by Sean Wallace
The lion lifted its head and snarled at him, in turn. Antony threw the wine jug at the animal and let himself collapse back against the divan, throwing an arm up over his eyes.
He slept again a while, and woke to someone nudging his leg. “I told you mange-ridden dogs to leave me the hell alone,” he muttered.
The nudging withdrew for a moment. Then it came back again. “Sons of Dis, I’m going to have you flogged until you—” Antony began, rearing up, and stopped.
“Is there anything more to eat?” the dragon asked.
He stared at it. Its head was about level with his, and it blinked at him with enormous green eyes, slit-pupilled. It was mostly green, like the last one, except with blue spines. He looked past it into the courtyard. Bits and chunks of shell were littering the courtyard all over, and the lion— “Where the hell is the lion?” Antony said.
“I was hungry,” the dragon said unapologetically.
“You ate the lion?” Antony said, still half dazed, and then he stared at the dragon again. “You ate the lion,” he repeated, in dawning wonder.
“Yes, and I would like some more food now,” the dragon said.
“Hecate’s teats, you can have anything you want,” Antony said, already imagining the glorious spectacle of his next party. “Maracles!” he yelled. “Damn you, you lazy sodding bastard of a slave, fetch me some goats here! How the hell can you talk?” he demanded of the dragon.
“You can,” the dragon pointed out, as if that explained anything.
Antony thought about it and shrugged. Maybe it did. He reached out tentatively to pat the dragon’s neck. It felt sleek and soft as leather. “What a magnificent creature you are,” he said. “We’ll call you – Vincitatus.”
It turned out that Vincitatus was a female, according to the very nervous master of Antony’s stables, when the man could be dragged in to look at her. She obstinately refused to have her name changed, however, so Vincitatus it was, and Vici for short. She also demanded three goats a day, a side helping of something sweet, and jewelry, which didn’t make her all that different from most of the other women of Antony’s acquaintance. Everyone was terrified of her. Half of Antony’s slaves ran away. Tradesmen wouldn’t come to the house after he had them in to the courtyard, and neither would most of his friends.
It was magnificent.
Vici regarded the latest fleeing tradesman disapprovingly. “I didn’t like that necklace anyway,” she said. “Antony, I want to go flying.”
“I’ve told you, my most darling one, some idiot guard with a bow will shoot you,” he said, peeling an orange; he had to do it for himself, since the house slaves had been bolting in packs until he promised they didn’t have to come to her. “Don’t worry, I’ll have more room for you soon.”
He’d already had most of the statuary cleared out of the courtyard, but it wasn’t going to do for long; she had already tripled in size, after two weeks. Fortunately, he’d already worked out a splendid solution.
“Dominus,” Maracles called nervously, from the house. “Cato is here.”
“Splendid!” Antony called back. “Show him in. Cato, my good neighbor,” he said, rising from the divan as the old man stopped short at the edge of the courtyard. “I thank you so deeply for coming. I would have come myself, but you see, the servants get so anxious when I leave her alone.”
“I did not entirely credit the rumors, but I see you really have debauched yourself out of your mind at last,” Cato said. “No, thank you, I will not come out; the beast can eat you, first, and then it will be so sozzled I can confidently expect to make my escape.”
“I am not going to eat Antony,” Vici said indignantly, and Cato stared at her.
“Maracles, bring Cato a chair, there,” Antony said, sprawling back on the divan, and he stroked Vici’s neck.
“I didn’t know they could speak,” Cato said.
“You should hear her recite the Priapea, there’s a real ring to it,” Antony said. “Now, why I asked you—”
“That poem is not very good,” Vici said, interrupting. “I liked that one you were reading at your house better, about all the fighting.”
“What?” Cato said.
“What?” Antony said.
“I heard it over the wall, yesterday,” Vici said. “It was much more exciting, and,” she added, “the language is more interesting. The other one is all just about fornicating and buggering, over and over, and I cannot tell any of the people in it apart.”
Antony stared at her, feeling vaguely betrayed.
Cato snorted. “Well, Antony, if you are mad enough to keep a dragon, at least you have found one that has better taste than you do.”
“Yes, she is most remarkable,” Antony said, with gritted teeth. “But as you can see, we are getting a little cramped, so I’m afraid—”
“Do you know any others like that?” Vici asked Cato.
“What, I suppose you want me to recite Ennius’s Annals for you here and now?” Cato said.
“Yes, please,” she said, and settled herself comfortably.
“Er,” Antony said. “Dearest heart—”
“Shh, I want to hear the poem,” she said.
Cato looked rather taken aback, but then he looked at Antony – and smiled. And then the bastard started in on the whole damned thing.
Antony fell asleep somewhere after the first half-hour and woke up again to find them discussing the meter or the symbolism or whatnot. Cato had even somehow talked the house servants into bringing him out a table and wine and bread and oil, which was more than they’d had the guts to bring out for him the last two weeks.
Antony stood up. “If we might resume our business,” he said pointedly, with a glare in her direction.
Vincitatus did not take the hint. “Cato could stay to dinner.”
“No, he could not,” Antony said.
“So what was this proposition of yours, Antony?” Cato said.
“I want to buy your house,” Antony said flatly. He’d meant to come at it roundabout, and enjoy himself leading Cato into a full understanding of the situation, but at this point he was too irritated to be subtle.
“That house was built by my great-grandfather,” Cato said. “I am certainly not going to sell it to you to be used for orgies.”
Antony strolled over to the table and picked up a piece of bread to sop into the oil. Well, he could enjoy this, at least. “You might have difficulty finding any other buyer. Or any guests, for that matter, once word gets out.”
Cato snorted. “On the contrary,” he said. “I imagine the value will shortly be rising, as soon as you have gone.”
“I’m afraid I don’t have plans to go anywhere,” Antony said.
“Oh, never fear,” Cato said. “I think the Senate will make plans for you.”
“Cato says there is a war going on in Gaul,” Vincitatus put in. “Like in the poem. Wouldn’t it be exciting to go see a war?”
“What?” Antony said.
“Well, Antonius,” the magistrate said, “I must congratulate you.”
“For surviving the last sentence?” Antony said.
“No,” the magistrate said. “For originality. I don’t believe I have ever faced this particular offense before.”
“There’s no damned law against keeping a dragon!”
“There is now,” the magistrate said. He looked down at his papers. “There is plainly no question of guilt in this case, it only remains what is to be done with the creature. The priests of the Temple of Jupiter suggest that the beast would be most highly regarded as a sacrifice, if you can arrange the mechanics—”
“They can go bugger a herd of goats,” Antony snarled. “I’ll set her loose in the Forum, first – no. No, wait, I didn’t mean that.” He took a deep breath and summoned up a smile and leaned across the table. “I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.”
“You don’t have enough money for that even now,” the magistrate said.
“Look,” Antony s
aid, “I’ll take her to my villa at Stabiae—” Seeing the eyebrow rising, he amended. “Or I’ll buy an estate near Arminum. Plenty of room, she won’t be a bother to anyone—”
“Until you run out of money or drink yourself to death,” the magistrate said. “You do realize the creatures live a hundred years?”
“They do?” Antony said blankly.
“The evidence also informs me,” the magistrate added, “that she is already longer than the dragon of Brundisium, which killed nearly half the company of the Fourteenth Legion.”
“She’s as quiet as a lamb?” Antony tried.
The magistrate just looked at him.
“Gaul?” Antony said.
“Gaul,” the magistrate said.
“I hope you’re happy,” he said bitterly to Vincitatus as his servants joyfully packed his things, except for the few very unhappy ones he was taking along.
“Yes,” she said, eating another goat.
He’d been ordered to leave at night, under guard, but when the escort showed up, wary soldiers in full armor and holding their spears, they discovered a new difficulty: she couldn’t fit into the street anymore.
“All right, all right, no need to make a fuss,” Antony said, waving her back into the courtyard. The house on the other side had only leaned over a little. “So she’ll fly out to the Porta Aurelia and meet us on the other side.”
“We’re not letting the beast go spreading itself over the city,” the centurion said. “It’ll grab some lady off the street, or an honorable merchant.”
He was for killing her right there and then, instead. Antony was for knocking him down, and did so. The soldiers pulled him off and shoved him up against the wall of the house, swords out.
Then Vincitatus put her head out, over the wall, and said, “I think I have worked out how to breathe fire, Antony. Would you like to see?”
The soldiers all let go and backed away hastily in horror.
“I thought you said you couldn’t,” Antony hissed, looking up at her; it had been a source of much disappointment to him.
“I can’t,” she said. “But I thought it would make them let you go.” She reached down and scooped him up off the street in one curled forehand, reached the other and picked up one of the squealing baggage-loaded pack mules. And then she leaped into the air.
“Oh, Jupiter eat your liver, you mad beast,” Antony said, and clutched at her talons as the ground fell away whirling.
“See, is this not much nicer than trudging around on the ground?” she asked.
“Look out!” he yelled, as the Temple of Saturn loomed up unexpectedly.
“Oh!” she said, and dodged. There was a faint crunch of breaking masonry behind them.
“I’m sure that was a little loose anyway,” she said, flapping hurriedly higher.
He had to admit it made for quicker traveling, and at least she’d taken the mule loaded with the gold. She hated to let him spend any of it, though, and in any case he had to land her half a mile off and walk if he wanted there to be anyone left to buy things from. Finally, he lost patience and started setting her down with as much noise as she could manage right outside the nicest villa or farmhouse in sight, when they felt like a rest. Then he let her eat the cattle, and made himself at home in the completely abandoned house for the night.
That first night, sitting outside with a bowl of wine and a loaf of bread, he considered whether he should even bother going on to Gaul. He hadn’t quite realized how damned fast it would be, traveling by air. “I suppose we could just keep on like this,” he said to her idly. “They could chase us with one company after another for the rest of our days and never catch us.”
“That doesn’t sound right to me at all,” she said. “One could never have eggs, always flying around madly from one place to another. And I want to see the war.”
Antony shrugged cheerfully and drank the rest of the wine. He was half looking forward to it himself. He thought he’d enjoy seeing the look on the general’s face when he set down with a dragon in the yard and sent all the soldiers running like mice. Anyway it would be a damned sight harder to get laid if he were an outlaw with a dragon.
Two weeks later, they cleared the last alpine foothills and came into Gaul at last. And that was when Antony realized he didn’t know the first damn thing about where the army even was.
He didn’t expect some Gallic wife to tell him, either, so they flew around the countryside aimlessly for two weeks, raiding more farmhouses – inedible food, no decent wine, and once some crazy old woman hadn’t left her home and nearly gutted him with a cooking knife. Antony fled hastily back out to Vincitatus, ducking hurled pots and imprecations, and they went back aloft in a rush.
“This is not a very nice country,” Vincitatus said, critically examining the scrawny pig she had snatched. She ate it anyway and added, crunching, “And that is a strange cloud over there.”
It was smoke, nine or ten pillars of it, and Antony had never expected to be glad to see a battlefield in all his life. His stepfather had threatened to send him to the borders often enough, and he’d run away from home as much as to avoid that fate as anything else, nearly. He didn’t mind a good fight, or bleeding a little in a good cause, but as far as he was concerned, that limited the occasions to whenever it might benefit himself.
The fighting was still going on, and the unmusical clanging reached them soon. Vincitatus picked up speed as she flew on towards it, and then picked up still more, until Antony was squinting his eyes to slits against the tearing wind, and he only belatedly realized she wasn’t going towards the camp, or the rear of the lines; she was headed straight for the enemy.
“Wait, what are you—” he started, too late, as her sudden stooping dive ripped the breath out of his lungs. He clung on to the rope he’d tied around her neck, which now felt completely inadequate, and tried to plaster himself to her hide.
She roared furiously, and Antony had a small moment of satisfaction as he saw the shocked and horrified faces turning up towards them from the ground, on either side of the battle, and then she was ripping into the Gauls, claws tearing up furrows through the tightly packed horde of them.
She came to ground at the end of a run and whipped around, which sent him flying around to the underside of her neck, still clinging to the rope for a moment as he swung suspended. Then his numb fingers gave way and dumped him down to the ground, as she took off for another go. He staggered up, wobbling from one leg to the other, dizzy, and when he managed to get his feet under him, he stopped and stared: the entire Gaullish army was staring right back.
“Hades me fellat,” Antony said. There were ten dead men lying down around him, where Vincitatus had shaken them off her claws. He grabbed a sword and a shield that was only a little cracked, and yelled after her, “Come back and get me out of here, you damned daughter of Etna!”
Vincitatus was rampaging through the army again, and didn’t give any sign she’d heard, or even that she’d noticed she’d lost him. Antony looked over his shoulder and put his back to a thick old tree and braced himself.
The Gauls weren’t really what you’d call an army, more like a street gang taken to the woods, but their swords were damned sharp, and five of the barbarians came at him in a rush, howling at the top of their lungs. Antony kicked a broken helmet at one of them, another bit of flotsam from the dead, and as the others drew in he dropped into a crouch and stabbed his sword at their legs, keeping his own shield drawn up over his head.
Axes, of course they’d have bloody axes, he thought bitterly, as they thumped into the shield, but he managed to get one of them in the thigh, and another in the gut, and then he heaved himself up off the ground and pushed the three survivors back for a moment with a couple of wide swings, and grinned at them as he caught his breath. “Just like playing at soldiers on the Campus Martius, eh, fellows?” They just scowled at him, humorless colei, and they came on again.
He lost track of the time a little: his eyes were stin
ging with sweat, and his arm and his leg where they were bleeding. Then one of the men staggered and fell forward, an arrow sprouting out of his back. The other two looked around; Antony lunged forward and put his sword into the neck of one of them, and another arrow took down the last. Then, another one thumped into Antony’s shield.
“Watch your blasted aim!” Antony yelled, and ducked behind the shelter of his tree as the Gauls went pounding away to either side of him, chased with arrows and dragon-roaring.
“Antony!” Vincitatus landed beside him, and batted away another couple of Gauls who were running by too closely. “There you are.”
He stood a moment panting, and then he let his sword and shield drop and collapsed against her side.
“Why did you climb down without telling me?” she said reproachfully, peering down at him. “You might have been hurt.”
He was too out of breath to do more than feebly wave his fist at her.
“I don’t care if Jupiter himself wants to see me,” Antony said. “First I’m going to eat half a cow – yes, sweetness, you shall have the other half – and then I’m going to have a bath, and then I’ll consider receiving visitors. If any of them are willing to come to me.” He smiled pleasantly, and leaned back against Vincitatus’s foreleg and patted one of her talons. The legionary looked uncertain, and backed even further away.
One thing to say for a battlefield, the slaves were cheap and a sight more cowed, and even if they were untrained and mostly useless, it didn’t take that much skill to carry and fill a bath. Antony scrubbed under deluges of cold water and then sank with relief into the deep trough they’d found somewhere. “I could sleep for a week,” he said, letting his eyes close.
“Mm,” Vincitatus said drowsily, and belched behind him, sound like a thundercloud. She’d gorged on two cavalry horses.
“You there, more wine,” Antony said, vaguely snapping his fingers into the air.