways below, their heads covered against the drizzle and the cool breeze that bent the spray from the fountains. She intended to follow the path that Math had described, but behind the thick screen of trees, the nearest hut clattered to the sound of a potter’s wheel. She passed on, unseen.

  The next workshop was busy with men sitting on the floor where a mosaic was being assembled on a wooden pallet, their concentration too intent to notice her progress. Next door to the mosaicists was a weaver and his wife, standing at a massive upright loom with baskets of coloured wool beside them. Beyond their hut was an open door where a white-bearded man sat at a bench, carefully filing at some small object held in a vice. Could this be the goldsmith?’

  He looked up as she hesitated, clearly intrigued by the sight of a lovely red-haired woman decked with gold ornaments worth a fortune. ‘Domina,’ he said.

  ‘Good morning. Will you show me your work?’ she said, drawing closer.