Night of the Wolf (36 page)

The soldiers charged Dryas, bringing mantles up to protect their faces as they plunged through the wall of flame. She cut the throat of the first within her reach and drove her sword into the eye of the next.

And Maeniel was again the gray wolf. Rage and wild delight surged in his heart. He plunged forward and hamstrung the third to reach her, then broke another’s lower leg. But he knew there were too many and the street was wide. Both of them could be flanked.

Dryas was backing when the wolf saw a shadow loom over them. He howled a warning too late.

The blazing skeleton of the hall, timbers outlined in fire against the sky, toppled, falling down on them.

He turned tail and ran, but Dryas was locked in swordplay with one of her adversaries and couldn’t or didn’t disengage. Not in time.

The timbers disintegrated as they fell. One of them cracked Dryas across the head, showering sparks and framing her face with embers Her opponent raised his shield and caught or deflected the debris raining down around them. Then he snatched up the woman and her sword from the street, threw her over his shoulder, and fled.

Lucius wandered away, not at all sure where he was going. He simply walked. The streets were crowded. Business of all kinds was being transacted around him. On the pavements, street hawkers sold everything from sex to household repairs.

In one block, a girl offered herself for two copper asses. She promised to accommodate him behind a nearby temple or inside the cella if he was squeamish about being seen. He accepted, paid her, but once inside the cella found himself completely incapable.

It was dark, the only light streaming in through two openings in the roof over the altar. There was no statue or even name emblazoned on the terra-cotta brick walls, and the altar itself was a square marble block with a dado at the top and base.

When he proved incapable, the girl looked frightened, but he gave her another copper and told her he wanted to be here alone with his thoughts. So he stood in the back, leaning against the wall, listening to the distant street noises.

He didn’t reach any conclusions, but his whirling mind quieted. He walked toward the altar slab. On the step near the altar stood a brass pitcher, a platter with a few pieces of fruit on it, a basin filled with water, and a cup. The cup looked like brass. It was a plain gold metal, fluted at the edges, a bell beaker narrower at the base than the rim.

Without understanding quite why he did it, he lifted the pitcher and poured its contents into the cup, then drank.

The temple vanished. He felt he was somewhere near the Appian Way. The tall cypresses grew there, overlooking and outlining a roadway. He walked along a path overgrown by creeping thyme and moss, bordered by lilies. He’d never seen such flowers before. They were trumpets of flame, scarlet and yellow with brown-spotted throats. Scattered among the most brightly colored ones were patches of ivory and even green blooms. He walked along in the cool, damp shade under the cypresses.

Ahead, a stone road cut through the path he traveled along, and he heard horns behind him. He hurried, dodging to the side of the path, and stood among the lilies.

The quarry reached him first. A gigantic boar came into view, and Lucius was glad the hunt was right behind him. He would not have wanted that animal to pause near him. The beast’s mouth was open, foam dripping around the jaws, and the tusks were almost as long as his forearm. The nasty little pig eyes swept over him, glowing with rage, and the beast turned toward him. Lucius knew an instant of terror. As far as a monster like this was concerned, he was helpless.

But the hounds were snapping at its heels. They were the largest hounds Lucius had ever seen, but they were clearly coursing hounds, slender, graceful, with lean bodies and short, tight coats, all marked in strawberry and blue, with sweet, clear voices.

Then the hunt appeared. Lucius gasped. All the steeds were white. Their coats glowed with a mother-of-pearl sheen and the wild, curling manes and tails reminded him of clouds receding into mist at the edges. They rode at him full tilt. He tried to back up and inadvertently pulled at his scar.

A jolt of electricity went through his back. He dropped to one knee. He looked up, trying to get his feet under him. At the same time, he was sure he was doomed and the fellow riding directly toward him would trample him. But he reckoned without
her.
She swept up from behind the leader. Her mount was black, a rich, shimmering darkness like the star-filled night sky. The weight of the gigantic animal pushed the glowing white one aside, nudging it away from Lucius. She passed within inches of him. Her right foot brushed his shoulder.

Then he watched open-mouthed as the magnificent creatures reached the road, a straight pathway made of smooth, hexagonal, blue-gray blocks. As they did, they soared into the air, floating almost like birds over the causeway.

He turned, jumping out from among the flowers at the edge of the path trying to get a better view, but stumbled and found himself on his hands and knees on the temple floor.

The place he had been vanished. Both cup and pitcher were gone from the altar, but the bowl still rested near where they’d been. He found to his astonishment that he was looking down into the water, but her face looked back at him. The face was the woman who had prevented his being ridden down.

But then, on considering the matter for a few seconds, he decided it couldn’t be
her
face. The woman on the midnight steed had a face like a goddess without mark or blemish. This dark-haired, still-faced woman had wisps of hair escaping from a coif he really couldn’t see and, while her features were as perfect as if they’d been chiseled and then polished from dense marble, she had a bruise on her right cheek and a small mouse under her left eye. She closed her eyes. He wondered if she were dead and found himself sad. Then he was surprised by his sadness. After all, why should he care if a woman, completely unknown to him, left the world or not? He tried to reach for her, touched the water, and found the basin was gone.

He knelt alone on the dusty floor. There was no altar, no pitcher, cup, or platter and the only light came from the door, seemingly far away, that opened into the street.

When he reached it, he was conscious that he’d run from the back of the temple. To his horror, he found the door barred by an iron gate. He found himself frightened by his own terror as much as anything else. He pushed at the door and found, to his great relief, that it opened at a touch. Then he was out, down the steps, and walking in the street. He didn’t look back until he reached the Forum. It wasn’t far away.

He couldn’t see the temple from where he was. It wasn’t until he reached into the draped folds of his toga to check his purse and find out if he’d come out with any money that he realized he held a plum in his hand. He looked down at it, astounded, then remembered the platter of fruit in the temple. The fruit was beautiful and he was hungry. The skin was smooth with the silken feel a ripe specimen of the fruit demonstrates and, for a second, he was tempted to eat it.

Then his hackles rose as he remembered where he got it. It was too beautiful, not like anything of this world. Blue, shading into violet, the color and fragrance were exquisite, carrying an essence of plumness. He placed it in the folds of his toga, then examined his purse.

Yes, he had money—a great deal of money, in fact. He became aware that the streets were emptying around him and the sun was high overhead. It was time for the siesta. There were a few people about and some shops were open. A lot of people didn’t bother to take a long rest in winter.

He looked over at the Senate House and the public gardens overlooked by Pompey’s Theater and the Temple of Venus.

He walked along the row of shops and saw someone he knew standing in a doorway—Lucrese. She turned toward him, a look of recognition in her eyes, then stepped back into the shadows of her cookshop.

He shrugged and walked on, but in a moment, a small, dark girl tapped him on the arm. “Sir! Handsome sir! My lady would speak with you.”

He followed her into the cookshop where he had seen Lucrese. It was a small place and very clean. There were no patrons in it at present, but there were benches and tables that showed signs of frequent use.

The girl, and she wasn’t more than a child, led him through the room and into a small herb garden with a grape arbor, a fountain, and a sundial. A table stood under the arbor and she seated him in a wicker chair beside it, then scurried away. She returned with a tray that held olives, cheese, and wine.

Differing spices and marinades flavored the olives. There were all sorts on this tray, each in its separate dish. Several varieties of cheese rested among the olives. The wine was one of those grown in the mountains near the coast: white, sweet, fragrant as an autumn mist, laden with the mixed scents of smoke, apples, hazel, and fennel.

The afternoon sun was warm on his face and neck. The sky was a hazy blue.

He relaxed and took the edge off his appetite with the olives and cheese. After a while, the child returned with a chicken and vegetable stew and a platter of bread cut into pie-shaped sections and flavored with hard cheese.

He used his fingers to eat the chicken and vegetables and the bread to sop up what remained of the gravy. All in all, he thought, it was one of the finest and most peaceful meals he’d ever eaten in his life.

When the child carried away the dishes, Lucrese brought him a platter of honey cakes. “How is Philo?” she asked.

“Sit down,” Lucius said.

“I don’t . . .”

“And I don’t care. Sit down.”

She sat on a small bench across from him.

“Not well,” he told her. “He was tortured and had a very bad time of it.”

“Oh, no!” she whispered, covering her face with her hands.

“Don’t be upset. You probably saved his life.”

She let her hands drop to her lap and looked away over the garden where neat rows of sage, thyme, fennel, cabbage, and mint grew in abundance.

“I just came from Caesar,” he said. “Is anyone else here?”

“No.” She looked suspicious for a moment. “Why?”

“The child?”

“No. She goes home to her mother. I pay her a few coppers a week to help me clean. I don’t own this. Myrtus, Felex’s aunt, does. She leases the shop to me and I pay her a weekly fee. Philo set it up for me. If all goes well, in ten years I’ll own it.” She crossed her fingers. “I hope. Why?” she asked again, still looking suspicious.

“I was just going to tell you what Caesar said.”

She leaned forward, resting her chin on her knuckles. “Please do.”

He recounted his conversation with the dictator.

“So,” she said quietly when he finished. “That’s how it works. Res publica, government of the people. You choose up sides, put your money in the hands of those you want to win, then winner take all.”

He nodded, ate a honey cake, and drank a little of the wine. “What do you think? Should I pay?”

They both watched the sun travel and the shadow on the sundial showed more than an hour had passed since he arrived.

“Do you know how I got here?” Lucrese asked.

He shook his head. “No.”

“The landlord wanted my father off his farm. My father defied him. You know what happened?”

Lucius nodded. “The landlord had him beaten or was it killed?”

“Beaten,” she said, “but he died. Caesar’s men came. My brother, who was tall and strong, marched off with the legions. He said he would return with rent money to pay the landlord, but he didn’t. My mother died that winter. The landlord sold me to pay his rents.” She stared directly into his eyes. “Lucius, I believe even the gods are bought and paid for.

“The sacrifices, bulls, rams, cows, and pigeons or doves purchased by the rich and powerful choke them with blood and meat, and blind them with smoke and incense until they have forgotten what virtue justice is, if indeed they ever knew.”

“Yes,” Lucius said, “and my sister is chaste.”

“I know. I can’t say the same. The first place I was sold into was a brothel. There I was sold again and again, sometimes as many as forty times a night, until I turned my face to the wall and refused food or water. The owner sold me in the hope of recouping his investment before I died. Yes, Lucius, pay Caesar. Pay him and count yourself lucky that you can protect those you love. I’m only sorry I couldn’t care for my own. Protect them from your ‘chaste’ sister and her little rat, Firminius. And protect yourself. You’re a good man and, on that account alone, I fear for you.”

As he left, he realized the siesta hours were over, the street was filling up again. He paused at the door and pressed a coin into her hands.

“For the meal,” he said.

“No, no,” she said, trying to give it back to him.

He shook his head. “Myrtus is a very practical Greek woman. She wouldn’t approve of your giving out free food.” Then he hurried away.

She slipped it into her dress pocket. It wasn’t until late that evening when she’d locked up and was standing alone next to her bed, braiding her hair by candlelight and preparing herself for sleep, that she remembered the coin, took it out of her pocket, and found a golden aureus.

XIX

Dryas awoke in the dark. Her head ached with a slow, miserable, dull throbbing. Her hands and feet were tied. She was in a cart. Not just a cart, but one hitting every bump and hole in the road they traveled along. She tried to open her eyes and her lashes brushed against something tied over them. She was blindfolded. Her stomach was queasy.

She remembered throwing the necklace into the fire. She was glad, even in this ugly situation, to be rid of the burden of imprisoning a creature she had come more to admire than not. She’d seen Cynewolf die and she was sickened to the bottom of her soul with what must have been her part in his destruction. The whole miserable business had been a fiasco from the beginning. Her life was over. She would not endure slavery.

Outside, she could hear voices and the jingle of horse trappings. Two people were talking; one had a voice like sliding gravel.

“She paid me,” Gravel Voice said. “Good thing. This one isn’t going to last. I’ll be surprised if we get her to the ship.”

“She’d be a novelty in Rome.”

“I don’t think she’d let them do that to her. They’d never get her to the arena. I don’t believe that’s what the Basilian bitch has in mind. What does she care about the mob? No, this one is intended for private use.”

“Hers?” A question to Gravel Voice.

“Yes! No! Who knows? Someone with a taste for the extraordinary. She cost us enough. Miletus, Florus, Scipio.”

“They wanted to go home rich like you.”

“Tillius won’t walk again. Achillas will be pissing lying down for a month.”

“That was the dog.”

“Dog! Dog, my ass,” Gravel Voice exclaimed. “It didn’t come until she crossed swords with us. No, she’s a witch, too. Some of Caesar’s legionnaires ran into them in Alba and said they were worse than men. Much worse. You bed down in what you think is a safe place to sleep and wake up with your throat cut. The whores put knives up their twats. You go to stick it in and next thing you’re split like a cooked sausage. The Basilian cunt is welcome to her. When we reach Messene, I get off. I’ll take my money and buy a farm on Campagna.” Gravel Voice sounded relieved. “I won’t even take ship with you. She can probably call a storm and have it sink the vessel before it reaches Ostia. I wouldn’t put it past one of them. One of their witches.”

Rome. Fulvia wants to take me to Rome. Caesar is in Rome,
Dryas thought.

The horses the men rode picked up the pace and moved ahead of the wagon. She could no longer hear what they said. However, she could hear Fulvia speaking to Gravel Voice. His answer sounded insolent, but Fulvia continued to insist and apparently he agreed because the wagon stopped a few minutes later. Dryas felt two people climb in, one lighter than the other.
Fulvia and Gravel Voice,
she thought.

A second later, Dryas felt hands exploring her body. Big hands.

“I’ll untie her feet,” Fulvia offered sweetly.

“Don’t untie anything!” Gravel Voice said forcefully. His hands moved over her breasts and stomach. “Nothing,” he said.

Dryas tried to remain limp. He rolled her to one side. “Back. Aaah, right here,” he said, and pulled out a knife she wore on a cord attached to her collar.

“Now the interesting parts,” Fulvia sniggered as Dryas was turned on her back.

“Nothing about this sow is interesting to me,” Gravel Voice said. “I watched her kill three of my men and if you’re smart, my lady, you’ll let me cut her throat right now and bury her under a crossroads with a stake through her heart and a big heavy rock holding her down so she won’t get up and run with her friends the wolves.”

As he spoke, he felt Dryas’ belly and buttocks, then probed between her legs and thighs. “Yes, here’s another strapped to her thigh. She comes with all the equipment she needs to . . .”

He stopped speaking because he’d lifted Dryas’ tunic and had pushed his hand down her pants to get the knife she had concealed there. He was preoccupied with getting to the hilt so he could pull it free. He did and carelessly let the razor edge scratch Dryas’ stomach. “Sorry,” he said.

“Sorry!” Fulvia screeched. “Don’t mark her up! Besides, who are you apologizing to? She’s unconscious.”

“No, she’s not,” Gravel Voice said. “She’s lying doggo, hoping we’ll think just that, but a couple of times I felt her flinch. She knows what’s going on, but there isn’t anything she can do about it.” His hands moved down Dryas’ legs while he spoke. “And yet another at the ankle.” He removed the blade. “Now, I’ll leave these with you, my lady.”

“Sure you wouldn’t like a little something for all your time and trouble?” Fulvia asked. “It’s just the three of us here and you could pull down those trousers she’s wearing and . . .”

“Force her,” Gravel Voice said.

“Why not?” Fulvia’s voice was husky with . . . Dryas wasn’t sure what . . . but whatever Fulvia was feeling, she was doing her best to disguise it.

“No, my lady,” Gravel Voice said. “Rape is an acquired taste, and as long as I’ve been a soldier, I never acquired it. Besides, you pay me to fight for you, not entertain you.”

Dryas heard Fulvia’s breathing quicken, but she said nothing more. Boards creaked as Fulvia climbed down from the wagon, then her feet hit the ground, but Dryas knew Gravel Voice must still be in the wagon, so she steeled herself.

Being taken in war was a risk shared by men and women alike. In that world, sexual abuse was commonly inflicted on both men and women. Perhaps it was a little more common with women, but men, especially young men, faced it also. The use of their bodies against their will. Dryas trained her students to expect that the worst might happen and to be ready to react with dignity and courage. She hoped she would be able in that grisly situation to be strong, but frankly found herself more outraged and annoyed than angry. She was sore and hurt in a dozen places. Now Fulvia and this loathsome piece of shit wanted to add to her misery. She wished an unpleasant fate on both of them if Gravel Voice acted on Fulvia’s suggestion.

“No, brugia witch, I won’t couple with you,” Gravel Voice said. “I have what I want.” Dryas heard the jingle of a sack of coins. “I wish she’d listened to me about cutting your throat. You might be better off and so might she.” Then he was gone and she lay alone.

The wagon didn’t move again and the sounds Dryas heard indicated they were getting ready to bed down for the night. She wondered how much time had passed since she’d been captured. Probably only a day, but there was no way for her to tell. She tried to roll over on her side and succeeded pretty well. She was lying on something soft, like cloth on top of straw. She was not too uncomfortable.

After a time, she smelled food cooking but no one offered her any. She wasn’t surprised and eventually fell asleep.

When she next woke, she could hear night sounds, wind and a nearby owl calling. It was cold in the wagon, but someone, she was willing to wager not Fulvia, had covered her up with a coarse and none-too-clean blanket. It stank of horse manure and equine perspiration.

She was clearheaded and the headache was gone.
I should be grateful for small mercies. At least the blanket is warm.
She began a process of stretching herself, trying to keep her limbs from cramping too badly, exercising first her feet and ankles, then her legs, torso, upper body, and arms. She contemplated trying to turn over and was puzzled about how to do it without pushing off the blanket when she became conscious that she was no longer alone in the wagon.

Claws clicked on the wooden floor. Well, she had thrown the necklace into the fire. He seemed to have brought the cold night air in with him. She could smell cold fur and something else. Cold touched her check and pushed the blindfold up.

She found herself looking into his eyes. There was a sprinkling of snow on his muzzle. Here and there, ice crystals glittered on his coat.

He made a soft, very soft whine in his throat. She understood it to be an inquiry. Her own hounds often greeted her with such sounds when she rose in the morning. They would look into her eyes and join her when she went to empty her bladder down near the stream.

She wondered who lived in her rath now. Who fed the dogs and journeyed out at dawn with them to hunt? She was reasonably sure she would never see her beloved highlands again, and the home she loved would know her no more.

“I am well,” she whispered to him, but two tears gathered at the corners of her eyes and coursed down her face. Since she was lying on her side, one slid across the bridge of her nose and another went under her eye and into the straw where her head rested.

He made a snorting sound and touched her cheek with his nose.

“I am well,” she insisted. “They are taking me to Rome. It remains to be seen what, if anything, I can do . . . about . . . Just as well not to speak of that here. Go! Be free, fly far away. I would not see you chained to the chariot of our mad kind. Nor will I any longer try to make you a means to my ends. I wronged you in the first place by trying.

“Be free always, because of all things, freedom is best, though it is not easily won and must be chosen by those who will enjoy it. As an eagle on a crag chooses the freedom of the wind and a wolf on the hunt wears no one’s collar. So, go with courage. There’s not much chance for me to . . . score. But however little it is, I must take it and never count the cost.” Then she closed her eyes.

He felt a cascade of brightness and cold fire and he was kneeling in the wagon beside her. “They have chained your wrists to the planks on this thing. Otherwise I’d have you out by now. I can follow them, pick them off one at a time before we ever leave the mountains. Help me.”

She didn’t open her eyes, but said, “No.”

He heard footsteps outside and was wolf before he willed it.

The sentry peered into the wagon and met his eyes.

A few hours later he was running along the slope of a mountain among the trunks of trees so ancient and tall they seemed clouds outlined against a brilliant star-flecked night sky. None had any branches closer than a hundred feet up. It had snowed, but only in some places had it reached the ground. It looked like splashes of silver against the black carpet of pine needles. The giant tree trunks lifted themselves as if they were the columns of some half-ruined temple submerged beneath the sea.

He ran among them, a shadow wolf against silver white snow and black damp drifts of needles returning the sun’s bounty to the earth.

He became a man and stood looking up at the trees and the cold stars. He cursed first Dryas and then Imona, women both, and on errands incomprehensible to a wolf and even perhaps to most men. But he understood Imona better now because he knew Dryas. She, too, was willing to give her life in the service of her people. Imona had not listened to him and neither would Dryas.

He was a nurturing creature. She told him to go and be free, but he knew now there was no longer any freedom for him. He was not simply a wolf any longer, but had found a journey he wanted. That journey, or possibly
passion
was a better word, would haunt his heart for however long he would live.

We, the gray people and the brown, knew long ago our affairs were settled for us by . . . whatever makes life. Brings it into being, gave us our laws. They are imprinted on the engrams of our very thought processes. We follow the patterns our ancient ancestor, the dire wolf knew. His law was mine and my mind can present me with memories of the hunt for monsters when glaciers rimmed the world. But in men, the world sees something new. They are not constrained by any law. Not back when they hunted across the ice, when all the world was winter, and not now. Their existence tantalizes as the woman did my first ancestor, when they allied themselves so long ago to hold back the night.

What they might become, he couldn’t imagine, but this prey followed madly across all time was worth the pursuit, whatever the outcome might be. They were created to fall lower and also reach higher than his kind could ever imagine. He would join them in their journey because whichever way they went, they would bring him with them. They were blood of his blood and bone of his bone. What gave them life danced the everlasting measure from a world with dark seas and poisoned air into the stars scattered by the prodigal hand of the unknown—and, perhaps, unknowable—across an eternal sky.

Then he became aware that his feet were freezing, his nose was running, and it wasn’t long till dawn. He had a duty to Blaze and Mir to tell them about Dryas. He didn’t care to inquire how he’d come to acquire that particular obligation, but he felt the pull of it and followed as he’d once followed his pack mates.

Let’s see what happens next,
he thought, became a wolf again, and found himself much more comfortable as he trotted uphill with the wolf’s effortless bicycling gait toward all that remained of the oppidum. He reached it near dawn and leaped the wall.

He found Mir, Blaze, and Evars at the house where they’d been living. Dryas’ blood bay horse was in the barn. He greeted the horse. It returned the greeting perfunctorily and then buried its head in the manger. He had a mantle, tunic, and shoes in an empty stall. He dressed and went into the house.

Mir looked up from the table. “Did you find her?”

“Yes,” he said, sitting down. Evars filled a bowl with oat porridge and placed it in front of him. He hadn’t stopped to kill and was hungry.

“Well?” the old man prompted.

“She won’t let me help her escape.” He was putting away the porridge with a will. Not his favorite thing, oats, but he was hungry and chilled by his long night’s run, and the porridge was warm.

“Why not?” Mir asked irritably.

“She thinks she can kill this Caesar if she finds a way to get close to him. I’m going to follow her to Rome.”

Evars burst into tears. “And get yourself killed.” She moaned.

“I take a lot of killing. You, Evars, need to go back with Mir. This is a worse place than where Mir was living. It’s more dangerous here. Speaking of living, how many are left?”

“Not many,” Blaze said, “and most are gone by now. They fled to friends’ or relatives’ places where they are welcome. A lot of the guests at the feast didn’t live here, but in holds deeper into the forest. Cynewolf should have left, abandoned what used to be his lands on the Roman side of the river, and cut his losses. Now he’s dead and most of the remaining lesser chiefs will find other lords to attach themselves to. I have an invitation to visit a people in Fresia. I had hopes of rebuilding something here, some resistance to these Romans, but Cynewolf was simply too weak a reed. The heart went out of him when . . .” He didn’t finish.