“You are… very welcome. How brave of you to fare so far at this dangerous time of year.”
His smile widened. The furrows that ran from it made it wonderfully lively. “Already the voyage shows a thousandfold profit.” There was nothing unctuous about his speech, extravagance was natural to his race.
“You wrote that you are a trader?”
“I may become one, if Ys cares for my cargo. It lies now at Gesocribate, but how more glad I’d be to deal here! May I beg my lady accept a few tokens?”
He drew the cloth aside. Dahut caught her breath. A golden torc coiled on the tray, decorated with intertwined figures, granulations, and millefiori disks. On one side of it was a penannular brooch, the salmonlike grace of its silver a leap between twin giant pearls. On the other side, an intricately scaled snake seized its own tail to form a bronze buckle. “Oh! Why, they are, are sheer beauty!”
“The finest craftsmen in Ériu could not make them good enough.”
“Come. Why are we standing? Let us be seated.” Dahut gestured at a table laden with refreshments. “Carry that away,” she ordered her servants. “Bring the best. The best, do you hear? Make haste!”
In her chair she examined the presents closely, with many remarks or queries; but her look kept straying to Niall. He met it with precisely sufficient reserve for decorum.
The wine arrived in advance of the delicacies. They tasted. “Ah, a noble draught, this,” he said.
“From Aquitania,” she replied. “Stay until eventide and sup. Nay, I insist. You’ll savor the meal, I promise you, and I—want to hear your whole story, you who must have adventured from Thule to the islands of the West.”
“Scarcely that wide about, my lady,” he laughed.
“What you have seen and done—I watch the gulls soar off beyond sight, and my heart is nigh to bursting with the wish to follow them.”
“Well, I have sailed and warred. And mayhap you’d like to hear somewhat of my homeland. She has her own enchantments.”
Dahut leaned a little toward him. “I know you are a mighty man there. You cannot be aught else. It shines from you.”
“I bear the name of King, my lady, but that means less… as yet… than it does here.”
“They are the fiercest warriors in the world, the Scoti, are they not?”
“I’ve seen my share of battles.”
“You shall tell me of them. I am no weakling.”
“Not from what I’ve heard, my lady, with due respect. But Ys, now, your Ys is a miracle beyond telling. I came in that belief, and today I’ve found ’tis true.”
Dahut flushed. She dropped her glance.
Raising it again, she said breathlessly, to low for her staff to overhear: “Would you like a guide? Someone to show you what you might never find for yourself. I could arrange that.”
“My lady is too generous to a stranger with foreign clay still on his boots.”
“Think me not wayward,” Dahut adjured him. “Women in Ys have more freedom than in most lands. I’m told ’tis so among your folk too. Let us know each other, King Niall.”
“That would be to me an honor, a delight, and the fulfillment of a dream,” he answered.
3
Waxing close to full in a sky again clear, the moon brightened dusk, dappled streets, frosted towertops rearing against a sea argent and sable. It highlighted the gauntness of the man, whitened his beard and tonsured hair.
Forsquilis opened her door herself when he knocked. She nodded. “I looked for you to seek me,” she said.
Corentinus gripped his staff hard. “How did you know?” he responded sharply. “Witchcraft does not cross the threshold of God’s house.”
“Mayhap. But I have had my visions and thought belike you would have more of your own, as we both did that night ere we met in the fog at the graves. Enter.”
The atrium was warm, but cold air pursued them inside. No servants were in evidence. “Follow,” she said, and took the lead.
She brought him to her secretorium. He had never been there before. Visibly, he braced himself against the pagan things that crowded around. The single lamp, fashioned from a cat’s skull, gave more luminance than was natural through its eye sockets and out of the flame above. From shadows the yellow gleam picked an archaic, shamelessly female figurine; thunderstones found in dolmens of the Old Folk; bundles of dried herbs that gave the air an acrid undertone; animal bones engraved with mystical signs, age-mottled scrolls and codices; a couch bearing three cushions whose leather was branded with images of owl, serpent, dolphin; a rattle and a small drum such as wizards used in lands beyond the Suebian Sea; and more, from all of which he averted his face.
Forsquilis smiled without mirth. Singularly lovely she appeared, her slenderness sheathed in a black robe whose clinging and sheen mocked the shapeless coarseness of his, her tresses falling free around the pallid Pallas countenance. “Take a seat,” she invited. “Would you like some wine?”
Corentinus shook his head. “Not here.” Both remained standing.
“Do you fear defilement? I would drink in your place if you admitted me.”
“It always has a welcome for those who seek its Master.”
“Heard I a hopefulness there? Quell it, my friend.” Her tone was kindly. “We do share a dwelling, this world of ours.”
He too became gentle. “You are mistaken, dear. Earth has no roof or walls. It stands open to the infinite. We by ourselves have no defense against the business that walks in the dark.”
Bleakness came upon her. “You have had forewarnings about Dahut,” she said. “What were they?”
Corentinus clenched and unclenched a knobby, helpless fist. “I prayed for the soul of poor Budic. Over and over I prayed, hour after hour, until weariness overtook me and I fell asleep where I lay prostrated before the altar. Then in a dream, if it was a dream, I saw him. He wandered naked through an endless dark. I could not feel or hear the wind that tossed his hair, but its bitter cold struck to my bones. Faintly, as if across more leagues than there are stars, I heard him crying out. ‘Dahut, Dahut, Dahut!’ he howled, from his lips and from the mouth that the sword had made below them. He saw me not. It was as if I were not there, as if no one and nothing existed but himself, in that night where he drifted lost. But as I wakened and the world came back to me, methought I heard other voices weeping and wailing. And what they called was, Alas, alas, that great city, wherein all grew rich who had ships at sea, from their gainful trade with her. In a singjie hour has destruction come upon her!”
Forsquilis shivered. “It could have been a simple nightmare.”
“You know not the book whence came those words.”
Like a man hard-pressed in combat who retreats a step, Corentinus sprang over to Latin, not the carefully wrought language of a sermon but the vernacular of his mariner youth: “Well, whatever you think of the Woman who rides the Beast, if ever you’ve heard of her, storm signs are black enough around Dahut. Either a devil got into Budic or she did. And I don’t mean it was just a hankering that swept him off, because I knew him too well till nearly the end. Likely she’d already egged on Carsa and that young Scotian. There, I’ve said it flat out, and I notice you haven’t hit me.”
Though she understood him, Forsquilis stayed with Ysan, as if its softer sounds could better carry sorrow. “I fear you are right.”
“What’s been revealed to you, and how?”
“You know of my night in the tomb,” she said low. “It was chaos, save that throughout it went ringing the iron command that I must no longer wield my arts in this web of woe; that if I did, not only would I be destroyed but Ys might suffer ruin.”
Corentinus regarded her for a silent while. “You’ve obeyed?”
She bit her lip. “Almost.”
“What may you tell me?”
“The unmagical things,” she sighed. “Hints, traces, spoor not entirely covered over, such as you know of. Yester’en three of us—Bodilis, her daughter Tambilis, and I�
��supped with Dahut. She came unwillingly, I suppose because she had no ready excuse for refusal. Wine eased her a trifle. She would only talk of small things; her mind meanwhile went elsewhere.” Forsquilis hesitated. “It went after a man. In a way beyond words, I knew that. Her eagerness filled the air like smoke off a fire.”
Corentinus grimaced. “I believe it. We’ve got a lustful demon loose amongst us.” In a jerky motion, he half turned from her. “I feel his power myself. Forgive me, Queen. You’re too comely. Best I run from you.”
“Think you I’ve no longings?” she exclaimed.
For another space they stood mute, aside from their breaths. Both trembled.
“I can do nothing,” he said finally. “Gratillonius led off the Roman soldiers. Half my flock, the strong half. Nobody’s left but a few women, children, and aged men. I’m aged too, and alone. I came to beg if you might have some way to cope with—with your Gods, before the true God gives Ys altogether into Their power.”
Pain sawed in her throat. “I know what must happen. That much is clear to me. The King must die. Then They will be appeased, and Dahut become the new Brennilis.”
“The Queen of her father’s killer,” Corentinus snarled. “Like you.”
“I also. His hands on my breasts, his weight on my belly, his thrust into my loins.” Forsquilis threw back her head and laughed. “’Tis very fitting. My punishment for my willfulness. The Gods gave me Their word one last time, in the dead of winter beneath a darkened moon. And I refused.”
“What was that?” he demanded.
“Had I heeded, Grallon would now lie quiet,” she shrilled. “The Suffetes would have gotten us a new King, as aforetime when the death happened otherwise than in sacred combat. Surely he’d have been a simpleton for Dahut to make into what she wanted. Surely the God would have absolved me, aye, blessed me, perchance even with death in the same dawn. But I denied Them.”
Corentinus congealed in his stance. “Gratillonius’s murder?” Slowly: “What if Dahut should die instead? It’s horrible to say, but—”
Forsquilis shook her head violently. “Nay! Would you call plague down on Ys, or worse? Whatever comes to pass, the Gods want the blood of Grallon. And Dahut is that priestess of Theirs who shall bring to birth the new Age.”
“So we can only wait for the victory of evil?”
“And endure what seeks us out afterward.” She was lapsing into resignation. “Although you misspeak yourself. The Gods are beyond evil or good. They are”
“Christ is otherwise.”
“How strong is He?”
“More than you can understand, my child.” Corentinus took firmer hold of his staff. “I suppose we’ve said all we have to say. I’m going back to implore His mercy on Ys. Your name will be second on my tongue, straight after Dahut’s.”
“Goodnight.” She stayed where she was, by the tall unwavering lamp flame, and let him find his own way out.
4
Clouds raced on a wild wind. Now and then stars glimmered among their tatters. The full moon seemed to flee above eastern hills. It cast hoar light over the edges of the clouds, light that blinked across the land beneath and turned the manes of waves into flying fire. When one stood at the bottom of a tower and looked up, it was as if the height were toppling.
A lantern bobbed in the right hand of a big man. His left arm was around the waist of a smaller companion, likewise in Scotic male garb. Wind flapped their cloaks and skirled around their footsteps.
“Did I not promise you we’d find merriment aplenty in Lowtown?” Dahut asked.
“You did that,” Niall answered, “and you kept the promise, too. ’Tis sorry I am to part.”
“Oh, we needn’t yet. See, yonder’s the widower’s house. Come on to Cian’s room and share a cup with your guide.”
Niall’s hold on her tightened. She leaned closer.
They made a game of tiptoeing upstairs. But after the door had closed on the shabby little chamber, they both grew abruptly solemn. He set the lantern down, turned to face her, took her by the shoulders. She gazed back with widened eyes and swelling lips.
He bent and kissed her, lightly, lingeringly. She threw herself against him. Her tongue sought between his teeth. Her hands quested about.
His were slower, searching with care. “Lass, lass,” he murmured after a while, “be not in such haste. We’ve the night before us.”
He began to undress her. She stood where she was, first mewing, then purring, while his lips and palms explored each revelation. When she was naked in the amber light, he quickly stripped himself. She gasped at the sight. He grinned, went to her, guided them both down onto the pallet. Still he caressed her, skillfully seeking what pleasured the most. She shuddered and moaned. When at last he took her, that also was like bringing a currach through the surf, until they mounted the crest of a comber and together flew free.
—Tides lulled. “Never erenow has it been like this,” she whispered in his arms.
He smiled into the fragrance of her hair. “I told you the night’s before us, darling. And many a night thereafter.”
XVIII
1
“This’ll be yer day, sir,” Adminius said. “Go get ’em.”
Gratillonius aimed a grin down at the snag-toothed face and jerked his thumb before he turned away. It was the least he could do, after his deputy had flouted both rules and Roman imperturbability to trudge from barracks to government hostel, ask how things went, and wish him well on behalf of all the men. Himself, Gratillonius had lower expectations than he arrived with.
Drawing his mantle together against chill, he sought the streets. As yet they were dusky between high walls, and scant traffic stirred. What wheels and hoofs went by seemed to make more than their share of noise, booming off the bricks. In a clear sky of early morning, the moon sank gnawed behind roofs. Entering Treverorum’s massive west gate, he found little change after fifteen years. Or so it appeared at first; but then he had waited for several days until he got his summons. Now he thought the city was less busy and populous, more shabby and disorderly, than before. The countryside through which he traveled had also often looked poor, ill-tended, though that was harder to judge at this niggardly time of year.
The basilica was still enormous, of course, and it had pleased him to see how smart the guards were. Today he couldn’t keep from wondering if they’d conduct him back to torture. When an underling took his cloak, he grew conscious that his tunic was old, in good repair but visibly old. He had given it no thought before, for he hardly ever wore Roman-style civil garb any longer. Well, Ysan array would have been impolitic. He’d gotten his hair cut short, too.
Activity made whispers along the corridors. Men passed by, officials, assistants, scribes, agents, flunkies. Retainers of the state, they were generally better nourished and clad than the ordinary person outside. But they were fewer than Gratillonius remembered; and a considerable part of them were weakly muscled, beardless, with high voices and powdery fine-wrinkled skins. Two such served as amanuenses for the hearing. Theodosius and, after him, Honorius had restored to the civil service those eunuchs imported from Persia whom Maximus had dismissed. Gratillonius understood the principle; without prospect of sons, such people ought not to harbor seditious dreams. He understood likewise that their condition was not of their own choosing. Nonetheless his guts squirmed at sight of them.
It was almost a relief to enter the chamber, salute the praetorian prefect, and stand attentive under the eyes of his enemies. He was over the slight shock of seeing who those were, and it no longer felt illogically strange that someone else should be on the throne where once Maximus sat.
“My regrets if you were kept waiting, sir,” Gratillonius said. “This is the hour when I was told to report.”
Septimus Cornelius Ardens nodded. “Correct,” he replied. “I chose to start beforehand, with certain questions that occurred to me.”
Questions put to Gratillonius’s accusers, in his absence, the newcome
r realized. Maybe now he would be allowed to respond. Or maybe not. He had reached Treverorum confident, but at yesterday’s arraignment there had been no ghost of friendliness.
Quintus Domitius Bacca didn’t seem pleased either. After coming the whole way from Turonum with his staff to prosecute in person the charges levied by his superior Glabrio, the procurator of Lugdunensis Tertia had been hauled out of bed this dawn and, apparently, suffered interrogation on a stomach that was still empty.
“May it please the praetorian prefect,” he intoned from his seat, “I believe everything has been satisfactorily answered.” He touched the papyruses before him. “It is documented here, in detail, that Gratillonius is a recalcitrant infidel who has made no effort whatsoever to bring his charges to the Faith. Rather, he has encouraged them to establish close relations with other, dangerous pagans beyond the frontiers; and this in turn has caused the Ysans to engage increasingly in illicit commerce, defiant of Imperial law and subversive of Imperial order. He organized and led an unprovoked attack on laeti, defenders of the Empire, which resulted in the deaths of many, the demoralization of the survivors, and thus a sharply decreased value of their services.”
“Have done,” Ardens commanded. “We’ve been through all that before. I told you I do not propose to squander time.”
He was a lean man whose long skull, grizzled red hair, and pale eyes declared that any Roman blood of his ancestors had dissolved and been lost in the Germanic. Yet he sat in his antiquated purple-bordered senatorial toga with the straightness of a career soldier; his Latin was flawless; and without ever raising his voice, he conducted proceedings as if he were drilling recruits.
“With due respect, sir,” Bacca persisted, “these are matters of law, basic matters. If he cannot even claim a mandate—”
Again Ardens cut him off. The wintry gaze swung to Gratillonius. “I do not propose to be chivvied into a hasty judgment either, like Pontius Pilatus,” the praetorian prefect said. “There has been a number of letters and other documents to study. I adjourned the hearing yesterday in part because of wanting to weigh the evidence presented thus far.” Harshly: “As well as because other affairs required attention, when the barbarians threaten Rome on every front. We shall not dawdle, cross-questioning each other. However, today Procurator Bacca brought forth an additional allegation. It develops that we do have a significant irregularity.
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