Sold Into Freedom

by Carole Towriss

  The first good news Quin had heard in weeks.

  When they returned to the stern, the captain leaned against the mast. “What legion were you in?”

  “How do you know I was in the army at all?” Quin lowered himself onto a box of ropes, trying to ignore the ache that now seemed to be his constant companion.

  The captain smiled softly. “My son was a soldier. I know one when I see one. Your discipline. Strict adherence to a routine only you know. Your respect for me, and others. Your physical condition.”

  He scoffed. “You mean this?” He pointed to the scar that extended well below his knee.

  “That, and the fact you are otherwise perfectly fit. You push yourself every day to walk on that leg, despite the pain. So, which legio?”

  “Second Augusta.”

  “Britannia?”

  Quin nodded.

  “What happened?”

  “Horse reared. Then a chariot.”

  The captain winced. “You’re a tribune?”

  He nodded.

  “Excuse me for saying it, but aren’t you a little old to be a tribune? Shouldn’t you be in Rome now, with some easy job in the city?”

  “Probably. Chose not to. Long story.”

  The captain held his gaze a moment, then pushed off the mast. “I’ll check on our progress.”

  Quin pushed himself up and strolled again to the bow of the ship. Grasping the rail, he leaned into the wind, letting it ripple his tunic. Too bad it couldn’t blow away his unease as easily.

  What awaited him in Philippi? For the first time in as long as he could remember, he had no idea.

  A short while later, with about an hour of sunlight left, the ship gently bounced against the dock. Sailors hustled to complete their assigned duties. The anchor was dropped. Rope ladders were thrown off the side and the ship securely tied to port. No one was idle.

  Crewmen extended a walkway from the deck, carted off boxes and trunks, and stacked them at the edge of the pier.

  The captain’s voice startled Quin. “Ready to go ashore?”

  “I suppose.”

  “I’ll have your things taken down for you. Will someone be waiting?”

  He shook his head. “No one knows I’m coming.”

  The captain beckoned a crewman. “Take his bags to the end of the dock and get him a raeda.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  “Thank you.”

  The captain was quiet a moment. “I couldn’t help my son. At least I can help you.”

  Tia waited on the wooden walkway of the dock while Max arranged transportation to his home in—what was it called again? Philippi.

  Max handed some coins to the stranger he spoke with and then returned. “I hired a carriage. It’s late, but I want to go home.”

  Within moments an iron-wheeled wagon pulled by a pair of beautiful horses the color of oak arrived at the end of the walkway.

  Max pointed at Tia. “Come.”

  Tancorix bent to pick up Max’s bag, then carried it to the raeda. He placed the bag on the rack under the seats.

  Max tipped his head toward another carriage as it pulled up on the other side of the stone road. “Ah, I see your new owner is here.”

  “Whose new owner?” asked Tancorix.

  “Yours.” Max grabbed him by the upper arm and steered him toward the second vehicle.

  Tia felt like one of the horses had knocked her down and stomped on her. Tancorix was the only reason she had survived this far. Without him, she would have jumped into the sea long before they reached harbor.

  She hurried to catch them. “No! You can’t take him! You promised we would stay together. Please!” She grabbed Tancorix’s other arm.

  “I made no such promise. If that is what you understood, that is not my fault. Now let go.”

  “Please! Let him stay with me!”

  Max grabbed Tancorix’s arm with one hand and her with the other. He twisted until she let go and then shoved her to the ground.

  She fell on her backside, the heels of her hands landing hard against the rough stone to break her fall.

  The Roumanos from the cabin next to theirs stopped on his way down the walk, standing between her and Max. “Is everything all right? Do you need help?”

  He looked at her, but why would he address a slave? Surely he was speaking to Max.

  “Just a disobedient slave. Sometimes you have to use a little force.” A sickening grin spread across Max’s face.

  Her brother climbed into the carriage. “Be strong, Tia. Carami te. And remember, no tears.”

  I love you too.

  “Get in the raeda.” Max’s voice sounded like the growl of the wolves back home.

  She watched for a moment until Max disappeared. Then she turned back and forced her feet to carry her across the walkway to the first vehicle. He was right. She could do this. She was a fighter. Strong. Britanni. And whatever it took, she would make her father proud.

  6

  “A false witness will not go unpunished,

  and whoever pours out lies will not go free.”

  Proverbs 19:5

  Tia awoke to the noise of someone opening the door to her room.

  She breathed in, slowly and deeply, remembering Tancorix’s words, letting them burn into her heart.

  Clatter drew her to action. A young woman in a woolen slave’s tunic, perhaps a year or two older than she was, added a loaf of bread to the platter of hard cheese and apple slices on the table.

  “Good morning. You must awaken, eat, and prepare yourself to go to the forum. I am to help you.” Her smile was sweet, her voice pleasant.

  She’d been dressing herself since she was a toddler. Why would she need help?

  “I’m Euodia. Change into your tunic, and I’ll be right back.” Euodia handed her a fresh garment as she breezed out of the room, closing the door behind her.

  At least this room had a window. Too small to be of help in an escape, but it allowed in air and light. Tia did as she was instructed, and Euodia returned just as Tia finished getting dressed.

  “Much better.” She grinned. “Now sit.” She pointed to a stool and handed Tia the plate of food. “You eat while I’ll arrange your hair.”

  Tia munched the crusty bread as Euodia pulled a comb through her tangled tresses.

  “I love your hair. Such a beautiful color, like the gold in the mountains near here. You wouldn’t believe what some of the women here will do to get their hair this color.” She came around to face Tia, piling a handful of hair atop her head. “The domina wants me to arrange it like hers, but I just don’t think that will work.”

  Was she talking to Tia, or herself?

  “I have a better idea.” The comb and Euodia’s fingers went to work, but Tia had no idea what was happening.

  Euodia checked the view from the front again. “All right, let’s see if Domina approves.” She led Tia to an enormous room open to the sky, much like the one in Dorkas’s house. Six couches were arranged in a three-sided square in the center, Max lounging on one and busily stuffing his mouth with bread. Grass grew between walkways which crossed the room from corner to corner. Bushes and flowering plants huddled against the walls, as if trying to stay as far away from the man as possible.

  He sat up and spread his hands. “This is Philippi, if you hadn’t guessed by now. Though we occasionally visit other towns, this is where we live and where we spend the majority of our time. It’s much larger than Neapolis but you will soon know and be known by most of the people here.” He stood and wrapped his arm around a woman who had entered while he spoke. “And this is Cassia, my wife and also your domina.”

  The woman was shorter and mercifully thinner than Max. Her thick, dark hair contrasted starkly with her white tunic, which was mostly hidden under another long, deep blue cloth she wore over one shoulder and under the other arm. Her gaze traveled up and down Tia and settled on her hair. She approached, then circled Tia, fingering her long locks.

  She glowere
d at Euodia. “I thought I instructed you to arrange her hair as a Roman. Only barbarians wear it down.” She patted her own elaborate hairstyle.

  Euodia dipped her head. “Yes, Domina. May I explain?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Quickly.”

  “I did try. It looked . . . wrong. Like it didn’t belong. I thought, and you are wiser than I, so I can try again, that perhaps a simple braid might convey the foreign impression you might desire without the loose nature of a barbarian. I’m assuming you do want people to know she is from Britannia, and that is why she is gifted as she is?”

  Cassia raised a brow, then allowed a half smile. “There’s a reason I keep you around. But she’s pale.” She studied Tia a moment more. “Do something with her cheeks.”

  “Yes, Domina.”

  She raised a finger. “Not with my cosmetics. There’s an empty glass of wine in my room.”

  “Yes, Domina.” Euodia steered Tia away from Cassia.

  “She was worth all our money? You were going to buy three slaves.” Cassia’s shrill voice followed them down the hall.

  “I retrieved some of our money when I sold the boy.”

  “How much?”

  “Not now.” Max shushed his wife.

  Moments later, her cheeks stinging from the red wine remnants rubbed into them, Tia left the domus with Cassia’s hand closed around her arm.

  White stone houses with arched windows and balconies soared over her head on both sides of the wide street. From the outside, they all looked the same—large, imposing, without character. She studied every door, every window, every brick. Burned it into her memory. One day, maybe they wouldn’t be watching her, and she could get out of this horrible place.

  Familiar scents of baking bread and simmering soup calmed her nerves—somewhat. At the end of the street they turned right onto a smaller road that led into a marketplace.

  A wide tiled walkway opened before her. A roof—supported by columns on one side, attached to a building on the other—offered shade for both seller and buyer. On her right, the building was divided into small rooms, about four times the length of a man lying down.

  Vendors of almost every possible ware hawked their goods. Clothing, food, pottery, silver, anything imaginable. Townspeople moved from stall to stall in no particular order, stopping to chat with friends and relatives.

  Max and Cassia had an apparently enviable position in the middle of the stoa. Everyone had to pass them in order to go anywhere.

  A brightly woven cloth covered a square acacia-wood table just big enough for Tia to reach across and hold the palm of her eager customers. A modest crowd had already gathered. Perhaps word from Neapolis had arrived. She moved behind the table, pulled back the wooden stool, and took her place at the table.

  Cassia remained with her while Max wandered up and down the stoa, talking to the townspeople, enticing them to visit the new seer from Britannia.

  After what seemed like hours, but was surely only moments, a young woman stepped forward from those watching, a basket hanging from one arm.

  Max’s words—commands—from this morning rang in Tia’s ears. Smile. Be pleasant. And above all, don’t take the coin. The coin belongs to them.

  So did she.

  Tia gestured to the stool on the other side of the table and held her breath.

  Brigid, help me.

  The woman sat, averting her gaze. The basket rested on the floor at her feet.

  Perhaps if she touched her, had some sort of connection, the woman might feel more comfortable. “May I hold your hand?”

  She placed one hand on the table.

  Elantia slipped her hand under the woman’s.

  “Will you tell me your name?”

  “Xenia.”

  “That’s a beautiful name.”

  She relaxed. Smiled.

  Tia stroked the back of her hand. Nothing came. “Xenia, what is your question?”

  Her cheeks pinked. “Will I . . . will I ever marry?”

  Tia closed her eyes. Images formed. “I see a man, an older man. He is kind and gentle, and he loves you very much.”

  “My father?”

  “Yes. And he is talking to a younger man, a man who is . . . he is shaking his head no.” Tia cringed as the tears fell from Xenia’s eyes—tears she had caused.

  “He refused my father’s offer.”

  “Ahhh.” The images blurred and reformed. “Wait, the younger one is with your father again. He now says yes.”

  “I don’t believe you. He already said no. He made it very clear he doesn’t want me.” She jerked her hand back. “You’re only telling me what you believe I want to hear.”

  Tia gasped. “I-I’m not. I say what the visions show me.”

  “No. It’s impossible.” She stood.

  Tia stood and reached for her. This was not the way to begin her time here. “Let me try to prove it.”

  “How?”

  “Please, sit?”

  Xenia scowled but perched on the edge of the stool.

  “When he was saying no, your father was with him in an olive grove. The trees were full of ripe olives. When would that be?”

  Cassia moved behind Xenia, blocking her exit. “Olives are ripe in the winter months.”

  Tia touched her arm gently. “But when he was saying yes, he was in a vineyard.”

  “Still proves nothing.” Xenia crossed her arms over her chest. “The grape harvest is nearly over.”

  Cassia stepped in. “How about this? You remain quiet until the harvest is over, and you pay nothing now. If the young man does not come to you, so be it. But if her prophesy proves true, you pay double, and you tell everyone in town.”

  Xenia pondered the offer, for longer than Elantia was comfortable. “Sounds fair.” She picked up her basket of fruit and wandered back into the crowd of people.

  Tia released a long breath.

  “Let me ask you one question.” Cassia waited until she caught her gaze.

  “Yes.”

  “Were you telling her what she wanted to hear, or was that truly what you saw?”

  “It was the vision Brigid gave me. I only tell the truth. I will only ever tell the truth. You can depend on that.”

  Cassia stared at her a long moment. “I hope so. Or it could lead to trouble for all of us.”

  After a night in Neapolis, Quin hired an open-topped raeda to take him to Philippi. The wide, spear-straight Via Egnatia stretched before him. After his years in Britannia, tramping over forest trails and slogging through rivers, Quin would be forever thankful for the precision of Roman roads. The close-set stones made traveling smooth and easy even in a bouncy iron-wheeled carriage.

  Halfway from the port of Neapolis to Philippi, he reached the highest point of the half-day’s journey. He looked west, drinking in the landscape. The enormous marshes southwest of the city had once been the vast battlefield where Marcus Antonius and Octavius avenged Julius Caesar, ninety-one years ago this month. Their sound defeat of Brutus and Cassius was legendary, and mandatory study for any tribune. They rewarded their loyal combatants with land. Ten years later, Octavius, after defeating Antonius and proclaiming himself Caesar Augustus, settled even more legionaries in the colony.

  Quin studied the land beyond the city’s walls, marked off into lots. They would now be owned by their grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Not many, if any at all, would be soldiers now.

  That was fine with him. He was weary of the machinations and duplicity of the Roman army—and her men.

  A modest size, Philippi nevertheless boasted loudly of the Roman status it won from Augustus, which gave them independent government, citizenship for anyone born in the city, and most importantly, freedom from taxation.

  Sitting with his legs bent for so long in the carriage had taken its toll, and Quin rubbed his leg as the driver urged the horses down the gentle slope of the Via.

  It was early afternoon when the carriage rolled under the arch of the Neapolis Gate. Streets lined w
ith insulae branched off the Via to the south. Row after row of four- or five-story apartment buildings reached all the way to the city wall. Resplendent villas followed as he drew closer to the city’s heart. To the north lay an enormous amphitheater.

  The forum, though only one-quarter of the size of Rome’s, was beautiful in its simplicity. The Via hugged the northern edge, a massive fountain on either end. A temple occupied the northeast corner.

  At the western end, a broad walkway lined with columns faced the forum. Clearly the town’s administrative buildings occupied the whole of this stoa. The northernmost building, jutting out farther than the others, must be the curia, the home of the senate. That left the ornate center office as the home of the duoviri, the pair of ruling magistrates. “Turn here, please.”

  The carriage stopped before a marble Fortuna seated on her throne. Perhaps the goddess of luck would be on his side for once here. The driver started to pull Quin’s bag from the shelf under the seat, but Quin stopped him.

  “Can you wait? I don’t think I’ll be long, and I’ll need you to take me to my final destination.”

  The driver nodded and shoved the chest back in place.

  He crossed the stoa and hesitated before the basilica’s double doors. When was the last time he was in a civilian building? If this were a military meeting, he would know exactly what to do, what to say. There were codes, rituals, protocols to follow. But he couldn’t exactly tell the duovir he was reporting for duty.

  One door was open, so he walked in. A slave met him in the atrium to the city’s main business office. “Please, come in.”

  “I am Quintus Valerius. I seek the duovir.”

  “Wait, please.” He disappeared down the hallway.

  Quin wandered through the spacious room. Alabaster statuary stood on pedestals. Rich tapestries hung on the walls. Black and white mosaic tiles in the center of the atrium’s floor created a picture of Bacchus, the god of wine.

  The slave cleared his throat, and he turned.

  A man several years younger than Quin and wrapped in a purple-bordered toga strolled in. He stopped ten or twelve strides away, head held higher than necessary. His dark hair was immaculately groomed, his eyes the color of sand, his hands soft as a baby’s.