Night of the Wolf (29 page)

Castor and Pollux clattered right back out, leaving them alone. The Gaul stood in the street also, his hands spread wide as if to say, “What could I do?”

Lucius nodded, jerked his head in the direction of Castor and Pollux, then turned and led Lucrese deeper into the darkness. “What’s wrong? Do you need help? Money, perhaps?”

“Oh, no, no. I’m fine,” she whispered. “And I wouldn’t trust those two.”

“Who? Castor and Pollux?”

“That’s not their names,” she said. “They’re called Macer and Afer and they were among your sister’s favorites.”

“Favorites? What was she doing? Sleeping with . . .”

She shook her head violently in negation. “No, oh no, no, no. Your sister is chaste.”

“Well, then, favorites in what way?”

She looked very frightened and glanced around as if afraid of being overhead.

“I don’t see a crowd gathering,” he said. “Now stop dithering and tell me what’s going on in my house. Why are they her favorites? No one can hurt you now. You’re a free woman, if Philo did as I told him, and safe from my sister’s wrath.”

“That’s a lie and you know it. The powerful in this city do what they like to the weak and no one gainsays them. Look at this Caesar. Everyone fears him.”

“He’s not the worst of the lot.” Lucius was exasperated.

“No, and that’s why they’re going to kill him. They’re already talking.”

Lucius clapped a hand over her mouth. “I don’t want to hear this, and if you know anything of such plots, don’t talk about them to anyone. Not your mother or sister or most trusted, beloved friend. Understand me?” Then he pulled his hand away. “Now tell me what that sister of mine is up to.”

“But, I don’t think the killing, the assassination, will happen. He, Caesar, is already taking steps to—” She was trying to reassure him, but he clapped his hand over her mouth again.

“Gods of war, destruction, and chaos . . . Shut up, please.”

She pulled away, weeping, saying, “Stop. I can’t breathe and—”

“Girl, get it through your head that if . . .” He took a deep breath. “There are people in this city who, if they get wind of such talk, will stop you from breathing permanently.”

She leaned against the wall, hands clasped at her breast, eyes closed, trying to get herself under control by an effort of will.

“Lucrese, tell me about my sister’s favorites.”

“I don’t know the polite words for it.”

“Fine. Tell me in the impolite words. I’m a soldier. I’ve heard them before. I’ve heard them
all
before.”

“She likes to watch people in . . . in . . . doing the act of desire. It . . . it excites her.”

Lucius sighed. “Ah, well, that’s not so bad, but
chaste
isn’t the word I would apply to such conduct”

“Oh, she doesn’t take part. No, she says her chastity is important to the future of the Basilian family.”

“I suppose it is. Macer and Afer supply the male, ah, point of view at these little . . . soirees?”

“Yes.”

“You’re sure about this?”

“Oh, yes.” Her voice shook. “I was there. They had a lot of fun with me. I’m afraid of men.” She began to cry quietly, then turned around and began to give vent to what was a deep, hopeless grief. “Participation isn’t voluntary.” Her voice was thick with tears.

“Now, let me get this straight You’ve been scurrying around Rome in the dark, putting your life in danger to tell me this ugly little secret about my sister . . . And while I, like you, deplore her actions, there’s very little I can—”

“No!” She spun around, wiping away her tears with the dark mantle. “What I came to tell you is that Philo’s been taken. He was at Gordus’ house, the gladiator. Philo went there to check on the son’s wound. Gordus’ wife walked with him to the end of the street. They found soldiers waiting there. Marcia, Gordus’ wife, tried to interfere, but they drew their swords and told her to get back home if she knew what was good for her. Then they took Philo away and no one has seen him since.”

Maeniel crouched. Then he could smell her. Mir’s wife, the mad girl. “Come,” he whispered.

She did as he asked and ran to him. He snatched her up and entered the shed. The chain clinked softly. He pulled the blanket away from the straw and pointed to the exposed bedding. She understood and burrowed down into it. He covered her with the blanket so that all a casual observer would see was a pile of straw covered by a ragged discard.

Then he raised his head and looked out of the window. Four men entered the clearing; two others were already at Mir’s door. He struggled savagely and futilely with, first, a desire to change his shape, then with the fear of calling attention to himself in his present helpless condition. But in the end, he did what he knew he must do, and roared out, “Dryas!”

Dryas came awake at the sound of her name. Her sword hung from the bedstead. She drew just as the first man kicked open the door. He was silhouetted against the first faint mixture of moonlight and dawn outside.

She crossed the floor at a run and drove her sword into his throat, then she kicked his body into the man behind him. They both went down, the first man dying: she could hear the bubbling roar of his last breath through his laid-open larynx. The second shoved the first aside, trying to get his sword clear of the sheath.

Dryas went for the best target she could see. She drove the sword into his upper thigh, severing the big arteries that send blood to the leg and foot He dropped his weapon and staggered away, trying to stem the brilliant red arterial flow covering his hands and spraying out onto the blue snow.

Four remained and they were afraid of her, but she hadn’t even been able to get to her knife. She wore a blood-daubed nightgown and held only a sword. She knew that unless she could somehow cut down the odds, she was doomed.

They were backing her away from the house toward the forest. She had to keep on backing because otherwise they would encircle her and she would be taken down. All she could hope for was that she might lead them away from Mir, his wife, and Maeniel.

Mir staggered out of the house.

Oh, no,
Dryas thought but then,
Maybe he will distract them.

“What do you want?” he shouted.

They weren’t distracted. They continued their advance. One held a spear—the long Roman pilum—and a sword; the rest had swords and shields.

“Give up,” the one with the spear said to Dryas. “What we want is you. You’re good, but we’re better. You’re over-matched. Surrender and we will leave the rest alone.”

No,
Dryas thought. She’d rather fall on her own blade than face such a fate. “What?” she asked. “Aren’t there enough whores in the camp for you?”

The light was better. She could see they weren’t Roman legionnaires, but wore much better quality armor: boiled leather with muscled breastplates, metal greaves and arm guards, plumed helmets with long, Greek nose guards.
Mercenaries,
she thought,
and well-paid ones at that.
The one with the pike was the oldest. His hair was grizzled, as was his spade-shaped beard.

“Give up,” he told her again in rather accented Latin. “We have orders to bring you to Rome. And strict orders not to hurt you while we’re bringing you there.”

“I don’t believe you,” Dryas whispered between her teeth.

Gray Beard motioned his men to back off. He continued to stand, pointing the spear at Dryas. “Get the old man and the mad girl,” he told one of his men. “You.” He gestured the spear at Dryas. “Stand where you are. If you run, this spear will be sticking out of your chest before you get two steps. I want to deliver you to my paymaster unharmed, as she requested, but you’ve killed two of my men and, if I have to, I’ll take your head to Rome.” He smiled. “Without the body, Gallic bitch.”

“No,” Mir cried. “Leave my wife alone—” Then he doubled over, trying not to cry out in agony as the soldier twisted his arm up behind his back.

Another one of the soldiers entered the house, while the third dragged Mir toward Dryas. There were sounds of a rough search being conducted in the house, furniture being overturned, pottery breaking.

In a trice, the soldier reappeared. “She’s not in here,” he said, and even while he was speaking, he started toward the shed.

Inside, the mad girl jumped out from under the blanket. She took Maeniel by surprise. He was looking at the door, but he was so fast that he nearly had her as she dashed past. All he got was her sleeve, and it tore away since the cloth was rotten.

She ran toward the woodpile at the other end of the shed. She reached it just as the soldier entered.

“No,” Maeniel shouted, “No!” trying to distract the man, and lunged toward him. The chain on his ankle brought him up short and he fell on his face.

It took the soldier only a second to see Maeniel was chained and he disregarded him. He snatched at the girl, but she had a big piece of wood, part of an ash branch, a log of about three feet. She swung it at his shin and connected, but he was wearing greaves. The wood bounced off, but the blow was painful.

The soldier ran the sword through her body, but the wood continued to roll toward Maeniel.

On his hands and knees now, Maeniel lunged for the log. Again, the chain brought him up short, this time cutting into his ankle and foot. The tips of his fingers brushed the wood.

The soldier advanced on Maeniel, ready to dispatch him, too. It looked easy. His foe was down, freedom of movement limited by the chain, and he was unarmed.

Maeniel scrabbled backward as if afraid.

The soldier came closer. He had both sword and shield. He slammed his shield in Maeniel’s body and raised the sword.

Maeniel dove under both sword and shield, got the man by both ankles, and pulled his legs up.

The soldier went down, cracking his head on the floor. But the floor was dirt and the soldier was wearing a helmet. He cursed and kicked, trying to break free. His helmet made a dull sound as it rolled away.

But there was nothing of the human left in Maeniel’s brain. He was all infuriated wolf. Still holding the soldier by the ankles, he swung the screaming man around and dashed out his brains against the oak planks of the wall.

The dreadful scream from the shed and the thud distracted the man with the spear for a second. Dryas threw the sword into her left hand and leaped right. She felt the spear point graze her stomach, slicing through her nightgown as she cut for the throat left-handed. She succeeded better than she’d hoped. She decapitated him.

In the shed, Maeniel picked up the sword the soldier had dropped as he died. The log the child had given her life for was now within reach. He stretched the chain over it and swung the sword down with both hands. The blow destroyed the sword, but it sheared through the chain and set him free.

XVI

Famous last words, Lucius thought. “I can
take care of myself.” Ave atque vale. Philo, you idiot.
What had his Greek physician stepped in? He studied the girl. “I’m worried about Philo, but I’m also worried about you. Can you safely find your way home?”

“Well,” the girl said, “I don’t want to tell you anything you don’t want to hear, but close by there is a place where I can spend the night. A shop I have to open in the morning, so . . .” She displayed a bunch of keys at her belt. “It’s only a few steps away.”

He nodded. “Good. I’ll lead Castor and Pollux off. I don’t think they saw your face, so they won’t be able to run to my sister with any information, but I’d wait till we’re out of sight, then dive for cover.”

He hurried back to the street. As he moved past the line of shops he found he could overhear the Gaul talking to . . . he’d forgotten their names already.

“I don’t like it,” either Castor or Pollux was saying. “If anything happens to him, the mistress will—”

“What?” the Gaul asked. “You think he’s some baby, needs his chin wipe? She lady’s maid. Her mistress want him hump! Hump! Hump! Gave him message where to come when husband not home.” Then he laughed raucously at his own humor.

“There’s money in it for you if you know who the lady is,” one of the unheavenly twins suggested.

Lucius paused in the darkness.

“How much money?” the Gaul asked, interested.

“Lots,” was the reply.

“Want to see money first.”

“He doesn’t know anything.” There was a certain studied contempt in the remark.

The Gaul refused to be drawn. He laughed again.

Lucius stepped out of the alley and brought the conversation to an end. “Get moving,” he told Castor and Pollux. “I want to arrive at home sometime this year.” When they tended to hang back, he ordered them, “Move! And get those torches up. I want to see my way, and I don’t want to be treading on your heels.”

The Gaul dropped back. Lucius found himself alone, thinking furiously. The worst of it was that freedmen, not being Roman citizens, had few rights, and there were a dozen places to which Philo might have been taken, including the dreaded Tullianum, the carcer or official prison and place of execution in Rome. As he walked, he felt his rage growing. He found himself struggling with the same frustration he’d felt when he was talking to Antony a few weeks ago, a feeling that somehow he was powerless to control the direction of his own life.

That feeling said that he didn’t want the future being mapped out for him. Not by his own family, but also not by Caesar and Antony. He drifted, rudderless, because he didn’t know what he wanted. Somehow the wound had changed him. He couldn’t tell what about it had wrought the odd alterations in attitude and belief he was experiencing now. Once, the fate of someone so low in rank as Philo wouldn’t have concerned him in the least. But now . . .

He knew that in Philo, he had a friend. He had drawn closer to the man. When and how it happened wasn’t clear to him. Was it the nights when Philo read philosophy and he lay there, chilling and then burning with fever, eyes on the ceiling, watching the shadows created by Philo’s flickering lamp, thinking about his own death? Struggling to pay attention to the convoluted arguments of some long-dead Greek trying to prove the immortality of the soul, and not believing one word, but knowing he was a lot closer to testing the validity of those propositions than the philosopher was when he penned the text . . .

He felt he had seen through the comforting illusions most people surrounded themselves with to hold back the darkness of the mind. A darkness deeper than the darkness of simple night. A bleak emptiness wherein the spirit doesn’t doubt the gods are only pretty images created by artists and we humans are nothing but a better kind of animal allowed a small sojourn beneath the sun by the ever-distant and, perhaps, blind powers. And then, nothing more.

So far as Philo went, he would sell the whole Senate cheaply to get his friend back.

Because that’s what Philo was, no matter what his rank—a friend. And whatever mysteries the universe may or may not hold, no one gets more than a very few of those in a lifetime.

He dropped back again and spoke to the Gaul. “Want some money?”

“A language everybody understand. Yes. What you want done?”

“When I reach my home, I’m going to ditch those two.”

“Smart. They sell you cheap.”

“You knew I was in the alley.”

The Gaul chuckled. “How much?”

“One hundred aurei.”

“Gold. Murder! Who?”

“You’re a man with a fine grasp of essentials. When you reach my house, I’ll go in with those two. You ease around back. There’s a stable there; I’ll let you in. Saddle two horses. Know anything about horses?”

The Gaul grunted. “Rode for Caesar.”

“An allied cavalryman. Good. What’s your name?” It was a jawbreaker and sounded more German than Gallic. Lucius whistled between his teeth, very softly lest he alert the two ahead. “Give me something I can call you.”

“Cut Ear.”

“Cut Ear?” Lucius questioned. To the best of his knowledge, both of the man’s ears were intact and unscarred.

“Ya! Cut ear and hang around neck. Call me Cut Ear when in army. Cut off lots and hang around neck. No problem. Cut Ear.”

“Certainly. Cut Ear, a nice name.”

Cut Ear chuckled. “Not so nice, but you don’t pay hundred gold coin for nice. Want nice? Go get women. Want carry big trouble with you? Get Cut Ear.”

“Are you free?”

“Sure. Amborux say ‘Cut Ear, get Roman home safe.’ Work for Amborux. Pay stinks. You pay better. For you, I kill.”

“Not tonight, I hope, but when I ask someone a question, if I don’t get the answer I want, you can kill him.”

Cut Ear grunted. They’d reached Lucius’ door. The porter opened it for him. Castor preceded him into the house, Pollux followed. Or maybe it was vice versa, he still wasn’t sure.

They tried to follow him to his room. He told them he hadn’t needed help undressing in about twenty-two years. He could tell they didn’t know what to make of this, since few men dispensed with the help of attendants, but they departed for their rooms.

As they left, he had a brief vision of what they were used to doing for his sister. The images weren’t salacious, they were repulsive. He decided he’d pick his own personal servants in the future.

Before he went to his room, he stopped by Philo’s quarters. The door was ajar. The room was not only empty, but stripped bare. Even the cot where he slept was gone. Lucius walked out, then turned his back to the wall, closed his eyes, and clenched his fists. He felt helpless, sick, and enraged all at the same time.

Then he entered his room. His sword was in the corner. He drew it, hoping it was not rusted or the blade dulled. No, it was still as sharp as the day he’d last put it on.

He remembered he’d had a hangover that day. There wasn’t much to do in a garrison. He and some of the other officers had sat up late. The others had done a little wenching, but he hadn’t joined them.

He’d had a strong sex drive, but the last whore he’d had stank so badly of her first fifteen or twenty customers that when he completed the act, which was almost without pleasure, he realized that the dank reek of her body was her form of revenge, directed at the men who used and despised her. He stared into her cold, dark eyes, slitted like those of the feral cats that foraged in the refuse that the soldiers dumped outside the palisade. The look in her eyes was worse than that in the eyes of the cats because they, at least, were indifferent to him, whereas a cold hatred glowed in hers and consigned him to an eternity of suffering that would not be enough to compensate her for even one moment of the life she led. He staggered out of the whore’s room and vomited in the ditch.

He’d never gone back to visit any of them again. He wasn’t sure how isolated his experience had been, but a lot of other young men seemed to feel the same. So they drank and boasted and drank some more and then woke up like him, with a foul mouth, a raging headache, and a sour stomach. Not to mention cursing the prospect of foraging around the farms of the unfortunate locals on whose necks the heel of the conqueror descended.

But he was glad this night that he’d cleaned the sword and . . . but then, he couldn’t have, because the man had driven it into his back, very nearly killing him. And so someone had come, cleaned the blood off the blade, and oiled it. So that now, tonight, he could go kill someone else with it.

He scrabbled around in the pile of military junk on the floor and found a dark, hooded mantle. He dropped his toga, the one decorated with the senatorial purple stripe, kicked it into a corner, and went to let Cut Ear in.

She was more dangerous than they thought. The awareness was written on the two men’s faces. Their commander lay dead on the ground. The one holding Mir quickly pushed him away. They had been six when they arrived. Now they were two and weren’t sure how it happened.

They both rushed Dryas. She circled and backed, trying to separate the two of them or, failing that, get one in front of the other. But they were both practiced swordsmen and it was only a matter of time before they had her.

Number One swung hard. She parried and slipped the blade, letting his weight take him past her, but she felt something like a streak of fire on her arm and knew one of them had gotten to her.

The adrenal rush that had carried her along at first was fading, and she was in increasing pain. Crash! She parried another blow, but the second sword licked at her and she found herself backing faster and faster as they both pressed her. Another and yet another. Her feet were numb, but she still had a trick or two left.

She dropped to one knee and struck upward at her closest opponent’s body, up under the breastplate. He jumped back as she’d wanted him to do, running into his partner. For a second, they got in each other’s way, but she couldn’t take advantage of their confusion. Her foot slipped and, to keep from falling, she had to catch herself with her free hand.

Just at this moment, Mir launched himself at one of the soldiers, landing on his back, arms around his neck. The man twisted, yelling with rage, slamming with the upper edge of his shield at the old man’s arms.

Dryas managed to avoid a really dangerous thrust of the other’s and opened a wicked gash in his sword arm, but she paid the price. He was able to slam his shield into her body.

Normally she would have ridden the blow backward and finally jumped clear, unhurt. But her ribs were broken and the raised metal shield bos dug right into them. The pain was blinding. She staggered back into something soft. The chain came out of nowhere, wrapped itself around her opponent’s neck and, a moment later, Maeniel’s fist slammed into the side of his head.

The one remaining soldier had just freed himself from Mir’s grip. He saw the massive individual come to Dryas’ help, threw down his weapon, and ran.

None of them pursued him. Maeniel and the rest went into the shed. They all knelt near the mad girl. Maeniel thought she was dead, but on closer inspection, he saw she was still breathing. One hand was over the dreadful wound in her body, the other lay on the dirt floor.

She gave a little sigh, smiled, and spoke. “Tell Dryas my spirit is free.” And there was nothing more.

There was no question of chaining him up again. In fact, he had to help the two of them to the house. Two bodies lay across the threshold. Maeniel gazed at a pale-faced and staggering Dryas with respect, kicked the bodies out of the way, then picked up Dryas and carried her unceremoniously to the bed and covered her.

Mir began to build up the fire. “You both need to soak your feet or they’ll freeze.” But he paused for a second before throwing tinder on the coals. “Do you know, I’ve never seen her smile before, but she did then, didn’t she?”

Maeniel paused, the faint glow of the firelight on his skin. “No,” he said. “She had never smiled at me either. She saved my life. The one who came into the shed would have killed me, but she got in his way.”

“She was glad to go,” Mir said.

“Old man, nothing dies willingly.”

“Sometimes we do,” Mir said, scattering kindling on the coals. Then he rose and went to a chest in the corner. He pulled out a mantle of black silk embroidered with autumn leaves in scarlet, brown, green, and yellow, and trimmed along the edges with fur of a sable, deep brown, almost black. He handed it to Maeniel. “Take this and wrap her in it. We will make a pyre for her tonight. The silk came from far away, but the embroidery was done by her mother and sisters and the fur was from kinsmen in the north. It is all that is left of the nobility and beauty they brought to the mountains long ago. Let her wear it when she joins them.”

Dryas said, “No! We have to get away from here. They came for something and they didn’t get it. You can be sure the one who got away will tell the rest in the Roman camp and they will attack again.”

Maeniel swung around and looked at her, an unreadable expression in his eyes.

Dryas felt the cold metal of the necklace against her skin.

But all he said was “No, they won’t. The sprinkling of snow last night was only the advance guard of what will hit today. I know. I felt it before I went to sleep and I still feel the storm. My ears are popping. I don’t know why, but they do before a blizzard. No! Soon nothing will move on the mountain or in the garrison camp below, and we won’t either.” Then he left.

Mir pulled some more heavy clothing from the chest and brought it over to Dryas, then began to heat water to wash her wounds.

Maeniel carried the mantle to the shed. He lifted the mad girl and placed her body on the silk, wrapping her carefully. Then he laid her on two of the wool blankets where he’d been sleeping and covered her with two more. He paused. When he was finished, he hadn’t covered her face. It was just visible through the fine cloth. The precious wrapping softened her features and hid the scars and, for a moment, he saw the woman she might have been if the murderous destroyers of her family hadn’t invaded her home.