Hadrian's wall

XXXIX

Stillness settled over the battlefield. To the south of the Wall, the Romans had won. Galba's cavalry had overwhelmed the Celts who'd broken through the gate and killed or enslaved every one of them. Arden Caratacus was unconscious and in chains. They'd even bagged a lean and defiant druid, caught in the conspiracy he'd spun. Kalin, the barbarians called him, clubbed to the ground and hog-tied to corral his magic. A priest to minister to the dungeon of Eburacum! The Romans spat on him and jeered, in fear.

To the north of the Wall the Celtic cavalry had triumphed. Marcus's force had been overwhelmed by a flood of numbers, and he and all his men killed, except for a handful who fought their way to the burned-out gate archway and finally gotten reinforcements from the Romans above. Longinus had survived, but the heart and the flower of the Petriana had been destroyed. His companions were dead.

The Celts, howling with triumph and wailing with grief, had retreated into the trees a mile away, taking most of their dead with them.

The stripped bodies of the Romans were left lying in the trampled and frozen mud. It began to snow harder, fogging the field.

The inner gate of the milecastle had been slammed shut against Arden's column of warriors, denying escape, and their bodies were heaped against it like a windrow of leaves. The pile was prickled with arrows and leaking a delta of blood. Now Galba ordered the corpses dragged aside and the gate opened, its lower half mottled with the stain of the dead. Eventually the heavy door swung wide, revealing the carnage of the milecastle courtyard beyond. Galba strode through in gruesome triumph, the dead the price of his victory. He stepped around the Roman bodies. He trod on the Celtic ones.

From the archway of the other side came the stink of ashes and burned flesh. Its barrel roof framed the other battlefield and its scattering of dead Romans and horses. From far away, through the gauze of snow, came the mournful drumming of the Celts.

Galba's expression was one of tight satisfaction. Everything had happened as he'd planned. He was the savior of Rome.

Huddled against the stone were the surviving men who'd ridden with the Petriana's flanking attack-a dozen in all, muddy, spattered with blood, exhausted. They were his now.

"Marcus Flavius?" he asked no one in particular.

They pointed. "A hero's death. He died standing up."

The praefectus hung from a loop of rope around his chest, his chin down, eyes closed, bloody arms dangling, one foot turned abjectly inward. Galba's face betrayed no emotion. "Indeed. We'll burn him with honors."

The Celts wouldn't come again, the tribune judged. Not for a while, at least, giving him the time needed to complete his scheme. The barbarians were headless, their leader captured. He'd won. Won everything in a morning! The praefectus dead, Caratacus in chains, the woman imprisoned and helpless, the victory his to claim alone. Now he'd see to the Roman beauty, and-

A familiar voice spoke to him from the shadows. "What's become of Valeria?"

He started in surprise. It was her slave woman, Savia! Huddled like the others against the blackened stones of the archway, a cloak around her trembling shoulders, her face black with soot. What was the maidservant doing here?

"Stand up, woman."

The familiar figure stood. A bit leaner, perhaps, swaying with exhaustion, but the same kind, stupid, cowlike face. That doggish loyalty he despised. "I'm servant to the lady," she reminded unnecessarily.

"And what are you doing here, handmaid, in the dung of battle?"

"I followed the Celts in hopes of rejoining Valeria. I was swept up in the attack-"

"Valeria's in prison. Locked there by her dead husband for adultery."

Savia looked at him with sorrow but not surprise. She knew, he realized. Knew he'd planned it this way from the beginning. Maybe he should just run her through now and be done with it, but no, what did he care what a slave thought? Besides, this mother hen might help persuade Valeria what her only choice must be. Savia, like everyone, had her uses. "That means your future is in my hands."

"Are you going to kill Valeria, too?" The question was a quiet one.

Galba walked close to her then so that the others couldn't hear. Spattered with blood and rank with sweat, he leaned close, the scar in his beard like a vast canyon. "Listen to me, slave," he whispered hoarsely. "Your mistress has one chance. One chance only. If you help me, then I can help you. If you oppose me, then I'll destroy you, just as I've destroyed everyone else who's ever challenged me. Do you understand?"

She nodded dumbly.

"Only I can save Valeria now. Do you agree?"

Savia said nothing, looking at him in wonder.

"Then come. We're going to see your mistress."

Galba burst through the entryway of the commander's house like a man who once more regards it as his, his black battle cape rippling behind to punctuate his urgency, Savia scuttling in his wake. "I'm here to see Valeria!" Slaves scurried out of his way and peered with apprehensive wonder from doorways. His skin was speckled with blood, hewn from his enemies. There was mud on his boots. Grim triumph on his face. And haste in his manner. He marched with a tramp as steady as a galley drum to the sleeping chamber where she was confined, the blood rings of his waist chain jangling of victory, his sheathed spatha rocking in rhythm. Two soldiers posted by the chamber's door snapped to attention.

"Unbolt the door!"

They did so, and it opened inward. Valeria stood at the sound, her back to the wall, unable to hide the worry on her face. She'd no idea who next would open that door, and thus who'd survived the battle. At the sight of Galba she tensed. He stepped inside.

His nostrils creased. The room had no window and was stuffy from the lack of air. Its lone oil lamp had created a haze of smoke, and its chamber pot added an acrid odor. Valeria hadn't been allowed to wash and again looked haggard, her eyes red from crying and her clothes sagging. She looked nothing like a Roman lady.

How he relished that fact.

"What news of the fighting?" she whispered.

"Shut the door," Galba told the sentries behind him.

It closed behind the tribune and Savia, leaving the trio in gloom. Valeria glanced past Galba for reassurance, but the maidservant leaned back against the door with her eyes shut in sorrow.

"Your husband is dead," Galba said.

Valeria groaned, bending as if punched.

"He died honorably, fighting the Celts. He'll join my fallen warriors in the pyre."

She drew breath. "His warriors."

Galba shook his head. "No, mine. They were never his, and he knew it."

"You're a cruel man to make such a remark, Galba Brassidias."

"And you're a faithless wife."

"You're the faithless one!"

"I'm a soldier, lady, who has won his campaign. Won everything."

She looked bleak. "The Celts lost, then?"

"Of course."

"And Arden?"

"Caratacus is in chains. He'll be executed when I order."

She slumped against the stucco. Just a few nights ago at Samhain, she'd known supreme happiness. In horrible payment ever since, her life had become a nightmare. She'd tried to save them all, and hadn't even saved herself.

"If I'd been given rightful command, this war would have never happened," Galba went on. "The Celts would never have dared rise, and hundreds of good men would be alive. It's you who put all this in motion, lady. You who almost destroyed the Wall."

Valeria looked bleakly past him to Savia. "What are you doing here?"

"I don't know. He found me among the survivors and brought me here."

"She's here to make you see reason," Galba said. "Your husband is dead and your lover captured, and because of that all protection has been stripped. Your family in Rome is a thousand miles away, and your usefulness to your father is at an end. I have it in my power to ruin you with scandal, a widow with no prospects, an adulteress who lay with a barbarian. You'll be disgraced and impoverished the rest of your life."

She looked at him in bewilderment. "Why do you hate me so?"

"I hate your class, lady. I hate its pretensions, I hate its unearned privileges, I hate its ignorance, I hate its joy. It lives behind my shield and gives no more thought to men like me than to a cur in an alley."

"Rome has rewarded you with career and station-"

"Rome has rewarded me with nothing! Nothing! I took what I have!"

"You'd never have had the opportunity-"

"Enough!" It was a shout. "From this moment forward you will speak to me only when I wish it, or I'll beat you within an inch of your life!"

Instead of cowing her, this sparked her own anger. "I'll speak to you as the provincial you are and will always remain-"

His blow cuffed her like that of a bear, slapping her back against the stucco. She bounced and slid down, mouth bloody and abruptly shut. Savia screamed but didn't move, fearing a beating herself.

"Listen to me," Galba growled, standing over Valeria. "You have one chance to regain your station. One chance to have a life! I can let the world know your sluttish ways; the humiliation of having coupled with a barbarian. Or… I can save and enhance your reputation in an instant."

He waited until she asked it, mumbling past her pain and bleeding. "How?"

"By marrying you."

She gave a quick gasp. "You're joking!"

He shook his head. "I'm as earnest about this as any battle. Marry me, Valeria, and no scandal will be heard. Marry me, and you retain your status. Marry me, and bring no shame on your family or yourself."

"You're a provincial!"

"So, originally, were half the emperors of Rome. Marry me, and I have entry into the patrician class."

"For your own advancement!"

"You'll rise as I rise. Enjoy what I attain. Unlike your late husband, I have ability, and have only lacked birth. You have birth, but you're a woman. We're not as different as you think. Together we could triumph."

"This is insane."

"It's the only logical course for you now."

"I'd never go to bed with you! I told you that before!"

"It is I who may never bed you. I'm seeking marriage, not love. Alliance, not sex. I'll satisfy myself with other women. Only if the mood strikes me will I take you. But I will take you, if I wish, as a husband's right."

"So I refuse."

"You'd rather have public humiliation as adulteress and traitor?"

"I'd rather have self-respect and freedom."

"Not freedom, lady. I'll leave you here to rot."

"You wouldn't dare. I'm a senator's daughter!"

"If word reaches your father of your conduct across the border, he'll disown you to save his own position. You know that better than I do."

"You don't know my father!"

"I know he sold you to a mediocrity to advance his own career."

She shook her head with new determination. "The answer is no, Brassidias."

"So." He nodded. "The plaything has some fire after all. Did you find it north of the Wall?"

"Get out of here. Leave me alone."

"But if you refuse me, you doom Rome as well."

"Rome?"

"If you don't marry me, woman, and give me the chance at advancement I deserve, I'll throw open the gates to the Celts. You heard me promise that cretin Arden before. I'll do it this time for real, and throw in my lot with the barbarians. I'll watch Londinium burn and make myself a king."

"You'll be hunted down and hanged if you dare that."

"I'll be a little man with thwarted ambitions if I don't."

He'd take the gamble, she realized. He was insane with frustration. And yet that was Rome's issue, not her own. "I still don't care. I'm not going to marry you, Galba. I once married a man I didn't love. I'm not going to marry a man I hate."

"Yes, you will." His look was confident. "Because there's one more reason to seek my protection. If you don't marry me, Roman bitch, you doom the man you do love."

"What do you mean?" she whispered, knowing full well what he meant.

"Arden Caratacus is known, falsely or not, as an agent of Rome. He worked, in a sense, for me. He could, arguably, be spared. I will in fact spare him, if you consent to marry me. But if you don't-"

"You'll kill him." It was a whisper.

"He'll be crucified on the parapet of Petrianis."

"That's inhuman! It will infuriate the Christians! No one uses that method anymore!"

"I will, and in a way that will take him days to die. And I'll tie you to a catapult next to it so you can watch him suffer."

She covered her face with her hands.

"I don't love you, and I never will," he went on. "I simply require you. Marry me, Valeria, and both our problems are solved in an instant. Defy me, and I'll destroy you, Arden Caratacus, and Roman Britannia."

Savia was weeping.

Galba grinned at them. "Think of all the gods. Think of all the druids. Think of all the priests, and then think of me, who believes none of it, and consider that I'm the one who has won."

"Can't you just kill me and free him?" Her question was a whisper. "That would be too easy." He ran his hand along his waist chain, making it jingle.

Savia watched the rings of dead men dance at his stroke.

The home of Falco and Lucinda was in quiet turmoil, the slave saw to her surprise. It was midnight, the countryside of Roman Britannia dark, and yet here candles burned as household slaves ran back and forth to pile bundles of belongings on carts. Horses were being hitched to harnesses. Litter and garbage were feeding a fire burning incongruously in the garden courtyard. The family was packing to flee.

"Who goes there? What do you want?" It was Galen, Falco's servant. He blocked her entry to the villa with drawn sword.

"I come from the lady Valeria. I need to see centurion Falco."

"Savia?" He squinted at her in the dark. "I thought you prisoner in Caledonia."

"I got back in the fighting. I was in the battle at the Wall. Please! My mistress is in peril."

"As are we all. There's a war on. My master has no time to see you now."

"What's happening?" She looked past him to the tumult of packing. "Is Lucinda leaving? Rome won the battle."

"The battle, but not the war. The Wall has been broken in other places, and each hour brings a worse dispatch. The duke is missing. It's not just the Picts and Attacotti. The Scotti, the Franks, and the Saxons are also attacking. My mistress is fleeing to Eburacum. Maybe Londinium."

"That defeat is what I'm here to prevent! Lady Valeria is in peril, as is the fort and everyone in it! I need to talk to Falco about Galba!"

"He's no time for Galba anymore, no more than Galba had time for his praefectus," Galen spat. "My master is tired of treachery. We've become a divided and dispirited command, each officer looking to himself. If the Celts come again, my master won't guarantee the outcome."

"That's what I need to talk to Falco about! That, and Roman justice!"

"Justice?" He laughed. "Where do you find that these days?"

"It's about a murder. The murder of his slave, Odo."

"Odo? That's an old matter, long buried." But Galen was curious.

"No, he was exhumed by the druids and spirited north of the Wall. When they carried him, he spoke a final time, naming his murderer. The killer wasn't young Clodius, as everyone believes."

"What are you saying?"

"That the Petriana is falling under the control of a man not just ruthless, but a criminal. Your own master is just. Let me explain to him."

They found the centurion in his office, instructing the foreman to drive the cattle into the nearby woods. An anxious Lucinda was bustling from room to room, issuing instructions like a general.

"What's this?" Falco said to Galen in annoyance.

"This slave has urgent news about Odo."

"Urgent? All Britannia is under assault. Odo and his killer are long dead."

"That's where you're wrong, centurion," Savia spoke up. "I've come because you're the last chance for my mistress. You remember the handle of the knife that killed your slave-"

"From my own dinnerware, which tribune Clodius was using."

"As was every other dinner guest, including Galba."

"You're accusing our new commander? Odo and Galba had no quarrel."

"He murdered Odo to cast doubt on Clodius. To provoke the attack on the grove. To maneuver lady Valeria to a place where she might be captured-"

"That's absurd!"

"The senior tribune dishonored you by misleading you, centurion."

Falco was impatient. "I've no love for Galba Brassidias, but you have no proof."

"Unless a dead man talks."

"What?"

"Did you know the Celts exhumed Odo's body?"

"There was report of this."

"They carried it north for return to the Scotti. A druid named Kalin oversaw this, and in the north, I met him. Now he's a prisoner, so I went to him and was reminded of a very strange thing. It seems that when they bathed and prepared the body of poor Odo and tried to place a coin in his mouth, something was already there."

"What thing?"

She held up a warrior's ring, heavy gold with red stone. "Do you recognize it?"

Falco looked puzzled. "The foray in support of old Cato. Galba took that ring from a Scotti chieftain he killed. It was the fight where Odo was captured."

"If you count the rings on Galba's lorica of chain mail, you'll find one missing."

"So?"

"Odo must have seized it as he died."

"He clutched Galba's belt?"

"The rings spilled like coins. In the dark and haste of having to prepare for the wedding processional, Galba couldn't find one. Instead, the druid Kalin eventually did, in the victim's mouth. The slave named his killer."

Falco was grim. "So Galba lied to all of us about poor young Clodius." He sighed. "Well, what of it in this catastrophe? What's one more victim?" He began to turn away. "Galba's in command now. If I challenge him, he'll simply have me arrested, or worse, put in battle to be killed. There's nothing to do except try to save what I can."

"But there's something you can do, centurion. Something before Galba weds the widow of your dead commander, Marcus Flavius."

"Weds Valeria!"

"Something before he creates a new tyranny over the wall that your family has defended for generations. Something before he betrays more armies, as he surely will do. Something before you and the last of the Petriana are sacrificed to his ambition."

"What, slave woman?"

"Help me free Arden Caratacus. And let him seek Roman justice for you."