The Adventures of a Roman Slave

by Lisa Cach

  Terix passed by him first. The guard scratched at his mustache, then frowned at his fingernails, examining what he’d gathered.

  I followed with Bone and my donkey, watching only the ground; the guard’s feet didn’t move. The hairs rose on the back of my neck, and I got an itchy feeling between my shoulders, certain that he was about to call out or grab me. A few steps more, and I was past him; a few more, and we’d reached the bottom of the ramp and started on the path that wound down around the hill fort.

  A giddy excitement rose in my chest. They hadn’t stopped us! Mordred must not have given orders that we were not to leave. Our suspicions of him had been groundless; of course, we were free to go. Didn’t he value independence above all else? His forceful invitation had been just that: an invitation from a crude man.

  I felt ridiculous. All that worry, for what?

  A shout came from the ramparts. Another. A word that may have been “Halt!”

  In front of me, Terix flinched but didn’t turn. I did the same, hurrying forward, hoping that the shout was for someone else. Pretending I didn’t understand, even as my giddy excitement was twisting into queasy fear.

  There was a soft whistle past my head and then a dull thunk. An arrow quivered in the dirt an arm’s length away. My heart jumped into my throat.

  Terix looked over his shoulder at me, the question in his wide eyes. Run?

  I shook my head. We were too close. They had arrows, horses, hounds.

  We stopped and looked up at the guards. “Is there something wrong?” Terix called out in Gaulish.

  The guard from the gateway ran toward us, his sword out and his teeth gnashing out harsh words. He grabbed my arm and jerked me away from my donkey. Bone snarled and prepared to lunge.

  “No, Bone! No!” I shouted. I didn’t want to give the warrior an excuse to hurt him. Bone kept growling but stayed put; Terix put a hand on the back of his neck.

  Mordred wanted us to stay, so stay we would.

  You’ll be pleased with my news,” Mordred said. It was two weeks later, and he was in his house, gnawing on a pheasant drumstick. He motioned for Terix and me to sit and take what we wished from his table of mostly eaten food.

  Not the most gracious of hosts.

  “I take it that it’s welcome news to you, too?” I reached for the pitcher of mead. Mordred’s blue eyes were sparkling above his grease-smeared mustache, and he looked as happy as I’d seen him since our first night here.

  There’d been no repeat performance of him taking me on his lap, though Terix and I had played music, told stories, and put on pantomimes to earn our keep. Terix had been more careful with his drink and made a point of keeping close to me when Mordred was near. During the day, Terix was subdued; I knew he was berating himself for failing me that first night. I’d forgiven him, but self-forgiveness was not coming easily. It didn’t help that his wakeful presence as my “husband,” minor as that was, seemed to be enough to deter Mordred from touching me again.

  Or maybe it was what I had done to Mordred that deterred him and made him wary of me; he might be wondering if I had more of Maerlin’s powers than I’d let on. I didn’t know, and I wasn’t going to ask.

  A few of the women at Tannet Fortress had become bold enough to talk with me, although not if Terix was near. Indeed, if any male over the age of twelve was nearby, their faces closed up, and their backs turned, their shoulders hunching as they bent back to their work. I’d caught glimpses of bruises, but it was the scuttling away from men like mice fleeing a cat that spoke most loudly of their lives.

  When no man was around, however, the women showed me their looms and skeins of dyed wool, their families’ livestock, their fortress’s rough kiln and forge, and a few even allowed me inside their homes. Though I showed great appreciation for all I was shown, privately I was appalled by how they lived. It seemed barbaric, compared with the life I had known in a Roman villa. Their pots were misshapen and undecorated, their iron both scarce and flawed, their shoes so simple a child could make them. Few wore ornaments beyond simple iron brooches, although I did spy a colored bead here or there, strung on a leather cord about the neck. They examined the embroidery on my gown, and in return, I admired their children and the fineness of their weaving. I was an exotic curiosity, and those who could overcome their shyness were eager to hear of how the Roman and Frankish women lived.

  Daella had become my guide and my shadow and clearly felt she’d gained status among the others by calling me her friend. Her brother Uern had built a loathing for both Terix and me, though; not only had he been one of the warriors who’d spewed in his breeches, but he was also the guard who had been too busy digging food out of his facial hair to notice when we walked past him. The berating he’d gotten from Mordred afterward had been vicious, and his fellow warriors took great joy in making him the butt of their jokes, reenacting the scene of our “escape” with their own embellishments, most often of Uern too busy stroking his cock to notice an army go by.

  Sometimes I caught Uern watching me, eyes burning with hatred while his rigid rod tented his tunic.

  Ah, friends everywhere.

  Whatever anger Mordred had, he’d hidden it. Or maybe he wasn’t angry at all at what I’d done to him; any physical pain I’d caused him had been of a very pleasurable sort. I often found his gaze following me and had the uncomfortable feeling he was plotting something.

  The reason he gave for keeping us here was that the roads were unsafe and that he feared to let us seek out the evil, baby-sacrificing, woman-ruining, and sheep-fucking druid Maerlin on our own.

  “You are guests, not prisoners!” he’d insisted. “But other Britons are not as friendly as me. Better to wait until someone goes north; you can go with them for protection.”

  “Yes, it is good news for me, too,” Mordred said now. He swallowed and grinned, his broad, straight teeth showing. There was a shred of pheasant wedged between two of them. “I go to take a wife. A Saxon wife, with much land.”

  So his Wild Hunts had paid off. This wife must be the Wynnetha whom Marri had mentioned.

  “Our congratulations to you,” Terix said.

  If not to Wynnetha, poor thing.

  “You will come, too. We’ll visit Horsa and his daughter in Calleva, and maybe Maerlin will be there.”

  I choked on my mead. “Maerlin! With the Saxons?”

  Mordred noticed the bit of pheasant in his teeth and worked at it with the tip of his knife. “I will have Wynnetha,” he said around the blade, “but Arthur wants her, too. Horsa invites us both, to decide. Where Arthur goes, Maerlin goes.”

  “Who’s Arthur?” I asked.

  Mordred waved his knife in dismissal. “Half brother to Maerlin. No land, no livestock. He only has a sword.”

  “If he has nothing, why would Horsa consider him for his daughter?” Terix asked.

  “Horsa wants to make a friendship with Ambrosius Aurelianus and have him as an ally.” He shrugged. “And the bear is good with his sword. Very good.”

  I sucked in a breath. “The . . . bear?”

  “Arthur. His name means ‘bear.’ ”

  I saw again the stag’s crimson antlers goring the bear. Under the table, I grasped Terix’s hand. This trip to Calleva seemed to have been fated.

  The stag and the bear: Mordred and Arthur.

  Gods help Arthur, for I had foreseen him slain by the foul man before me.

  Marri found me leaning over an animal pen, scratching a goat’s brow. “I would speak with you,” she said, her hands clasped before her and her lips pressed in a firm line. Her back was rigid, her wild white hair scraped back in a tight braid, though one wiry lock had snuck loose.

  I straightened, worried at her tone. “What is it? Is something the matter?”

  She shook her head in a quick jerk of denial. “Not here. Walk with me.”

  I did,
falling in beside her, her tension making me anxious. As we approached the crown of the hill, I got a view over the countryside: green grass, the cold brown bark of trees half-denuded, leaves that had lost their autumn vibrancy and had become dull ochre smears among the branches, and, smothering it all, the heavy gray skies. A damp breeze sent a chill to my bones.

  I’d had the feeling that there was something she wished to say to me since that day Terix and I tried to leave. I often found her eyes on me, as if she was considering, evaluating. Was it a warning she wished to give? A favor she wanted to ask? She was a woman whose thoughts were carefully guarded, though her emotions sometimes betrayed her. And her hair: it got wild when she was agitated.

  I liked Marri. She was a born teacher and had described to me everything she did as she processed herbs and roots in her small house. She’d given me a fresh supply of the wild carrot seeds that Basina had told me about, which prevented conception if eaten every day. “Women’s knowledge,” Marri had said, and nodded in confirmation. I understood what she meant: not to be shared with men.

  She led me now through the grounds of Tannet Fortress to the grove of oak trees, far removed from the bustle of the small village. Her movements were furtive, her eyes checking that no one was following us or coming near. Her nerves were contagious, and I found myself checking over my shoulder, too. We followed a path into the grove, our feet kicking through fallen leaves that had begun to rot. Mushrooms sprouted among them, as big as my hand. There was a small clearing at the center of the grove; it had once been larger, I guessed, based on where the trees stood, but the underbrush had encroached until there was room for no more than the two of us.

  “It is said that long ago, the druids gathered here, to harvest the mistletoe,” Marri said, stopping in the clearing and looking up.

  I followed her gaze and found the cloudlike growths of green-yellow mistletoe in the bare branches.

  “They used a golden sickle to cut it, and when they were done, they had a feast and sacrificed white bulls, to gain the favor of the gods.”

  “What did they do with the mistletoe?”

  “They used it in their medicines; they thought it an antidote to poison and also good for infertility. They were wrong, of course. Its true value is in easing shaking fits. I taught Daella that. I taught her all that I know.” Marri took my hands and looked into my eyes. “You must take Daella with you to Calleva.”

  “Take her to the Saxons! Why?”

  “Not to the Saxons. To Maerlin. He is a druid, so he will understand the value Daella has. He will take her to Ambrosius Aurelianus.”

  My jaw dropped. “But you said Maerlin was dangerous.”

  “I never said he was dangerous. I said there are terrible rumors about him.”

  “Even so! And Ambrosius Aurelianus is Mordred’s enemy.”

  She hissed. “Mordred!” She released my hands to make a rude gesture with her own. “Idiot. Savage. Animal.”

  I stepped back, surprised at her explosion. This fierce creature was not the Marri I was familiar with.

  “What future does Daella have here, with Mordred?” Marri went on. “You have seen how the women here are treated. You have been treated such yourself. At best, Daella will be given to one of the lesser warriors, who will beat her. More likely, she’ll be a shepherd’s wife and spend her days endlessly spinning and weaving, pregnant with children who, once born, will stink of sheep.” Marri waved her hands before her as if to erase such a future. “Daella is plain of face, but her mind is sharp. She is skilled in the healing arts, though I have not let her show her knowledge. Mordred thinks her my ignorant assistant, nothing more. She could have a life of her choosing, if she can get to Aurelianus. She would be valued. Everyone knows that Aurelianus thinks learning to be important, for men and women both.”

  “Mordred implied he was a tyrant, a man who wants to be the new emperor of Britannia.”

  “He’s a hero, and Mordred is jealous of his fame. Forty years ago, he led the great battle that defeated the Saxons, pushing them from our lands. They have not regained any of that lost ground in all the years since.”

  “So what Mordred says of him is untrue?”

  She looked away and shrugged. “Mordred did not lie; we’ve all heard his complaints a thousand times, and they are true. What is bad for Mordred is not necessarily bad, though. We might be better with an emperor, if he were such as Aurelianus.”

  She reminded me of Sidonius Apollinaris. Did everyone who reached great age become so willing to see both sides?

  I thought of other older people I’d met and decided . . . no.

  “What of Maerlin,” I said, “if he is as the rumors say? You cannot want to leave Daella in his hands.”

  Marri chewed her lower lip. Her small dark eyes darted and blinked. “You will protect her from him. If you are kin, you will be safe. He will not harm you or those under your protection.”

  “I don’t know that. Neither can you.”

  “It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that Daella leave this place.”

  I was starting to feel trapped. I didn’t want this responsibility; it was too big. “What of yourself? If life is so much better with Aurelianus, don’t you also wish to go?”

  “Mordred would never allow it. I am his only healer, as far as he knows; he would not be without me.”

  “Daella won’t want to leave you on your own.”

  Marri grabbed my upper arms, squeezing. “She must. I am old; I will not see many more winters. She must leave now, before she’s old enough to catch a man’s eye and before I die and leave her on her own. She need not worry about me; I will have Uern to look after me.”

  She read the skepticism on my face and tilted her head, her lips pulling into a crooked smile. “Uern has less wit than a duck, but I am still his grandmother, and he is proud that I have status. He will not let me want.”

  “You don’t think he’d look out for his sister, too?”

  “He judges Daella by her face and so thinks her worthless. He is ashamed of her and will be rid of her as quickly as possible.” She took my hands again. “Do not think I do this lightly. For many years, I have worried over Daella. I have seen the light of intelligence and curiosity in the eyes of other young women and have seen it snuffed out by Mordred and his men. They turn them from shining girls full of hope into shadowy women of despair, without the energy to do more than survive and beg the gods for a better future for their children. Daella deserves a better life.”

  Her words saddened me, and I could not deny their truth. “All the women deserve a better life.”

  “I cannot save them all,” Marri said. “I can save Daella, if she goes with you.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know what lies ahead. I don’t know if I can keep her safe or if her life with Aurelianus might be worse.”

  “She’ll have a chance at something different. She can always choose to return here. Give her the choice, Nimia. At least give her that.”

  My strongest memory of my mother was of her telling me that I must make the best of every choice I was offered in life and wring all I could from it.

  I thought about what it would be like to bring Daella with us and felt the weight of responsibility descend heavily on me. It would be difficult to have a young girl, not yet grown, depending on Terix and me to look after her. We could barely manage to keep ourselves in one piece.

  On the other hand, the thought of Daella losing the light in her eyes and ending up like the other women here at Tannet Fortress made my heart hurt. Marri must be desperate, if sending Daella with me to the supposed baby sacrificer Maerlin was the best solution she could come up with.

  “There’s nowhere else, is there?” I said, more to myself than to Marri. “There’s nowhere for women to run if they hate their lives.” I was thinking of myself as much as Daella.

  “Not anymore
. Once upon a time, the Isle of Mona was such. Even after Paulinus attacked it, the druids held on. But that was before it turned into . . . something else.”

  Again, the teasing about what had happened at the Isle of Mona. Tempted as I was to pursue the topic, it wasn’t what mattered. “Does Daella want to go with us?”

  “She wants to be away from here. You can ask Mordred to bring her along as your maid. She’s free; she should be able to go where she pleases once you find Maerlin.”

  “You know it won’t be that simple. What of Uern? Won’t he try to stop her? I don’t know your laws, but I know most men think any unmarried female in the family is theirs to command.”

  Marri snorted. “I’ll deal with Uern.”

  Given the fierce light in her eyes, I was sure she would. I nodded. “All right. If we can get her away from here, Terix and I will try to get her to Aurelianus.”

  The tension in her face drained away, and the gleam in her eye was softened by a film of tears. She wrapped her thin arms around me and wept.

  It took three days to get to Calleva, as we traveled a Roman road at the pace of the oxcarts hauling gifts: amphorae of wine; soft furs in grays, browns, white, and black; silver goblets inset with colored stones; lengths of fine linen; boxes of honeyed dates and figs; and even a fragile glass drinking horn, packed in an arm’s depth of straw. There’d been no wine served at Mordred’s table; it and the other luxuries had been hoarded as bridal gifts. Mordred traded Dumnonian tin to the ships that came from the Internal Sea, bringing with them a rare taste of another world. Mordred didn’t care for that exotic flavor, but he was canny enough to know that Horsa and Wynnetha would be impressed.

  The tedious pace of the journey was driving me mad, with the knowledge that Maerlin lay at the end of it. Maerlin! A man I’d first heard of while still a slave in Sygarius’s household. Maerlin had been the reason Clovis had sought me out in private. My life would not have taken the shape it had if Clovis had not met Maerlin many years ago. I might now be the mother to Sygarius’s child, living in a villa, and the Franks might never have ventured forth from Tornacum to vanquish Soissons and so destroy the last Gaulish province of the Roman Empire.