The Legions of Fire (29 page)

“I see,” said Hedia. She wasn't used to people being quite so blunt about the choices they were making.

“I thought you might,” said Pandareus. “Seeing that you're of the same opinion. A rare one, I'm afraid.”

Hedia was glad they'd stopped, because if they'd still been walking, she would have frozen in her tracks. “I don't think you'd find many people to agree with that judgment of me, Master Pandareus,” she said.

Then, in part because she wanted to change the subject, she went on quickly, “Why have you come to view the ceremony, if I may ask? Are you of a religious inclination?”

“No more than they are, your ladyship,” Pandareus said. He gestured toward the squad of the Praetorian Guard posted in front of the Temple of Juno; the Republic's mint was housed in the precincts of that temple. “But I thought Master Nemastes might make an appearance—”

“I'm glad he didn't!” said Hedia.

“I understand that,” said the teacher, “but I fear Nemastes could be more of a problem when we don't see what he's doing than he'd be if we did.”

He cleared his throat. “Regardless,” he went on, “I wanted to observe what happened to Lord Varus at an event as charged with spiritual power as this one is. Odd things have been happening in your son's presence recently.”

“You mean what happened last night?” Hedia said. “At this temple, I believe. Though Varus wasn't very forthcoming when we met him on the way home. Corylus had been attacked by a pack of dogs, he said.”

“I won't be very forthcoming either, your ladyship,” Pandareus said drily.
“Though for what it's worth, I don't have any great insights to offer anyway. Nor did I know anything about the … dogs, you say?”

“
He
said dogs,” Hedia corrected with mild emphasis.

Saxa and Naevius had been talking with a number of temple functionaries. One of the latter trotted toward an outbuilding. Even before he reached it, a man with triple chins and the double-striped toga of a knight waddled out, followed by four servants. Two carried a rectangular wicker cage, while the others had a baton and a small grain jar respectively.

“I gather the noble Gaius Naevius has found the omens favorable,” Pandareus said. “Shall we move closer, since you have very kindly brought me through the barrier?”

“Naevius couldn't find his ass with both hands,” Hedia said, letting her opinion of her former cousin by marriage show more directly than she usually would have done in front of a near stranger. She must trust the teacher more than she had any reason to do. “And I don't have much more confidence in the chickens.”

Pandareus smiled faintly as they walked to where Saxa stood with the priest. “I'm sure that they'll eat,” he said. “Certainly I never found any difficulty in eating after I'd fasted for a day.”

“A religious rite?” Hedia said.

“No, a rite of poverty,” the teacher said in the same dry deadpan as before. “Many philosophers claim that it strengthens the soul, but I don't believe my own soul would have been seriously weakened by a scrap of bread or an onion in season.”

“My noble lords!” said the fat chickenkeeper. “I am Sextus Claudius Herennianus, a knight of Carce, and honored to hold the office of overseer of the sacred fowl!”

His speech would have been more impressive if he hadn't paused to cough after the word “honored.” Not very impressive, but more so.

Seeing him beside the two senators, neither of whom was exceptionally tall, Hedia realized that Herennianus would barely come up to her own ear. Not that she had any intention of letting him get that close.

“Yes, yes, man,” growled Naevius. “Get on with it, won't you? We've wasted enough time already!”

Saxa looked a trifle put out by the priest's attitude. This was, after all, his moment in the highest formal position in the Republic of Carce. To Naevius, of course, it was simply a tiresome exercise that he had to perform a
dozen or more times a year in exchange for his reserved box at the Games and other public events.

Hedia's smile grew harder. Naevius had never attempted to see things from any viewpoint other than his own. The fact that this nonsense was important to Saxa wouldn't cross the priest's mind—or affect his behavior if it did. She wanted to walk over and caress her husband, but this wasn't the time for it.

“Your noble lordships!” Herennianus repeated, bowing as low as his ample girth permitted. He straightened and took the baton from the servant, then used its tip to scribe a circle about three feet across in the dirt. The ground was hard, but his ragged line in the dust was adequately visible.

The chickenkeeper handed back the baton and took a small scoop in exchange. The servant with the grain jar came forward, tilting its open top toward his master. Varus had moved closer too; he was continuing to jot notes.

“I will now sprinkle the sacred—”

“Yes, you fool, get
on
with it,” Naevius said.

Herennianus withdrew a scoopful of meal from the jar, but the priest's brusqueness had flustered him. He scattered half the contents onto the ground before he got the scoop over the circle he'd drawn. He stared transfixed at the spill, then reached for the jar again.

“By Hercules, you fool!” said Naevius. “That's enough. Just get back.”

The priest paused for a moment to compose himself. Then he pulled up a fold of his toga to cover his head and lifted the curved rod in his right hand.

“I pray to you, Jupiter, the chief and best among the gods, all-seeing and lord of all!” he chanted. “You are the fulfiller who whispers into the ears of the prophets. Be gracious, all-seeing lord of the heavens, most excellent and great! Bless these undertakings with your wisdom!”

Naevius lowered his staff and stepped back. He looked ready to snarl at Herennianus, but the chickenkeeper had already gestured frantically to the servants with the basket. They lifted off the wicker top and tipped the opening down to decant the sacred hens into the circle.

Three birds spilled out. Their feathers were completely white; Hedia presumed that was a requirement for the post.

But one hen had blood in her neck where another had pecked her. There was a collective gasp from the spectators. Even Hedia, who knew
little and believed nothing about this business, felt a stab of cold to see the blotch.

“Catch that chicken!” cried the priest, swinging his staff at the chicken. “Don't let it eat!”

All three birds turned and ran toward the grove of cypresses, squawking and flapping their wings. The birds took increasingly long hops. Their wings had been clipped but not recently enough, and when the breeze gusted all three managed to get airborne. Herennianus ran after them bawling in horror, but his servants remained transfixed.

Varus shrugged out of his toga and ran after the chickenkeeper. Hedia saw him drop his notebook down the neck of his tunic so that the sash would hold it at his waist. Pandareus jumped from her side and sprinted through the circle; his feet scattered the uneaten meal.

Like the escorts of the other nobles, the boy's servants had been keeping well back from the ceremony. They must not have realized what was happening immediately, because Varus had dropped his toga. When Candidus recognized the youth in a tunic as his master, he started after him with a shout as horrified as that of Herennianus a moment before.

The chickens vanished among the cypresses.
They flew into the branches,
Hedia thought; but their white feathers should have showed up vividly against the sparse foliage.

The chickenkeeper, Varus, and Pandareus followed—and vanished. There were only six trees in the grove, but Hedia couldn't see the men among them.

And from the increasingly desperate shouts of Candidus and the rest of Varus's escort, neither could they.

C
ORYLUS AWAKENED IN BROAD DAYLIGHT
and slid open the curtain of the alcove. Though the shutters were closed, the suite was so bright that he had to squint.

“Good morning, Master Corylus,” said an oily under-steward who'd been part of Varus's escort at the Temple of Jupiter. He bowed deeply. Three footmen stood with him against the outside wall of the bedroom proper. “His young lordship instructed us to provide you with whatever you wished upon rising.”

That's typically thoughtful of Varus,
Corylus thought. The fact that his
friend had been able to get up and dress without waking his guest was remarkable, though.
I must have been sleeping the sleep of the dead
.

“A little bread and wine for breakfast, if you please,” he said aloud. His stomach rumbled. He thought of porridge but decided he didn't want the weight.
But perhaps some cheese? No, not that either
.

A footman scurried off in silent obedience. Corylus thought of the dream he'd had, then looked down. His feet were splashed with mud, and a half-rotted birch leaf, one cast the previous fall, stuck to the inside of his left arch.

He peeled it off, thinking. The servants watched, silent and probably uninterested. The leaf was a matter of concern only because of the dream—of which they knew nothing.

Corylus swallowed. “What time is it?” he asked, suddenly remembering that he'd promised Alphena to exercise with her.

“Almost half past the third hour, sir,” said the steward, bowing again.
His name's Manetho, isn't it?
Not that it mattered. “The young master has gone with his father and mother to the Temple of Jupiter to take auspices for the noble Lord Saxa's consulate.”

The steward coughed delicately into his palm. “The young master directed that we show you every courtesy until his return, which he expected would be not long after midday.”

The footman reentered the suite. Instead of bringing a quarter loaf of bread and a cup of wine lees to dip it in—Corylus's normal breakfast, perhaps with fruit or (out of season) dried fruit—he was accompanied by four members of the kitchen staff. The first held a platter with six styles of breads and buns; a silver mixing bowl and cup were on the second man's tray; and the maids carried a jar of wine and a jar of water respectively.

Corylus stared at them in a mixture of frustration and horror.
They
knew
I just wanted a simple breakfast!
But maybe they didn't know; and anyway if they brought this panoply, they couldn't be accused of not carrying out the young master's orders. Varus wouldn't play that sort of game. His sister might if she was in a bad mood, though; and Alphena seemed to have more than her share of bad moods.

“Right,” he said. He was
still
frustrated and more than a little horrified. He wouldn't take it out on the servants, but neither was he going to be bound by their standards of propriety.

Corylus took the wine jar from the girl—she
eep
ed but didn't object—and the cup from its tray, then poured a few ounces of unmixed wine into the cup. He returned the jar, then took what he hoped was a wheat bun from the other tray while the servants watched in concern.

He'd expected Manetho to protest aloud. He seemed to have become less officiously garrulous than Corylus remembered him being in the past.

“I'm going into the back garden to eat my breakfast,” Corylus said in what could easily have been taken as a challenging tone. “I do not wish to be attended while I do so.”

He turned toward the door to the suite. Manetho bent to whisper in the ear of a footman. As soon as Corylus was out of the door, the footman sprinted past him.

Nothing is simple,
Corylus thought with a grimace. But in this case, the footman was probably going to clear the garden for him.

That
was
an advantage to being extremely rich. You certainly couldn't get everybody out of the central courtyard of the apartment block Corylus lived in, not unless you were willing to deploy most of a cohort for the job.

Corylus sauntered past the gymnasium on one side and the summer dining room on the other. A miscellaneous group of servants was leaving the garden as he approached; they hastened to get out of his way. Mostly they turned their faces away when they saw him, but the footman who'd brought the warning made a short bow of acknowledgment.

The gate onto the alley banged closed as Corylus entered by the inside door. Apparently Manetho's order had applied—or been applied—to the guard on duty as well as to loitering members of the household staff. Corylus didn't imagine that he had real privacy, but at least he wouldn't find himself listening to a watchman's reminiscences about service in the army … or the city watch … or the bodyguard of some Lycian chieftain.

Corylus really wanted to relax and think about last night's dream or whatever it was, before he had to deal with Alphena. That wasn't going to be relaxing.

There were two trees in the garden, a pear and a peach, but the pear was leafless and the bark was scaling off its dead trunk. Munching a bite of bun which he'd dipped in the wine, Corylus walked over to examine it.

His frown deepened. Several of the branches had split along the grain. Corylus had seen that happen in Germany, when a hard frost had struck
early and sap still in the limbs of fruit trees had split them. There'd been no such frost in Carce, not in the past few nights—or ever, he suspected.

“Well, hello!” someone behind him said in a throaty voice.

Corylus spun, choking on the last bite of what had turned out to be a currant bun. A young woman was seated on the curb of the spring in the corner beyond the peach tree. He'd never seen her before. She had red-gold hair and wore a silk synthesis dyed to a perfectly matching color.

Whoever the woman was, she hadn't come far. She was barefoot, and her garment was so thin that Corylus could be certain that she didn't wear anything beneath it.

“I'm Persica,” she said, patting the ancient stone. “Come sit with me, why don't you? I'm more fun than she was, even before the Hyperborean killed her two days ago.”