Night of the Wolf (37 page)

“When they took his eldest son,” Evars said. “He’s in the bog with the child, the Veneti noblewoman—”

“Evars, be quiet!” Blaze ordered.

She glanced around the table, astonished. “Did I say something?”

“So,” Maeniel said, looking at the two old men. “She was, what did you call her? A Veneti and a noblewoman.”

“Yes, both,” Mir said.

“It doesn’t seem to have done much good,” Maeniel said.

“No.” The hand Mir used to spoon porridge into his mouth trembled. “But she was all . . . the only one we had left and I had to try.”

“Oh, yes, and now Dryas will try,” Maeniel said. “She’s not going alone. I’ll join her and we can do our best against these Romans.”

“What about me?” Evars asked.

“What about you?” Maeniel said. “If you like, you can come with me. If not . . .”

“I don’t want to go to Rome,” Evars wailed.

“I’ll go talk to Dryas’ horse,” Maeniel said. “She feels a certain loyalty to her. I’ll ask her if she’s willing to carry me to Messene. Besides . . .” He glared darkly at Evars. “She makes more sense than anyone at this table.”

“You will need money,” Mir said.

“I know,” Maeniel replied. “Dryas had a lot. I’ll go get some. Dryas showed me where she hid it.” Then he strode out.

“He will go speak to the horse,” Mir said, placing his spoon in the empty bowl. “I must see this.” Then he followed Maeniel out of the room.

“I don’t want to go to Rome,” Evars repeated stubbornly, her lower lip protruding.

Blaze sighed deeply and continued on with the porridge.

“I don’t want to go to Rome,” she repeated.

Blaze was deeply annoyed. “If I were you, I would be quiet. He’s an unusual man.”

“He’s not a man at all,” Evars snapped. “I saw him turn skin last night. And he can’t just put me down like a sack of turnips and . . .” Then she looked disconsolate. “Yes, I suppose he can.” She began to cry.

Blaze had spent his life settling disputes between people more hotheaded and stubborn than these two. He had a solution for both of them.

In the barn, Maeniel walked up to the stall. There was no door. The horse was tied to a ring on the wall.

She rolled her eye at him.

He snorted.

She blew between her lips.

Maeniel grunted a horse grunt.

She lifted her right forehoof and put it down with a thump.

He leaned against a beam and let go with what to Mir sounded like a few more grunts.

She pawed the dirt with a forehoof.

He said, “Messene.”

The horse turned and presented him with her broad behind, looked back, and rolled an eye at him.

“Well?” Mir asked.

“She has to think about it, but she probably will. Then I’ll turn her loose. She was borrowed from some people near the coast and is pretty sure she can find her way home.”

“She told you all these things?” Mir asked with some skepticism.

“No,” Maeniel said. “She told me about where she lives night before last. We were passing the time of day and I was practicing my horse. We aren’t particularly friendly. Usually we eat them.”

“I can see how that might make for an uneasy relationship.”

“Yes, most of them won’t speak to us, but when we do strike up a conversation with some, we tend to avoid antagonistic behavior in the future.”

“Oh,” Mir said.

“Yes, friendship has its advantages and benefits for both parties. I believe you have an aphorism that describes such situations. They can sometimes obtain advantages for us that we cannot obtain for ourselves and vice versa. As you say, you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.”

“Ah,” Mir said. “Yes, that is certainly so.”

“I never heard anyone let out such an awful scream ever before in my life,” Fulvia said.

Gravel Voice and Fulvia stood in the wagon looking at Dryas. She was sitting up, leaning against the side of the wagon, red-eyed with fatigue and discomfort.

“He said it was the biggest wolf he’d ever seen,” Gravel Voice said, “but being that he probably hasn’t seen a great many wolves, I don’t think we need believe the beast was unusually large. What bothers me is, why was it here? What was it doing in this wagon?” He studied Dryas narrowly. “Do you understand us?” he asked her.

“Yes,” she answered.

“She spoke very good Latin when we first met,” Fulvia interjected. “I should think she does understand us.”

“I did then, I still do,” Dryas said.

“Why was the wolf here?” Gravel Voice asked.

“He’s a friend,” Dryas answered.

“What!” Fulvia screeched. “You are insolent, and a slave who is insolent . . .”

“Fulvia! You will not make me a slave!” Dryas said. “If you want something from me, this is the wrong way to get it.”

Fulvia went white with fury. “You,” she whispered hoarsely. “I’ll have you flogged until you beg for death . . . until the skin hangs in red strips from—”

“My lady!” Gravel Voice said loudly, then he jerked a thumb at the clearing where the soldiers were preparing breakfast. He jumped down from the wagon and Fulvia followed.

He walked to the edge of the camp, then turned and spoke quietly. “My lady, I have no ax to grind. In a few days I’ll leave you and I will probably never see you and your prisoner again. But I know these Keltoi and my people don’t chisel all of those statues of them killing themselves because they’re a gentle and malleable sort of people, especially not the noble and priestly classes. I think this woman is both, and if you do want to bring her to Rome alive, and if in Rome you want her to perform in the arena, I would show her some respect and give her reason to cooperate with you. Besides, I don’t know what Lydius saw in that wagon last night, but if it’s even half as big as he said it was, I wouldn’t care to trifle with any person who has such . . . peculiar . . . and possibly unpleasant friends.”

Fulvia didn’t answer. Instead she looked away from him into the misty track leading to the coast. “You’re right,” she said at length, “and, curse it, I do want this woman to show herself as a fighter. An important friend of mine is, shall we say, enthralled by the thought of a genuine Amazon, about seeing one of them perform in the flesh. How do I handle her?” Fulvia could look appealing and sweet when’ she wanted to.

“Leave me alone with her for a while,” he said. “Possibly, just possibly, I can persuade her to become more cooperative.”

He returned to the wagon and looked in at Dryas. Her eyes were closed. “You have to be uncomfortable by now. If you like, I’ll take you to a stream nearby and, if you promise not to run away, I can unchain you and get you something to eat.”

Dryas opened her eyes and nodded

“Your word,” he insisted.

“Yes.”

He had to help her down from the wagon since she was so cramped from being tied up, but he led her to the stream and looked away when she went behind a tree.

“A friend,” he said.

“Yes.”

“You wouldn’t care to give me a more detailed explanation.”

“No.”

“I thought not.”

She came from behind the tree, went down to the stream, and began to wash her hands and face.

He glanced uphill to where the soldiers were working around the camp. Fulvia was nowhere to be seen and the men were out of earshot. “You’re important. She paid me a thousand in gold to bring you back. I’m not a fool. I know your kind and you wouldn’t be alive now if you didn’t want to be, so you must have something in mind. These Romans are bastards. So . . . let her bribe you and maybe push you a little. I told her I’d get you into a more cooperative frame of mind. Play along and I’ll help you get to the coast alive. After that, you’re on your own. Pretend you want money. Gold. That’s the best tack to take with them. They’re right about me, I do. But you, no. What’s your name, dark woman?”

“Dryas.”

He nodded. “Aquila.”

“Thank you, Aquila.”

“Good luck, Dryas.”

When Lucius arrived home, he went to see Aristo. “How much money do I have?” he asked.

“A lot,” Aristo answered.

“Good! Enough to raise a legion?”

“Yes, easily about three times that much.”

“Send him, Caesar, enough for a legion and sufficient to pay the men for a year.”

“This is what is desired?”

“Yes.”

“And you will get what you want?”

“Yes. I also want a wooden bowl, but I can get that in the kitchen.”

“To be sure,” Aristo said. “I thought you might be contemplating some such transaction and have prepared the paperwork.”

Aristo handed Lucius several sheets of paper. Lucius duly read them and then signed each.

“Yes,” Aristo said. “Blood will tell. I believe you will probably be as successful as your grandfather was.”

“My grandfather?”

“Yes, he really founded the fortunes of the Basilian family. I was only a young boy when we met. He bought me from a family that couldn’t feed their children any longer. Those were the very bad times of Marius and Sulla. Many were impoverished during their proscriptions, my parents among them.”

“How terrible!” Lucius whispered.

“No,” Aristo said. “As it turned out, their misfortunes were my good fortune and, in the long term, theirs also. Because of your grandfather’s wisdom, they recouped all they had lost and much more, as did I and my brothers and sisters. Your family is among the richest knightly families in Rome.”

Lucius swallowed. “But you became a slave.”

“My boy! My boy!” Aristo sighed. “Men have accepted slavery to acquire the position I got and that my father held before me, dispensator to a family on the rise, as yours was then. I believe my father felt your grandfather might be there to take advantage of our disaster—supporting Marius—but when we heard his offer . . . He tendered a princely sum, one that allowed my mother to live well and my sisters to make excellent marriages. Of course, Mother had to divorce Father. Too bad. She was hard hit by that. She loved my father. They were together at the end, though.”

“Things don’t always turn out so well though, do they?” Lucius asked. “Consider Octus.”

Aristo frowned. “I wasn’t aware you knew.”

“It took a while to jog my memory. I didn’t connect my mother’s steward with the elderly porter in chains at the door. But when I saw him better dressed and walking about the house at liberty, I remembered. He deserved a lot better of this family. A lot better of my mother’s son.”

Aristo looked uneasy. “Possibly, but then your father may have had his reasons. I can’t say. He didn’t communicate them to me . . . or anyone. I can only speak for myself. And we, my family, prospered. My father received his freedom when your grandfather died. I got mine when your father passed on.” The old man leaned back in his chair, lifted a small knife from the table, and sharpened the nib of his pen. “I didn’t say this to elicit your sympathy, but only to make the point that in this life, sometimes we have no choice.”

Lucius nodded. “I was maneuvered.”

“Very probably. I can’t prove it, of course, and even if I could, what would you be able to do about it?”

“Nothing.” Lucius looked down at his fingers. “Who was the instigator?”

“Probably Antony. I tell you this because I believe you to be your grandfather’s true descendant and cool enough to be able to use this information for your own benefit and those you are determined to protect. And by the by, your sister’s idea about planting vines in Gaul is probably a good one, so stay out of her way.”

He felt a sense of dismissal. Aristo bent over the papers on his desk again and his pen began scratching.

“They say there are sixty of them,” Lucius said.

Aristo’s pen halted and his head came up. He looked Lucius full in the eye. “ ‘They’ say a lot of things. What do you think?”

“Folly! The worst kind of folly! I don’t like politics. Gambling with money is bad enough. I don’t care to risk my life.”

“You may not have a choice.” Aristo spoke quietly.

“Do you know, Caesar said the very same thing.”

“Caesar is probably right. So were I you, I would prepare myself. By the way, you did a very nice job of bringing Firminius to heel. I don’t think you’ll have any further problems with him and neither will I. However, your sister is quite another matter.”

“Speaking of my sister . . .” Lucius paused in the doorway. “There is a cookshop near the Curia. The proprietress did me a . . . service.”

“Say no more,” Aristo interrupted. “Please!” His eyes were hooded.

Yes,
Lucius thought,
not a safe topic. Not in this household. If Fulvia found out . . .

“You don’t look closely at papers you sign, do you?” Aristo asked. He proffered one to Lucius. Lucrese’s debt to Myrtus was paid in full.

Lucius nodded, smiled, and handed the document back to Aristo while pondering the paradox that, in a world where few could read, a written communication was safer than speech. If he uttered one word about the matter, it might be repeated in every household in Rome before nightfall, but buried in a pile of dusty household accounts, no one would ever know. He smiled again and was gone.

XX

It wasn’t yet dawn. Dryas looked through the portcullis at the arena. Only a few torches burned outside and, though she’d never seen one before, the arena matched Mir’s description. This wasn’t very big, though. Yes, there were the seats rising in tiers, one above the other, but there were no more than eight or nine rows.

It had a box overlooking the sand-covered surface. The raised box was ringed by a rail of iron spikes curved down so as to give a good view of anyone sitting behind them, but placed to prevent any of the participants in the entertainment, provided by humans or animals in the ring, from reaching these important spectators.

“Yes,” she said quietly. She was alone. She had been brought to Rome in the late afternoon. She had reached the ludus after dark and heard part of a loud argument between the man who ran the gladiatorial school, the so-called lanista, and Fulvia. Or possibly it wasn’t an argument, only Fulvia laying down the law. She was fond of doing so, as Dryas learned on the way to Rome.

Aquila was still present. Fulvia had bribed him to remain.

They had brought Dryas to a cell in the building. It had no provision for air or light, being a windowless box closed by an iron grating and, during inclement weather, as it was now, by a door of three heavy oak panels. Terra-cotta brick on one side of the tiny room formed a raised platform. On it, she saw a roll of bedding.

She had been left with a small clay lamp, but it held only a dab of oil. The flame was already guttering. Dryas used the few minutes of light to unroll the bedding and then was almost sorry for the light because she saw that the straw tick was bloodstained in more than a few places.

A small earthenware pot with only a rag for a lid was pushed into the back corner of the cell. Dryas turned the bedding and saw even larger stains on the other side. The blanket included with the tick was as bad.

Outside, even with the door closed, she could hear the sound of rain and wind and the occasional thudding as the wind pushed the door back and forth. There must have been some provision for ventilation because, from time to time, Dryas felt the storm outside create a suction, and air flowed through the tiny room.

It was so small that when she stood in the center, her hand touching the back wall, she was within a few feet of the door. Standing in the center with her arms outstretched, her fingertips brushed the walls on either side.

The very animals the beastiarii fought were stabled better, but then that probably wasn’t surprising. They were more expensive.

The lamp went out then, leaving Dryas alone in the dark. For a moment she felt fear, succeeded by sorrow and then despair. The damp brick walls were impregnated with the feelings of those criminals and war prisoners condemned to the arena.

And what had these unfortunates done?
Dryas thought. Some, a few, probably deserved death, but with most, she as a judge would probably have let them off with a fine and restitution.

Most had probably committed petty crimes. Theft was the most usual one and Dryas knew the richer the rich got, the more they feared and hated anyone who tried to deprive them of even a small modicum of their wealth.

As for the war prisoners, she remembered what Aquila had said, “These Roman bastards believe the gods have given them dominion over the whole world. And anyone who says to them, ‘You don’t have a right to rule me or exert your sway over my little corner of land and people’ is a criminal who deserves death.

“The saved is the slave, if they let you live. They have the right to do what they want with you. And trust me, that’s all they mean by the rule of law: their laws and their rules.”

He had sounded bitter. She knew they must have left a trail of anger and bitterness behind them everywhere they went. By their standards, she also was a criminal. Her people had ridden down from their highlands and helped the coastal peoples against Caesar, and no doubt would do so again. So by the Roman standard, a standard they hoped to impose on the whole world, she was worthy to be an objectification of their power. A demonstration of absolute rule. Because there is no more absolute power than the power to make men fight to the death and kill on your command.

It’s one thing to consider this usurpation of godlike direction in the cold light of day; another to lie in the dark and feel agony, defeat, and pain-drenched loss seep out of the very walls around you. And listen to the rain.

She slept and dreamed somehow she’d broken free and was returning, climbing the thick grassy slopes to her home, and this evil fate was simply a nightmare to be forgotten as she ran with her hounds through the heather in the dreamlike purple, violet, blue, and pale rose of early dawn. Her soul was privy to a love of her own world so powerful it was an unending delight to her heart.

She woke to darkness and a despair so bottomless she knew it couldn’t be her own. The lost soul wailed like an abandoned child and she quieted it with memories she searched out, finding them in her mind like the torn fragments of a parchment or a collection of drifting autumn leaves: red, yellow, orange, and gold floating on the surface of a still pool. The spirit yielded up its grief and slept. So did she.

Aquila woke her before first light. It was still dark outside. He handed her a cup of posca, the sour low-alcohol wine fed to soldiers and slaves. Dryas would have preferred one of her own teas, but this wasn’t too bad. Someone, a woman possibly, had infused it with a fragrant herb, hyssop probably. In small doses it was a stimulant.

“Marcia, that is, the lanista’s wife, she says you can use her latrine. It’s off the kitchen and she’ll find you something to eat,” Aquila said.

Dryas nodded as she finished the sour wine.

Aquila led her down the stair. She’d been put on the third floor. From the walkway she could look down on an arena big enough to hold a few hundred spectators. There were more cells along the walkway.

“How big is this place?” Dryas asked.

“Holds about three hundred, more or less. Mostly less. Lately there haven’t been any munera, and no games are planned until spring, so I doubt if there are more than a hundred men here.”

“Munera?”

“Offerings of gladiators.”

“Offerings? Is that what they are called?”

“They’re offered as a memorial to someone dead.”

“And this pleases his spirit?”

“I don’t know,” Aquila said. “I am a good Greek and we never figured out how we feel about the afterlife. If you want my opinion, and you probably don’t at this hour of the morning, the Romans don’t care in the slightest how many of their slaves they kill. And they enjoy the drama.

“As for Caesar, all he cared about at his munera was impressing everyone in Rome with how successful a conqueror he was and getting rid of any prisoners who were too brave, rebellious, or possibly even intelligent enough to defy him. The ones who bowed their necks to the yoke got off. The rest, well, if you murder most of the young men among any people, they won’t be giving the Roman tax collectors any trouble for a long time.”

They paused at the foot of the steps and Aquila rapped on the door of what looked like a small Roman house. A woman opened it.

“Here she is,” Aquila said, giving Dryas a slight shove toward the woman.

The woman reached out and pulled Dryas into what was clearly a kitchen. Porridge was cooking in the corner of a charcoal grate. The smoke exited through an opening near the ceiling.

The woman was pretty, if faded, a Latin with dark, curly hair, olive skin, and an ample figure.

“Oh, no,” she said to Aquila as he entered the kitchen behind Dryas. “What is the Lady Fulvia thinking? I expected some trollop, a circus performer, but she’s a lady.”

“Watch out, Marcia. Her Latin is very good, better than most pedagogues, and she can read and write it, too.”

“Juno Matrona, she can’t stay in those holes upstairs where they keep criminals and I don’t know what.” Marcia sounded scandalized. “Come, my dear.” She took Dryas by the wrist and drew her through a curtain and past a wooden screen. The latrine had a wooden seat. There was a bronze bucket full of water next to it and a sponge on a stick hung from the wall. A table across from the latrine held a basin of warm water. Steam rose from the surface. Another sponge and a tunic and sandals hung across the back of a chair.

Marcia looked embarrassed for a moment and pointed to the sponge on the wall. “That one is . . .”

“I understand,” Dryas said. “Vinegar?”

“Oh, yes,” Marcia answered. “I didn’t think of that, but it works well. Leave your clothing here. I’ll wash it. Is that your sword? Aquila said it was, but I didn’t really believe a woman would—”

“They do among my people, and I do. I’m supposed to. I received it from my teacher when I came of age.”

Marcia’s hands fluttered. “I see, I see. No, I don’t see. You’re a lady. Aquila said you were of high rank . . .”

Dryas shrugged and smiled. “I don’t suppose that matters now.”

Marcia left to let Dryas complete her ablutions.

As Dryas used the latrine, bathed, and dressed, she could hear them talking.

“What is she thinking?” Marcia repeated.

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m still here,” Aquila said. “I swore I was going to leave them at Messene, but she’s not what I thought. Marcia, she killed about six men and Lydius swears he saw a wolf visit her by night.”

“How did she explain that?” Marcia asked.

“She said it was a friend.”

Marcia didn’t answer.

Dryas finished dressing and returned to the kitchen. Marcia gave her a bowl of wheat cooked with milk, and some flat bread. Aquila took his leave.

Dryas ate quickly. As she did, Marcia continued cooking, but watched her from the corner of her eye. She was just finishing when Aquila came back to the kitchen.

“Time to go,” he said. “She wants you there by dawn. She wouldn’t let me go with you. There’s a litter outside . . .”

Marcia left and returned with a dark mantle, a palla. “Here, you’ll catch your death.” She wrapped it around Dryas.

The litter rested on the ground before the gates. It was still dark. Dryas parted the curtains and sat on the cushions. Aquila chained her ankle to one of the posts holding the curtains. He looked shamefaced. “I have to” was all he said, then pulled the curtain closed.

A powerful-looking man rode beside the litter. When Dryas tried to open the curtain, he snarled, “This is forbidden.” But Dryas did manage to leave it open a little. Not that she saw anything that she felt would help her. Only dark, shuttered buildings, narrow streets, and the torches of outriders flaring against blank walls or locked and barred windows and doors.

There was a faint light in the east when they reached the arena outside the Basilian villa. The shackle on her ankle was unlocked and she was hurried through a tunnel into the cell where she stood looking out at the slow progress of the breaking day. The door was bolted.

With the growing light Dryas saw an earthenware jug and a cup on a bench built against the wall of the chamber. She sat down and poured some of the liquid from the jug. Posca, again. She shivered in spite of the mantle. It was cold so she drank some of the warm liquid.

She felt oddly relaxed. Her mind was quiet. She was sure she would die soon. Might a way open for her to take this Caesar with her? The wolf hadn’t said he would follow her, but she thought just possibly he might. If he did, he might be a useful ally. She rested her back against the wall and waited in complete tranquility for what was to come.

Octus woke Philo about the same time Dryas arrived. Philo got up and began to dress.

“She will want you,” Octus said. He looked haggard.

“What happened?”

Octus leaned back against the whitewashed wall of Philo’s cubiculum. “It’s been a bad night. No sooner did she arrive than she began throwing things. All her maids are in tears, or at least all the ones not in hysterics are in tears. Firminius locked himself in his bedroom. Even Antye can’t do anything with her.”

“Antye?” Philo asked.

“Yes, her tirewoman. She and Firminius are usually the only ones she’ll listen to when she’s having a tantrum.”

“Did you try waking Aristo?”

“I’m not completely mad. Do you think I want to wind up chained in that cell by the door again?”

“I don’t think you would.
He
likes you.”

Octus smiled, a bit tremulously. “Does he? He says so little one way or the other. I really wasn’t sure.”

“He does, very much.” Philo put his hand on the older man’s shoulder. “I don’t think you have anything to fear at present.”

“Well, in any case, my patron needs his sleep. I didn’t think it would be wise. She broke a glass vase over Firminius’ head and threw a hand mirror at Antye. Antye bore up well. She ducked, but Firminius ran screaming. He was barefoot and he cut his foot on the glass. I don’t think he was very badly hurt, but he left bloody footprints all over her bedroom, the atrium, and the hall to his rooms. I don’t think she hurt anyone else, though. But she was vowing to sell the whole lot of them in the morning.”

“She doesn’t mean it.”

“No, probably not or she would have awakened Aristo herself. At any rate, you are to prepare some new gladiator for a private showing in her personal arena this morning.”

“Very well,” Philo said. “What was she so angry about?”

Octus’ eyebrows rose. “I don’t know. She came in, saw Macer and Afer playing doorkeeper, and sent for Firminius. Antye and the rest of the girls were undressing her. He came, she sent the girls out. Antye was her nurse and she trusts her, so she stayed. The next thing any of us knew, Firminius was screaming and running, so was Antye, and she was throwing things.”

“You should have awakened me. I could have given her a sedative,” Philo said.

“You should pay me protection,” Octus said. “One of the people she was cursing besides
him
was you. Watch out for the new gladiator. She bought him in Gaul and I think she hopes you’ll be his first kill. In any case, she wants to give Caesar a taste of her new star, so she has a wild boar waiting.”