The Forest House (49 page)

“If we promise them some concessions, they will support us…Queen Brigitta's daughters will be coming to us soon, and Valerius is helping me to find appropriate foster parents to raise them. Romans and Britons are bound to become allies in the end. This way it may come a little sooner, that is all.”

Gaius whistled soundlessly. This was sedition on a grand scale! He gulped down the last of his wine. When he looked up again, his father was watching him.

“Stranger things have happened,” Macellius said quietly. “Depending on how things go, there might be quite an interesting future for a Roman of the Silure royal line!”

 

Gaius rode home with his head reeling from more than the mulled wine. He had humored Julia long enough. It was now perfectly clear to him that he must adopt his son by Eilan formally. But when he arrived home, he found Julia could speak of nothing but her latest visit to the hermit, Father Petros.

“And he says that it is certain from Holy Writ—and from all the other prophecies—that the world will end with the passing away of this generation,” she told him, her eyes glowing. “With the coming of every dawn we should think that it may not be the sun, but the world beginning to burn. And then we shall be reunited with our loved ones. Did you know that?”

He shook his head, amazed that she, who had received a good Roman education, could believe such stuff. But then, women were credulous, which was probably why they could not serve in public office. He wondered if the Christians were trading on the current anxieties about the Emperor.

“Are you going to become a follower of the Nazarene—that prophet of slaves and renegade Jews?” he asked sharply.

“I do not see how any thinking person can possibly do anything else,” Julia replied coolly.

Well,
Gaius thought,
I am obviously not a thinking person—at least not of her kind.
He only said, “And what will Licinius say?”

“He will not like it,” Julia said sadly. “But this is the only thing I have been sure of since…since the children died.” Her eyes filled with tears.

That makes no sense,
he thought, but did not say it aloud; making sense did not seem to have comforted her very much. And indeed she looked happier than he had seen her since Secunda's death. The image of his daughter drowned was still behind his eyes night and day. Logical or not, he almost envied her.

“Well, do as you will,” he said resignedly. “I will not try to stop you.”

She looked at him with something almost like disappointment, then brightened. “If you had any sense of what was right, you would become a Nazarene as well.”

“My dear Julia, you have told me many times I have no sense of what is right,” he said sharply. She stared at the floor and he knew there was something else. “What is it?”

“I do not want to say this before the children,” she stammered. Gaius laughed, took her arm and led her into another room.

“Well, what is it that you cannot say before our children, Julia?”

Again she cast her eyes on the ground. “Father Petros says that…as the end of the world is so near…” she stammered, “it is better if all married women—and men—take an oath of chastity.”

At this, Gaius threw back his head and did laugh. “You do realize that, as the law now stands, refusing to sleep with your husband is grounds for divorce?”

Julia, although obviously troubled, was ready for the question.
“In the Kingdom of Heaven,”
she quoted,
“there is neither marriage nor giving in marriage.”

“That settles it,” said Gaius, laughing again. “I do not care for your Heaven, at least not that portion of it over which Father Petros rules.”

He added, knowing it would hurt her, “Take all the oaths you like, my dear. Considering that for the past year or so you have been about as much use in bed as a stick of wood, I can't imagine how you think it would make any difference to me.”

Her eyes were wide with surprise. “Then you will make no difficulty?”

“None, Julia; but it is only fair to tell you that if you are no longer bound by our wedding vows, I will not hold myself bound by them either.”

He realized that he was spoiling the scene she had resolved to play; he should, he supposed, have raged or pleaded.

“I would never consider asking you to take such a vow,” she said, and then, spitefully, added, “I doubt if you would be able to keep it if you did. Do you think I do not know why you bought that pretty slave girl last year? God knows she is little enough use in the kitchen! With so many sins already upon your soul—”

But Gaius had had enough. He would not discuss the state of his soul—whatever she might mean by that—with her.

“For my own soul I will be myself responsible,” he told her and went into his office, where he found a bed already made up for him. So she had counted on his willingness to sleep alone, whatever else he might say.

Gaius thought briefly of celebrating his freedom by summoning the slave girl, but he discovered he had no wish to do so. He wanted something more than the compliance of a woman who had no choice in the matter. His mind went to Eilan. Now at least Julia could make no objection if he wished to adopt Gawen. How would he break the news to her?

Finally he was free to seek Eilan out once more. But the face of the Fury he had seen at the Midsummer festival came between him and his memories, and it was the face of the girl he had met at the hermit's the year before that went with him into sleep at last.

I
n the middle of February the storms gave way to a period of fair, clear weather, brisk but sunny. In sheltered spots early fruit trees began to put forth buds and the branches grew red with returning sap. The hills were melodious with the bleating of new lambs, and the marshes resounded with the calls of returning swans.

Eilan looked at the blue sky and realized that the time had come to keep her word to Macellius. She was waiting in the garden when Senara answered her summons.

“It is a fair day,” Senara said, clearly wondering why Eilan had called her away from her duties.

“It is that,” Eilan agreed, “a fair bright day for performing an unwelcome duty. But you are the only one I can ask.”

“And what is that?”

“Brigitta's daughters have been here for a year now, and it is time to send them to the Romans as I promised. They have kept their word regarding Brigitta, and I trust them to deal kindly with the children. But it must be done quietly, lest all the old enmity be awakened again. You are old enough to take them to Deva, and you know the Latin tongue enough to ask your way to the house of Macellius Severus. Will you take them there?”

“Severus?” Senara frowned. “I think I remember that name. My mother told me once that her brother served him, and that he was a hard man, but fair.”

“That is my understanding.” Eilan nodded. “The sooner the girls are in his care, the sooner he can settle them in their new home.”

“But they will grow up Romans,” Senara protested then.

“Would that be so bad a thing?” Eilan smiled at her. “Your own mother was a Roman, after all.”

“That is true…” the girl said thoughtfully. “Sometimes I wonder about her family, and what it was like growing up in that world. Very well,” she said at last. “I will go.”

It took some time to make the children ready, for Eilan wished to make sure that no one in the Roman town should have cause to say that the girls had been neglected while they were among the Druids; but at last even Eilan was satisfied, and Senara, holding a little girl by either hand, was ready to set out for Deva.

 

The day was crisp but clear, and even with one child in her arms and the other trotting at her side, Senara made good time. The children babbled merrily, excited by the outing. When they grew tired, she tied the younger girl in her shawl, where she soon fell asleep, and picked up the older one in her arms. By this time she could see the straggle of houses at the edge of the city and the stout log walls of the fortress beyond. When she reached the central Forum, she sat down on a bench beside a fountain to rearrange her burdens before asking her way to the house of Macellius.

Suddenly the sunlight was blotted out. Senara looked up to behold the Roman she had met at the house of the hermit the year before. Later it seemed altogether symbolic to her that he should stand between her and the sun; but she did not think of that then.

“I have seen you before, haven't I?” he asked.

“At Father Petros's hut,” she said, blushing. One of the children awakened and stared at him with owlish eyes. She had not seen him at any gathering of the small group of local Nazarenes; but then, living as she did actually within the Forest House, she was not able to go there very often. She had gone the first time from curiosity, and later because the Roman tongue seemed somehow a link with her dead mother, and finally, because she found comfort there.

The handsome Roman was still regarding her. He was younger than she had thought at first, and she liked his smile. “Where are you bound, maiden?”

“To the house of Macellius Severus, sir; these girls are to be given into his care—”

“Ah, so these are the children.” For a moment he frowned, then the quick smile once more lit his eyes. “We are well met, then. I am myself bound there; may I be your guide?”

He reached out one hand, and the older girl placed her small one within it, smiling up at him.

She looked at him a little dubiously, but he swung the child up to his shoulder, and hearing the little girl's laughter, Senara decided that he must be of a kindly nature after all.

“You hold her as one well used to children, sir,” she said, and though she asked no further, he replied, “I have three daughters of my own; I am well accustomed to little ones.”

So,
she thought,
he is married. Is he one of us?
After a moment she said, “Tell me, sir, are you then a member of Father Petros's flock?”

“I am not,” he replied, “but my wife is.”

“Then, sir, your wife is my sister in Jesus, and thus kin to me.”

His lips twisted rather sardonically at this, and she thought,
He is too young to smile so bitterly. Who has hurt him so?

“You are very kind to escort me,” she said aloud.

“It is no trouble. Macellius is my father, you see—”

They were approaching a fine-looking house near the walls of the fortress, white-washed and tiled in the Roman style. The Roman knocked on the gate, and after a moment a slave pulled it open and they passed through a long hallway into an enclosed garden.

The Roman asked, “Is my father within?”

“He is with the Legate,” the man replied. “Go in and wait for him, if you will; he should be getting back just about now.”

It was in actual fact only four or five minutes till Macellius arrived. Senara was not sorry to see him, for the younger of the children had wakened and begun to fret. Macellius turned them both over to a buxom and kindly slave woman who would look after them until the foster parents he had chosen for them came. He thanked Senara, and asked her politely if she needed an escort to return.

Senara shook her head quickly. At the Forest House they thought she had taken the girls to relatives of their mother in the town. Returning with an escort of Roman soldiers would have put the fat in the fire for certain. It would have been nice, though, if the younger Severus could have escorted her home—she thrust the thought away.

“Will I see you again?” he asked, and a little tremor of excitement ran through her.

“Perhaps at one of the services.” Then, before she could make a fool of herself entirely, she slipped away through the door.

 

Julia Licinia never did anything by halves. One night in April she asked Gaius to accompany her to an evening service in the Nazarene temple in Deva. Though their marriage had become a polite fiction, she was still the mistress of his household, and Gaius felt bound to support her. He had considered divorce, but could see no point in hurting Licinius and his children in order to marry some other Roman girl.

He was not in sufficient favor with the Emperor to make an alliance with a family of his party, and to ally himself with the opposition could have been dangerous. Though the elder Macellius said little, Gaius knew that the conspiracy was growing. If the Emperor fell, all would be changed. It seemed to Gaius better to put off worrying about his personal future until he knew whether he had one.

Since the Nazarene temple had been, in part, purchased with the proceeds of the jewels Julia no longer seemed to wear, Gaius was curious to see what sort of value she had got for her money. By the time they set out they were quite a large party; not only Gaius and Julia, but the little girls and their nurses, and what seemed like half the household. “Why do we have to have all these people with us?” Gaius demanded, not altogether good-naturedly. He and his family would sleep that night at the house of Macellius, but his father did not have room for their whole staff.

“Because they are all members of the congregation,” Julia said more pleasantly. Gaius blinked. It would never have occurred to him to question how she managed her household, but he had not realized that her zeal had led her quite so far. She added, “They will return to the villa when this is over. I cannot deny them the chance to worship.”

Gaius thought it was, rather, that she would not, but he thought it wiser to say no more. The new Christian church was a largish old building near the river that had belonged originally to an importer of wine. The reek of old wine was overlaid by the fragrance of wax candles and early flowers were heaped on the altar. Rather crudely painted pictures—a shepherd carrying a lamb, a fish, some men in a boat—adorned the white-washed walls.

As they entered Julia made a cryptic sign; he was displeased to see that Cella, Tertia, and Quartilla all tried to imitate her. Had Julia converted not only her servants but her daughters as well? He wondered if these Christians were in the business of undermining the authority of the home.

Julia found a seat on a hard bench not too far from the door, and sat down, surrounded by her waiting-women and her daughters. Gaius, standing behind her, looked round to see if anyone else in the congregation was known to him. Most of the assembled worshippers seemed to be working people of the poorer kind, and he wondered how the snobbish Julia liked finding herself among such folk. Then he recognized a face: the girl who had brought Brigitta's daughters to the town. She had told him she came to the meetings when she could get away, and he realized now that one reason he had given in to Julia's request that he accompany her was a faint hope of seeing her.

A priest, closely shaven and wearing a long dalmatica, entered with two boys, one of whom carried a large wooden cross and the other a candle, and a couple of older men whom Julia had told him were deacons, one of whom carried a heavy leather-bound book in his hand. This one was a rather sober-looking man of middle years. As he laid the book on the immense lectern, he stumbled over a four-year-old child in the aisle; but rather than fleeing in terror, the child laughed up at him, and the deacon bent down and hugged the toddler with a smile that transformed his face, then handed it back to its father, a rough-handed, grimy man with a blacksmith's brawny arms.

There were prayers and invocations; the congregation was purified with incense and water, all of it similar enough to a Roman ceremony that Gaius did not feel too uncomfortable, though the Latin was rather less pure. Then the priests and deacons were seated and there was a little stir of excitement as another man came forward.

Gaius was not surprised to recognize Father Petros, looking frowsy and bearded next to the others. He gazed at the collected worshippers with such intensity that Gaius wondered uncharitably if the hermit suffered from poor eyesight.

“Our Master once said,
‘Suffer the little children to come to me, and forbid them not; for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.'
Many of you here tonight have lost a child and you grieve; but your children, I tell you, are safe with Jesus in Heaven, and you parents who grieve are happier than those parents who have given their children over, living, to the service of idols. I tell you that it would be better for these children to be safely dead, having sinned not, than living to serve false gods!” He paused for breath and the people sighed.

They have come here to be frightened!
thought Gaius cynically.
They are enjoying the thought of their own virtuous superiority!

“For the first of the great commandments is this: thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy soul; and the second of the great commandments is this: that thou shalt honor thy father and thy mother,” Father Petros boomed. “The question arises, then: how far can a young person be held responsible if his guardians place him in the service of a heathen idol? There are Fathers in our Church who have said that all, even infants in arms, are guilty if they are present during the worship of an idol; but there others who hold that if a child's guardians commit him to serve an idol before he shall have arrived at an age of reason, then he should be held guiltless. My own feeling is—”

But Gaius did not really care what the Father's own feeling was. By this time his gaze had fixed on the far more pleasing spectacle of the girl, Senara, who was leaning forward, absorbed in the hermit's words. He had hopelessly lost the thread of the Father's discourse, but he had already decided that these Christian ceremonies were too dull for his taste; no sacrifices, no roaring exhortations, not even the drama the rites of Isis or Mithras could sometimes provide. In fact these Christian ceremonies, all told, were duller than anything he had ever heard except some of the Druidic philosophies.

Even with the girl's bright face to look at it seemed a long time before Father Petros's discourse finally rambled to its end. Gaius was looking forward to leaving, and it was with consternation that he heard that he and the other unbaptized members of the congregation were now expected to wait outside while the initiates participated in some kind of love-feast. His complaints were so loud that Julia finally agreed to leave, although she promised the nurses and serving women they might remain.

He picked up the sleeping Quartilla, and they set out for Macellius's home. But they had hardly started when Tertia began to complain that she wanted to be carried too. Gaius told her brusquely to behave like a big girl and walk; her mother's health had improved but she was not yet strong enough to carry the child, and Cella was still too small. As Tertia began to whimper, someone moved behind them and he heard a sweet voice saying, “I will carry your little girl.”