Celtic Fire (18 page)

She passed through the gate into the walled court that enclosed the hospital garden. The layout was smaller and more utilitarian than the courtyard in Lucius’s residence and boasted no fountain. Rhiannon was relieved to see no soldiers about.

Judging from the condition of the plots, the garden received few visitors. Weeds overran the herbs and choked the narrow paths. Rhiannon waded through the chaos, picking out familiar remedies—coltsfoot and horehound for cough, foxglove for chest pain, mugwort to purify the sickroom. Silverweed for fever, but when the peddler’s illness had afflicted the dun, silverweed alone had not been sufficient to quell both the fever and convulsions. Only mistletoe cut from the sacred grove had eased the malady. Even so, several of the elders and two of the children had died.

Footsteps crunched on the gravel behind her. She turned, expecting to see Demetrius, but the newcomer was not the healer returning from his ministrations. A soldier stood watching her, his eyes shaded by the jutting visor on his helmet. He was tall and broad-shouldered—of a size with Edmyg, Rhiannon guessed. His mail shirt molded his torso as if it were a part of him. His beard was clipped short, but its relative neatness did little to quell the subtle threat Rhiannon perceived in his stance. He projected the menace of a predator waiting to pounce.

A shudder raced through her. She straightened, holding her ground as he approached, his step quiet despite his bulk. When at last he stood before her, the glint of a gold torc at his neck caught her attention. It was old and finely wrought with terminals in the shape of horned serpents’ heads. A symbol, along with the stag, of the Horned God, Kernunnos.

She blinked in astonishment. “What manner of Roman soldier wears the torc of a Celtic king?”

“Ye are the woman the commander captured in battle,” the man replied. It was not a question.

She made no reply.

With a swift motion, he caught her chin in his hand. When Rhiannon tried to twist her head, his grip tightened.

“Let go!” She kicked, striking his knee.

“I enjoy a woman with some fire about her,” he said, unmoved by her struggle.

He caught her wrists and shoved her against the garden wall, pinning her arms above her head and trapping her lower body with his hips. His arousal, hot and hard beneath the leather strips of his war belt, pressed into her belly.

She gave a cry of dismay and tried to free herself, but his fingers only tightened. He gave her no quarter, transferring both her wrists to one of his powerful hands. The other found her breast and palmed it through the thin fabric of her tunic. His fingers tightened on her nipple and his hips jerked against hers with short, brutal thrusts.

His breath, sour with
cervesia,
came hot on Rhiannon’s neck. Her stomach lurched. She struggled again, then stilled when she realized her movements only increased his excitement. “Take your foul hands from me,” she said from between clenched teeth. “Or I will scream.”

In reply, he covered her mouth with his, thrusting his tongue deep. Rhiannon gagged and fought anew. When he withdrew for a breath, she clamped her teeth on his lower lip and bit as hard as her jaw allowed.

He jerked his head back and swore. His fingers squeezed her wrists with a punishing grip as he wiped the back of his free hand across his mouth, catching a trickle of blood. His lips curved in the parody of a smile. The expression chilled Rhiannon more than his anger had done.

“A firebrand,” he said, his cock hardening even more against her stomach. “Cormac told me as much. Yet I had to see for myself.”

“Cormac? What has he—”

The sound of voices cut off her words. Abruptly, the soldier released her and stepped away.

Demetrius and the fort medic appeared in the doorway. Upon sighting Rhiannon’s attacker, the medic came to attention and saluted. “Quartermaster. I did not know you were here. How may I help you?”

Rhiannon’s attacker nodded to the footsoldier. “At ease.” He turned to Demetrius.
“Medicus.
How fares your patient?”

Demetrius’s voice was grave. “Worse, and three more have fallen to the same illness. I will do my best to heal them, but the fever comes on like a Fury. I promise nothing.”

“I understand. Nevertheless, we are fortunate to have the benefit of your wisdom.” He turned to the medic. “Commander Aquila requests a full account of the garrison’s health status. Have your report in my office before the seventh hour.”

“Yes, sir.”

His gaze raked over Rhiannon with an air of carnal propriety, leaving her with an urge to scrub her skin until the memory of his touch faded. The brute nodded once more to Demetrius, then turned on his heel and strode from the garden. The medic trailed after him.

“Who is that man?” she asked Demetrius once he’d gone.

“Gaius Brennus, the fort’s quartermaster.”

“An officer?”

The healer nodded. “Lucius’s second-in-command.” His gaze narrowed. “Did he interfere with you?”

“No,” Rhiannon replied quickly. Cormac had spoken about her to the brute. That fact rankled, but she could not afford to accuse the foul-breathed officer of misconduct without knowing what sort of association he had with her brother-in-law.

“He is not Roman,” she said.

“Not a citizen, but he serves the Empire as his father did before him. He is a Gaul from Belgica, as are most of the soldiers stationed here.” He pointed to the first garden bed. “Shall we begin?”

Rhiannon spent the next few hours identifying the herbs in the hospital garden, hardly aware of the information she imparted. Her mind spun with the implications of Brennus’s acquaintance with Cormac. She’d thought the prospect of mutiny unlikely, but now doubt crept into her mind. Gaulish Celts manned Vindolanda. Perhaps, despite their allegiance to Rome, they had not forgotten their blood.

Night fell grudgingly in the northlands, coming late and creeping through the sky like a thief. Lucius rubbed one hand over his eyes as Candidus lit a lamp against the gathering gloom in the headquarters office. Aulus paced behind the secretary, the hem of his shredded toga trailing across the floor. The bruises on his face had turned a mottled purple over the white sheen of his skin. Lucius wished Rhiannon were here to banish him.

I’ll promise you tomorrow.
His own words haunted him as thoroughly as Aulus did. Was Rhiannon waiting for him as night fell and the house grew still? If she was, why was Lucius dictating correspondence in the fort headquarters office in an effort to avoid her?

Lucius had an uneasy suspicion that the reason was fear. He tidied the stack of wood tablets on his desk, checked the cap on the inkwell, then lined up his writing instruments in a neat row.

“—ready to continue, my lord?”

Lucius refocused on Candidus. The secretary had reinked his stylus and was holding the pen’s sharpened nib poised above the shaved wood tablet, waiting for Lucius’s reply.

“Where was I?” he asked.

“Your last words were, ‘In summary, I find the garrison at Vindolanda to be in a deplorable state.’ ”

“Yes. Continue with, ‘In light of the increased barbarian threat, I request immediate deployment of reinforcements from Eburacum, numbering no less than eighty men.’ ” Little good the request would do, for Lucius knew the commander at Eburacum did not have a full century’s worth of men to spare. Still, perhaps forty might be sent. Provided the messengers bearing the letter managed to reach the fortress.

A young foot soldier approached the doorway, requesting entrance.

“Come,” Lucius said. The man moved forward and placed a clay mug at Lucius’s elbow. “The refreshment you requested, sir.”

Lucius lifted the mug and without looking took a long draught. The next instant he choked, spewing a putrid yellow froth across the desktop.

“What swill is this?” he thundered.

The young foot soldier took several steps backward.
“Cervesia,
sir.”

“Tastes like piss,” Lucius muttered. “Looks like it, too. Have you no wine about?”

“No, sir.”

Lucius thrust the mug in the man’s direction. “Get this out of here.” He turned to Candidus, who was already mopping the desk with a rag. “Fetch meat and drink from the residence.”

The secretary straightened. “I’ll go at once, my lord, if you wish, but the correspondence is complete. Why not quit your office for the night?”

Why not indeed? He watched Aulus limp to the doorway, pivot, then start back across the room.

I’ll promise you tomorrow.

Lucius might as well have promised Rhiannon his soul, for he suspected that was what he would lose if he touched her again. She knew of Aulus. She’d seen Lucius frightened, nearly sobbing. That fact alone should have made him despise her, but just the opposite had happened. His uncharacteristic vulnerability had loosed something inside him that had long lain buried. He ached for Rhiannon even more than before.

He felt his control slip with every notch his desire rose. Once he gave in to his yearning and lost himself in her arms, he would be completely ensnared in her witch’s spell.

The thought terrified him.

“My lord? Shall I put away my pen?”

“No. I wish to dictate another letter, to the governor at Londinium. I’ll proceed once you return with our supper.”

The vision coalesced slowly, gaining form and depth by slow degrees until it claimed more solidity than the ground beneath Owein’s knees. It burned with fervor, like the heat that rolled in merciless waves from Madog’s fire. The scent of blood hung in the air as the flames leapt into the night sky. Hideous wails filled the Druid circle—wind in the trees, or the spirits of those long dead? Owein didn’t know, didn’t question.

Madog’s voice creaked like winter branches. “Look into the past this night, lad. See what horrors the Romans visited upon the sacred Isle of Mona fifty long years ago. See what must be avenged.”

Owein struggled against the harsh spear of pain in his head. He peered through the veils of time and he Saw.

The Romans came in the night.

Their Legions massed at the foot of the sacred mountains and rippled on the shore like a sinuous beast. The glare of a thousand torches stained the black waves. Shouts echoed against the stones.

The moon, a shivering crescent, cowered above the thin line of water that separated the isle from the mainland. A foul wind blew, sweeping the call of the night creatures into the arms of the sea.

The children of the Horned God gathered beneath the spreading branches of the oaks, erect and unafraid. The hand of Kernunnos shielded them; the invaders could not prevail. The Druid men took their places on the beach, aligned according to power. The women shook loose their braids and smeared mud on their flesh. Sacred fire, lit in the bowels of the forest, licked to the top of the Druidesses’ pitch-soaked branches and flashed against the sky. Their children hid in the shadows, silent.

The conquerors set flat-bottomed boats upon the restless waters. Horses swam alongside. Slowly, one by one, the Romans slid across the strait.

Unnoticed by his elders, a small lad crawled from the shelter of the forest and clawed his way to the rocky coastline. Trembling with fear and exhilaration, he huddled in the cleft between two stones and watched as the Romans emerged from the sea like some fearsome fiend of legend, armor glinting like scales, talon swords unsheathed.

As the last warrior gained the shore, the Druid women came alive. They hurled themselves through the ranks of their men, shrieking, torches sparking fiery trails behind them. The lad thought their surge a fierce and beautiful fury, not unlike the violence of the storms that rolled from the sea each winter. He’d always loved watching the sea. He flattened his palms on the smooth, damp stone and leaned forward, hoping to catch sight of his mother and sisters.

The Romans halted as if frozen by a wintry blast. The soldiers looked at their leaders, sword points dipping to the rocks. Sparks fell from their torches to sputter and die on the ground.

The sons of the Horned God lifted their arms and faces to the sky. The lad’s great-grandfather, an Elder far beyond the memory of his birth, shouted a Word of unimaginable power. The lad had never before heard the sound. He whispered it in his hiding place and felt the stones tremble.

The ground shook. Kernunnos, the Horned God of the forest, stirred. The Druid men called to him, hurling prayers into the night sky like spears. The women ran through the ranks of their men, shrieks echoing across the water. The wind howled. The ancient curse rose.

The Roman beast on the shore shuddered.

For one pure, shining moment, the conquerors staggered under the weight of their fear, their weapons as heavy as grinding stones in their hands. The lad eased from his lair, shifting to get a better view of the spectacle. The Horned God was the greatest of all and his victory was at hand.

At that moment, a dark figure separated itself from the cowering Legions. The lad gasped as the man gave his back to the Druids. How did he dare to insult Kernunnos in this way? The dog would surely be struck dead. The lad held his breath, waiting for a bolt of lightning to drop from the sky.

It didn’t come.

The Roman, pacing, waved his sword before his troops. His voice pierced the air, a thin reed above the wild prayers and savage wails of the Druids. Yet like a reed, it did not break before the brunt of the storm. The man waded through puddles of torchlight, red cloak whipping about his shoulders. He barked harsh words, slicing the night with his blade in emphasis. Then he spun about, pointed his weapon at the Druids, and gave a shout.

The Roman horde roared in response as they surged across the beach with all the fury of a winter tide. The defiant shrieks of the lad’s mother and sisters turned to cries of terror. The prayers of his father and uncles shattered as the Roman swords struck.

Blood flowed in rivers on the ground, seeping into the sea. The lad smelled death. Bile rose in his throat as flames engulfed the forest, racing to the tops of the ancient oaks to snap at the sky, shouting to any that would listen that the glory of Rome was stronger than any barbarian god.