Beloved (63 page)

“Because of Aurelian? I understand why you have taken him as a lover, Zenobia. As an imperial captive you had no choice in the matter short of death. You are not a woman to take the easy way, my darling.”

For a brief moment she thought of all that had passed between herself and the emperor. No, she would not have willingly accepted him as a lover, lust or no, had he not forced her.

A brief shadow of worry crossed her beautiful face, and he instantly asked, “What is it, beloved?”

“There is now,” she said, “but what of tomorrow?”

“I do not know,” he answered her honestly.

“So I must remain a choice bone to be fought over by the two of you,” she said softly.

He sighed. “My love for you cannot put you in such a terrible position, beloved.” Then he groaned. “Zenobia, is there nothing for us? I cannot go on like this. I dare not be seen with you publicly. I cannot even see my daughter except across a garden wall. I must not speak to the child lest she make some innocent remark to the emperor and compromise us both. It is not to be borne!”

Compassionately she put her arms around him, holding him close. He offered her the chance to walk away from this encounter. To remain meant that once more they would become lovers, and then when Aurelian returned and she welcomed him to her bed, she would truly become a whore. It isn’t fair, she thought angrily. None of this is of my making, yet I am a pawn. Suddenly his voice cut into her thoughts.

“Zenobia, once I asked you to marry me secretly, but you refused for the sake of your son, and your position. Now will I ask you again. There are many forms of Roman marriage, but legally all that is necessary is that we consent to live together as man and wife. If we make this consent before several witnesses—my mother, old Bab, and your younger servant, Adria—then our union is legal. Will you marry me, beloved? Now? Tonight?”

“But what of Aurelian? He is already on his way back from Gaul. How can I be your wife and his mistress? I do not think that I can do it, Marcus. Not even for you, my love.”

“You won’t have to, beloved. I promised Gaius Cicero that I should look in on his wife while he was away; and when I visited with Clodia today she read me his latest message to her. Aurelian plans to stay in Rome but a very short time when he returns from Gaul. His next campaign must begin almost immediately. He goes east again toward Byzantium. There are rumblings there of extreme discomfort, and unless he can quell them he will have a great deal of trouble on his hands.”

“A winter campaign? Your rumblings must be serious.”

“He will be in Rome less than a month. You can hold him off by claiming to be pregnant. Not only will it keep him off you, but it will prevent him from taking you with him on campaign.”

“Yes,” she said slowly, “I could do that. The emperor desperately wants a child; but Marcus, when he returns from this war with Byzantium? What will we do then?”

“We will not be here then, Zenobia. None of us are kept under
guard any longer, a mistake on Aurelian’s part. While he marches his army across Macedonia, we will be making our way to Britain. Winter travel is dangerous, but we will survive. No one will come after us, I swear, for who will know we are gone? You do not entertain, nor do you socialize with fashionable Rome. It could be that you will not be missed until Aurelian returns, and our trail will long be cold by then.”

“He will know we have gone to Britain,” she said, “especially if you and your mother are missing, too.”

“We will be where he cannot find us, beloved, I promise you that. We will not go to my mother’s people, but rather to a group of small islands at the very tip of Britain. I visited them once when I was a boy. My grandfather owned one of those little islands—it was a dowry from one of his wives. It belongs to Aulus now, but I know that he will give it to us. It is very tiny, but it is warm almost all the year long, and there are palm trees there. Not our beautiful Palmyran palms, but palm trees nonetheless. The Romans have never been seen upon those islands, Zenobia. Aurelian will not find us there.”

“My son is in Cyrene,” she said. “What will Aurelian do to him, Marcus?”

He smiled. There were so many barriers to their being together, but he would dismantle them one by one until she was content. “If I swear to you that I will arrange to see to your entire family’s escape, will you marry me tonight?”

“Yes!”

“Then I promise you, beloved. Everything shall be as you want.”

Suddenly Zenobia began to giggle, and when he looked somewhat puzzled she stopped and explained. “How can I ever explain to our children that their father proposed marriage to me while we both knelt naked in a cave?”

A dark eyebrow waggled dangerously at her. “You plan to give me children, my beauty?” he queried.

“Of course!” she exclaimed indignantly. “I may be past thirty, but I can yet give you children!”

“Then let us start now, beloved,” he said, and pulled her down upon his cloak with him. “I have hungered for you, Zenobia, for two years. I am no longer interested in talk.”

“Then be silent, Marcus Britainus,” she commanded him, and drawing his head to hers she kissed him a long and sweet kiss.

Although his head was spinning, he still managed to place an
arm about her shoulders and cradle her against him. His big hand caressed her full breasts, and Zenobia felt a thrill run through her. She had never again thought to be loved by him, and now as his passion grew her own rose to match his. He bent his dark chestnut head to nuzzle at her breasts, and shifting so that she lay upon her back, she drew him as close to her as she could, murmuring softly as his tongue encircled her taut nipples. She threaded her fingers through his thick hair, and with one hand rubbed the sensitive back of his neck.

“Oh, Marcus,” she murmured, “you will think me wanton, but I am so filled with desire for you, my darling. Do not play long with me, I beg you.”

With a low rumble of deep laughter, he lifted his head from her ripe breasts and, shifting his position slightly, gently entered her. Simultaneously they sighed, and then as he began to move in a slow and sensuous rhythm against her, she nipped him lightly upon his shoulder. “Little wildcat,” he whispered, “I love you.”

“I love you,” she whispered back, and then Zenobia gave herself over to the storm of passion that built quickly within her, sending her moaning and thrashing against him as her desire peaked over and over again. Still he would not give her release, and when she roundly cursed him in her childhood Bedawi dialect he laughed aloud, but continued the pleasure-pain until he knew from her mewlings and whimperings that she would bear no more. Only then did he tumble with her into that dark abyss of passion, already longing to possess her again.

With the saucer lamp flickering low, and the chill of the little, damp cave licking at their naked flesh, the lovers did not stay long that night. They now desired only one thing: to pledge themselves quickly in matrimony before witnesses. Neither would feel safe until that sacred promise had been made to the other. Alone each was helpless, together they were invincible.

Silently, hurriedly, they dressed and left the cave, walking swiftly back down the pebbled beach and up the cliff staircase. Although they had been gone less than an hour, night had fallen, and had it not been for the quarter moon they would have had a hard time finding their way. Dagian dozed, her head nodding against her chest as she sat waiting on the marble bench. Gently Marcus kissed her, and she awoke with a small start.

Before she could speak he said, “Zenobia and I intend to marry tonight, Mother. Will you go to her house, and bring old Bab and Adria here to us? We will pledge ourselves here beneath the night
sky for all the gods to see. Let Diana, the goddess of the moon, and the hunt, be our chief witness.”

“If Aurelian learns of this …” Dagian said quietly, but Zenobia cut her short.

“Tonight we have learned that there is no life for us apart. We should rather face the emperor’s wrath than ever be separated again, Dagian.”

“Besides, Mother, he is not going to know. Trust me, for this time I have a foolproof plan.”

Dagian could see that there was no reasoning with either of them. The light of their shared love shone in both their eyes, and she realized that further argument would be useless. Obedient to her son’s wishes, she rose from her marble bench and hurried off to Zenobia’s villa to fetch the queen’s two faithful servants. When she was well out of earshot Zenobia turned to her beloved, and said softly, “I cannot tell Aurelian that I am with child, Marcus. Not when he first returns, at least. He is no fool for all his passion for me. If I say I am to bear his child, he will call in a physician to examine me. He will want to be assured that both the child and I are in good health; he will want to know the birthdate; he will want reassurance. Whether I am your wife, or not, I will have to play his whore a little time longer. If you love me, and value our safety, then you must live with that knowledge. Can you? Perhaps you would prefer that we wait until we can escape to Britain.” Her gray eyes looked searchingly at him. “Tell me true, my darling.”

For a moment Marcus looked unhappy. The mere thought of Aurelian touching Zenobia infuriated him, yet he knew she was right. If she claimed to be with child, an excited and happy emperor would demand not only proof of her condition, but more dangerous knowledge as well. Still, he did not want to wait. Even knowing that she must bed again with the emperor, Marcus wanted Zenobia for his wife—now, tonight. What she did with Aurelian would mean nothing to her, and in the years to come the memory would fade from both their minds. What she did she did for love of him, for their future together, for their descendants. “I love you,” he said quietly. “I do not choose to wait.” Then he took her into his arms and kissed her tenderly. “You have always been my wife, beloved.”

She brushed the sudden tears from her cheeks. “I think that perhaps the gods have not deserted me after all. Mayhap they were merely testing me, for this night I have found the kind of happiness that is rarely granted to any mortal.”

“Are you not Zenobia, the Queen of Palmyra?” he said. “Are you not beloved of the gods, of your people, and of me?”

“Oh yes,” she whispered breathily at him. “Yes, my darling, darling Marcus!” And she clung hungrily to him, looking up at him with the shining light of her love, transforming her whole being until she seemed almost luminous.

He stared down at her transfixed, totally unaware that his own love shone as brightly, infusing her with such warmth and well-being that for the first time in months she felt safe, no longer afraid. She had lived with fear these many months, although never once had she dared admit it, even to herself. Now, like a ship escaped from a terrible tempest, she was in a safe harbor.

At a noise on the path they broke apart. Into view came Dagian, Bab, and Adria.

Zenobia’s elderly servant looked at Marcus with a sharp eye. “So, Marcus Alexander Britainus, you are finally come back to us.”

“Yes, Bab, and tonight I shall claim my own.”

“It is good,” the old woman nodded.

“The slaves?” Zenobia queried her servants.

“All in their quarters, and sleeping,” Adria assured her mistress.

“Very well, then,” the queen said, and she turned to Marcus. “Shall we begin, my darling?”

“Yes, beloved.”

So in the green, sweet-smelling garden, its flowers lightly touched by the silver glow of the quarter moon, Zenobia, the Queen of Palmyra, turned to her lover, Marcus Alexander Britainus, and said in a low but clear voice,
“When and where you are Gaius, I then and there am Gaia.”
It was that simple. They were now man and wife, and he took her once more into his arms to kiss her as Dagian and Adria wiped the tears from their faces and old Bab gave a little hiccough of a sob, and then said, “It has taken you two long enough. I thought never to live long enough to see you both wed. Now may I die in peace.”

“You are not going to die yet,” Marcus chuckled.

“No, I am not,” the old lady cackled, “else who will teach your son manners!”

“And keep me in my place?” he teased her.

“My children,” Dagian said, “we must separate now. None of us must allow the least suspicion to fall on Zenobia and Marcus.”

Adria and Bab nodded, and began to make their way back to the villa, while Dagian walked in the opposite direction toward
her own house. The newly married pair stood hand in hand for a few minutes, talking quietly to reassure each other that they were indeed man and wife.

“Once you said you would not marry me except that it be in the bright light of day, before all; and that I should escort you with much pomp to our new home. Alas, at the moment I have no new home to escort you to, beloved.”

“How foolish I was,” she answered him.

“I should have insisted, especially when I knew I had to return to Rome. I should not have left you so unprotected, Zenobia. I will never again leave you, my darling! Go now and dream of me, beloved.” He kissed her gently once more, and then stood watching as she obediently turned and hurried back to her own villa. She would not always, he thought, somewhat amused, be that obedient.

Walking back through the garden, Zenobia’s heart soared with happiness. She was
his
wife now, and nothing would ever part them again. She had once warned Aurelian that in the end she would win the battle between them, and now she almost had. It mattered not to her that he would not know, at least not yet. What mattered most was that she and Marcus were finally united, united now and forever; and nothing, not even death, would ever divide them again!