He had taken sips as he talked. Now he drained his cup.
Cadoc had listened with increasing attention. “Conspiracies are apt to leak, aren’t they?” he warned.
Rufinus grinned. “You’re not altogether the dewy infant you sometimes act. Correct. But this isn’t really a conspiracy either. Let’s call it discreet. If we can form a club of men who’re possible leaders, and it agrees on a general plan, then we can approach Gratillonius. That’d make a nice present for him, wouldn’t it?”
“We’d still be taking a chance,” Cadoc persisted. “And, and the cost is certain, time and effort we need for other things. Would the force you’re imagining—could it become good enough t-to warrant this?”
“Absolutely. Because the risk and the cost of doing nothing are sky-high more.”
“And of failure? We failed at Ys, you know. We won booty and lost lives, but we failed in what was Gratillonius’s main purpose. He told me about it. The Scotic King Niall remains alive and … free to work fresh deviltries.”
“He won’t for much longer,” said Rufinus, abruptly stark. “I swear it. After what he did to Gratillonius—to Ys, he shall not live.”
Cadoc looked closely at him before murmuring, “You’re very concerned for Gratillonius, aren’t you? As if that was the foremost thing in your life.”
“He’s my master,” said Rufinus. Briskly: “Well, what about the idea? I don’t expect you to decide at once. But offhand, how does it seem to you?”
Cadoc shook his head and stared afar. “It may be the only hope we have,” he answered low, “God help us.”
7
After the swearing to the marriage contract—on the porch of Apuleius’s and Rovinda’s home, that everyone in the crowd taking holiday for this might be witness—the wedding party proceeded to the church. There Bishop Martinus blessed the union and held a Mass to celebrate and consecrate it. Gratillonius must wait in the vestry when the door closed behind communicants in the Mystery, and he knew this hurt Verania, but she came forth to him radiant.
Thence the numerous invited guests walked to the old manor house outside Confluentes. They let the bridal pair go first, and themselves bore torches. Most of both populations followed behind. Song rose, sound of harp and horn, mingled with laughter. It was a brilliant day, fire well-nigh lost in its light. Leaves blazed with red, russet, gold, the reminding hue of evergreens. Many birds had departed, but blackbirds, crows, sparrows flew from the din in their sober garb, while a hawk aloft caught splendor on its wings. They were no brighter than Verania’s hair, a lock or two fluttering from beneath a garland of autumn crocus and the veil, with the color and vividness of a maple leaf, that she had now drawn back from her face. She held Gratillonius’s arm tightly.
Trestle tables had been set up in a nearby field, well laden so common folk could make merry too and drink to the couple’s good fortune. For the wedding party, the manor house was swept and garnished. If flowers were scarce, there was abundance of juniper boughs, fiery rowan berries, clustered nuts.
Gratillonius thought briefly that it was as if the place denied every memory of Runa, poor Runa. And today it was not a basilica either, it was an ancestral home of the Apuleii, bidding him welcome into the family.
The feast was not lavish, which would have been beyond the father’s and bridegroom’s thin-stretched means, but it was excellent, served forth on snowy linen and fine ancient ware. Polite, the company was also in a mood for enjoyment. Afterward musicians played, men and women talked, watched a performance of classical dances, talked, mingled, talked, helped themselves to refreshments, talked, while the atrium grew hot and the newlyweds waited.
Everyone offered Gratillonius congratulations. He’d already gotten those that meant most to him, from persons who were outside or not here at all, Rufinus, woodsrunners, tribesmen, sailors, their wives. … Well, the prosperous husbandman Drusus was present; and then Rovinda whispered to him, “How glad I am, how thankful to the kind saints;” and later Apuleius, a trifle in his cups, therefore extremely dignified and honest, said, “I’ve waited a long time for this, you know.”
And finally the sun set and the guests made their farewells. It was maddening how often they lingered at the exit, talking, but the last of them did finally go. They left behind Gratillonius, Verania, her brother, her parents, and household slaves. Also, Drusus had posted several armed men around the walls for the night. Nobody would make a disturbance.
Bearing candles, the few went down the corridor to the bridal chamber. At its door, Salomon uttered with the enormous gravity of youth, “God be with you, my new brother,” fell into flame-faced confusion, and shuffled his feet. The slaves said no more than, “Goodnight,” though tenderly, for they had always been kindly treated. Nor did Apuleius and Rovinda, but they two each kissed Verania and Gratillonius on the cheek.
The groom stooped, gathered the bride in his arms, lifted her. How slender, firm, warm she was. He carried her past the open door. Rovinda shut it. Gratillonius set Verania down. She did not let go of his neck until she was standing.
Here the air was fresh and rather cold, sweet with arrays of juniper. On one wall hung a tapestry—Ulysses and Penelope when she first knew him on his return—that was traditionally brought forth for nights such as this. Multitudinous candles burned. Drapes did not entirely cover the windows, whose glass reflected the light like big stars.
For a while the pair stood looking at each other. He thought that in her saffron gown she was like a candle herself, aglow above, holding darkness at bay. His heart thudded.
Her smile trembled to a sigh. “I am so happy,” she said at last.
“Me too,” he answered in his clumsiness. He could not have gotten a lass more dear. How long Dahilis had rested under the sea. But Dahilis would not want him dwelling on that. If her ghost could come tonight from wherever such as she went, she would bless them.
“I waited many years for this,” Verania said, while the color ebbed and flowed in her face. She hadn’t been in hearing when her father gave Gratillonius the like words. “I think it’s been as long as I can remember.”
“Oh, now,” he mumbled.
“You came riding and striding so gallantly. You were like a wind fresh off the waves that I’d never yet seen.”
“Ordinary soldier man. I don’t deserve this.”
Suddenly her laughter trilled. “What, shall we contend in humility? Haven’t we better things to do?”
It sang through his blood. He made a step toward her.
She lifted a small hand. “Hold, please,” she said in quickly descending seriousness. “Before we—I should offer thanks, if I may.”
His own hands dropped to his sides. “Of course. I was forgetting.”
She went to stand by the richly covered bed, lifted arms and eyes upward as if there were no ceiling, and crooned in a voice not quite steady, “Our Father, Who are in Heaven—”
Blindingly came back to him his wedding night with Tambilis. He stood for a moment at the bottom of Ocean among its dead.
He thrust himself from it, all of that from him, and joined Verania. “I should offer thanks too,” he said. The glance she cast him was ecstatic.
The formula pattered from his lips. He thought that now if any time he ought to feel what he was speaking. But no awe arose, no sense of Presence, nothing like that which had come over him when he was consecrated a Mithraic Father. Did Christ not care to hear him?
Help me, blessed Virgin, he found himself appealing. Maria, Mother of God, lead me to Him.
Somehow that brought peace to his breast.
Verania took his hand. Her lashes dropped, till she forced herself to level those hazel eyes at him and say, “We’ve paid our thanks. Shall we … take the gift?”
She’s braver than I am! he thought. Joy rushed free. He drew her to him.
In Ys they would have left the candles burning through the night. Verania went around gently blowing them out. After that, though, she held nothing back;
and enough moonlight stole in to bewilder him with beauty.
8
In the dark of the moon before winter solstice, Confluentes burned.
Verania sensed the first smoke and crackle in her sleep. She roused and shook Gratillonius. He opened his eyes on thick night and sat up, instantly ready for battle. “Darling, I think we have a fire,” she said, almost calm. Even as his nostrils drank the acrid whiff, he was aware of her warmth and woman-fragrance close against him.
“Out!” He swung his legs around, got feet on floor—its covering shifted and rustled—and surged erect. Familiar with the layout of his dwelling, he found the door, unbarred and opened it. His first sight was of stars, numberless in crystalline black above roofs and lanes. A thin hoarfrost shimmered over earthly things. His breath steamed before him. Shouts from elsewhere reached his ears. They swelled to a clamor.
Verania appeared. She had fumbled her way to the clothes pegs and taken a tunic for him, a shift for herself, to throw across their nakedness. He ignored them while he jumped forth and stared at the house from outside. Flames crawled yellow and blue at a corner below the eaves. A breeze from the north fanned them. Feeding on dried turf, they were quick to gain size and strength.
He looked around. In moments, other fires leaped tall; those roofs were thatch. He saw them each way he gazed. “Out!” he said again. Verania hesitated. He stepped back, seized her wrist, hauled her from the doorway. “Come along. I’ve got to take charge, if I can.”
She handed him the tunic. Laughter broke against his teeth. What a time for modesty. But no, she was right, it was bitterly cold. “Hang on,” he said and, while she was pulling the gown over her head, ducked back inside.
“Gaius!” he heard her scream, and roared: “Stay where you are. You’re carrying more than yourself.” Just a few days ago she had joy-deliriously told him of reasons to believe she was with child. He found sandals for them both and returned.
Garbed and shod, they started off hand in hand. He cried to everyone he saw—dashing in and out with ridiculous little possessions, moaning and stumbling along in blind funk, standing stupefied—“Leave off that! Go straight to the rivers. Pass the word.” If obedience was not immediate, he added, “I order you, I, the King of Ys.” That usually worked.
Somewhere a roof fell in. Sparks and embers fountained above the black outlines of its neighbors and splashed on them. They caught fire too. A growling as of an angry surf waxed; above it went a sizzling, spitting, and whistling; Confluentes keened for its own death. Red flickered in smoke. Where it did not hide them, the stars watched indifferent.
Gratillonius and Verania came out in the open close to the meeting of the streams. Water sheened darkly through gray-white reaches. Beyond the Odita, Mons Ferruginus hunched into heaven. People were gathering, more of them by the minute. He dared hope everyone had escaped. They milled around, wept, cursed, prayed, implored, babbled. “Keep them off me, will you?” he requested of Verania. Young though she was, she had an inborn dower of giving heart and solace.
“Can we fight this, sir?” asked a guard. “I’ve seen a few men with buckets.”
Cratillonius shook his head. “Good for them, that they thought of it. But no. Look. It’s not a single fire, it’s a score or worse. More every minute. Let’s get the crowd to shelter.”
Rufinus appeared. He spent the winters in town, except when he went off on one of his solitary and unannounced, unexplained long rambles. In the uneasy red light, he might have been a demon from hell. “This isn’t accidental,” he said. “It was set. Somebody crossed the ditch and the wall—about the middle of the east side, I’d guess—and went around with a torch.”
Verania heard. Anguish wrenched her mouth out of shape. “Why?” she wailed. “Who would do such a thing? A man possessed?”
“I suspect not,” said Rufinus bleakly. “Sir, may I take a party to try tracking him down?”
Gratillonius nodded. “Go.” He thought Rufinus must share his guess as to who had sent the arsonist.
He had more urgent business. With those men and women who showed themselves capable of it, he pushed his way into the throng, bullied, cajoled, bit by bit imposed a ragged sort of order.
People in Aquilo were aware; their own watchmen had seen and called them. Several arrived to offer help. Gratillonius got most of his homeless across the bridge and onto the road leading there. A number of able-bodied men he kept. The basilica manor house and its outbuildings could shelter them. Once again those stood vacant except for caretakers. Verania might have lived there with her husband in much more comfort than his dwelling afforded, but had said of her own accord that his place was among his Ysans and hers at his side.
He set about roughly organizing his gang. “We’ll try to save what can be saved,” he told them. “We won’t get reckless; nothing is worth a life. But it’ll mean a lot if we can keep the town granary from burning, for instance, and I think maybe we can.”
Verania caught his arm. “You will be careful?” she pleaded.
Even then, he could smile down at her. “Certainly. I want to meet my son, you know.”
“That manuscript—I forgot it, God forgive me, but could you possibly—not to take any chances, oh, no, but it is a precious thing—”
He had forgotten too. Memory jolted him. She had lately carried from the basilica what there was of Runa’s Ysan history, mostly notes, to study at home in her rare moments of leisure. Otherwise she never mentioned Runa, nor did he. At that time, though, she had said, “I have her to thank for all this about your city. Maybe we can find someone who’ll carry on the work.”
By flanraelight and starlight, he shook his head. “I’m sorry. That’s bound to be impossible.”
And it drummed within him: The Veil of Brennilis, the revenge of the Gods, whatever it is, casts its shadow yet, and always shall, until Ys is wholly lost and forgotten. We’ll never find time to write that chronicle, nor will anyone else. The story of Ys will die with the last of us who lived the last days of it; and our city will glimmer away into legend.
He turned to his men. “Let’s go,” he said.
—Rufinus came back about dawn. Gratillonius was awake in the basilica. The sleep of exhaustion held the others. They had kept the blaze from spreading to granary and warehouse. Those Gratillonius had originally directed to be built near the Stegir, with space between them and adjacent structures. Some houses had survived as well, some valuables were pulled out of others before they caught fire. It was no great victory.
Under the pale east, Confluentes was ash heaps. Dwindling flames gnawed at charred timbers. Most walls had collapsed as the wood weakened too much to hold clay. A few stood black, like boles after a forest has burned. Smoke lay in a stinging, stinking haze.
“We found tracks in the frost, a couple of fellows and I,” Rufinus reported. “Three sets. They’d sneaked out of the woods and returned. There they dispersed. We couldn’t follow two. They’d taken care to leave no trail we could see by night once they reached the trees and brush. The third was a dunderhead He’d actually made a campfire and rolled out a blanket for a rest before daybreak.” His curtness dissolved in a sigh. “Unfortunately, when we appeared he panicked and bolted. Before we could run him down, one of us put an arrow through him. I’d rather not say who. He’s young, hot-headed; the damage is done, and he’s loyal and promising. When I dressed him down, he cried and asked to be whipped. A month’s worth of the silent treatment will drive the lesson home better than that.”
He must be an adorer of yours, Rufinus, thought Gratillonius. Aloud: “Are you sure the party you found was guilty?”
“His clothes were freshly stained with oil. How’d that happen, except when he was pouring it out of a jug onto the wood he was going to set alight? Good clothes, too; he well fed, and barbered within the past few days; so, no landlouper. What else would he be doing in the wilderness at night in the dead of winter?” Rufinus studied Gratillonius. “Do you want to come with me for a look at th
e corpse? We’d better cover it up, just in case, but it might be somebody you’d recognize. Somebody who—let’s say—was with tax agent Nagon Demari on his last visit to us.
“I think likelier not,” Gratillonius replied. “They aren’t stupid, those who ordered this thing. They’d guard against the chance of their bully boys getting caught at it.”
“And mine wringing the truth out. M-hm. A middleman hired them.” Rufinus pondered. “Not common alley lice. You couldn’t rely on that sort, especially to get through the forest. Maybe the middleman paid their gambling debts and told them he had a long-standing grudge against Ys. If we’d gone to Turonum with his name, we’d have found he’d left for the far South, leaving no address, and no underling of the governor’s had any knowledge of him.”
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