Terra Incognita

40

"I was just coming to look for you,’ Ruso said. ‘Where have you been?”

Tilla was frighteningly pale.

“Are you all right?”

She did not answer.

Metellus smiled as he stood aside to let her enter the infirmary and assured Ruso that she had been very helpful. “Property returned in good condition as promised, doctor. I’ve told the watch captain you’ll be escorting her out later.”

He beckoned Ruso outside and murmured, “Any sign of Thessalus withdrawing his confession?”

“Not yet.”

“I told the girl I’d give you a few moments alone together. I’d be interested to know what she says to you. Just watch what you tell her. I know she’s very lovely, but she is a native.”

“I’m not a fool, Metellus.”

The aide smiled again. “I do hope not.”

One of the orderlies was rattling a broom around the corners of the treatment room. Ruso took Tilla by the hand and led her into his temporary quarters. When she was clear of the door, he squeezed in himself and sat beside her on the narrow bed, observing, “You’re pale.”

No reply.

Perhaps she needed to be distracted. He tried, “I expect it’s a lot more comfortable than this at your uncle’s.”

She said, “Yes,” but hardly bothered to look around.

He put an arm around her shoulders. She gasped with pain.

“Sorry,” he said, retracting the arm. “I forgot. Tell me what happened with Metellus.”

“I would rather have the ugly centurion with his stick than that one,” she said. “That one has things in his room that I do not want to think about.”

“He promised me he wouldn’t hurt you!”

“I am not hurt.”

“So what happened?”

“Nothing. I am all right.”

“It is not nothing,” he insisted. “And you are not all right.” He got to his feet and turned around in the small space between the bed and the door. “I should never have left you alone with him. Tell me what happened and I’ll go and see him right now.”

“He did not touch me.”

“He frightened you.”

She bowed her head. He saw the dark splashes of the tears in her lap. If Metellus had been within reach at the moment, Ruso would have punched his even features out of alignment.

More tears. He could not send her back to her uncle in this state. “I’ll go and see him. I won’t leave you alone with him again.”

She gave a loud sniff, and whispered, “I am no good.”

“They’re desperate to catch the man you saw in the yard,” he explained. “Lydia’s man isn’t the first one he’s killed. But if you can’t help, it isn’t your fault.”

She rubbed her fists into her eyes. “Last night a rude man will not let me in here. Now you take me in to look at some men of my people, and the officer with the smile of a snake wants me to get them into trouble.”

“You can only do your best, Tilla. There’s nothing to worry about. The accident wasn’t your fault.”

She slapped her hands down on her knees in exasperation. “Is not me I am worrying about! Is Rianorix!”

“Rianorix? The man at the clinic? He’s not seriously hurt, you know.”

“They are still asking questions about him,” she said.

“Well, just tell them what you know.”

“I know he does not kill that man. But they do not want to say the gods did it because that will show our gods are more powerful than theirs. And they will not blame the doctor because he is a Roman.”

Ruso sighed. This was exactly the native reaction that Decianus had anticipated.

“The doctor has a lot of problems,” he explained, “but really I don’t think killing Felix is one of them.”

“Well, it is not Rianorix. You must tell the officer he is wrong.”

“Tilla, when your gods do things, do they send people to act for them?”

She thought about that for a moment. “It is likely,” she said. “A stag is a messenger.”

“So the stag would give someone a message from the gods to do something?”

She nodded. “We must find out who the gods send to kill Felix. You must talk to the men who are with him in the bar. Perhaps it is them. Perhaps it is somebody who wants to kill Felix and blame Rian for it. Perhaps it is anybody. I will talk to Susanna at the bar and we must find Dari and ask if she knows where he goes afterward.”

“Dari?” Dari the arm-wrestling waitress? “What’s she got to do with it?”

“Susanna says she is the last person talking to Felix before he goes. We must find out. Like you find out what happened to the girls in Deva.”

“I can’t just go trampling all over Metellus’s investigation, Tilla.”

“Why not? He is wrong.”

“You’re absolutely convinced Rianorix is innocent?”

“I know.”

For a moment Ruso wondered if he should ask her what a native warrior would do with an enemy head. Where would he hide it? Who would he show it to? Tilla, whose kitchen duties were often accompanied by interminable songs about her ancestors, must know the stories. She could save the army hours of fruitless hunting and possibly a great deal of trouble with their own men. The killer’s trophy, the head of a Batavian soldier, might even now be at the center of some ghastly magic ritual that Rome had failed to stamp out with the extermination of the Druids. According to Albanus, which force had led Rome’s final assault on the Druid stronghold?

The Batavians.

Ruso did not know what Batavians believed about death but he was certain that none of them would believe Felix was resting peacefully while his head was still in the hands of the enemy. Worse, it would no doubt reappear in a show carefully orchestrated to cause the maximum alarm among the Roman forces. One question to Tilla might save them from all of that.

On the other hand, Metellus could have asked her that himself, and it seemed he had not. Maybe his investigation did need a little trampling upon.

“I’ll talk to Metellus,” he promised, reaching forward to slip a finger under a curl that was touching the corner of her eye.

“You must tell him Rian is innocent.”

“Yes. Now, since we’ve got a few minutes’ privacy…”

She grabbed his hand. “Not now. They will make me go before long and I have to explain to you why Rian is angry with this Felix.”

He stretched out along the bed and drew her toward him. “Tell me lying down.”

“You will not listen.”

“I promise.”

She rolled over to lie on top of him with her elbows dug into his ribs.

“Even when we are small,” she said, “my cousin Aemilia wants to marry an officer.”

Ruso closed his eyes and slid his hands down to cup the curve of her bottom. He had a feeling this was going to be a long story.