Terra Incognita

79

There were thirty-four of them. Tilla knew that because she had heard the guards counting them as they were herded into the corner of the big courtyard where she had seen the men lined up to be identified.

The army did not seem impressed with their prisoners. They had captured mostly old people and mothers with young children: the ones who had not been able to run fast enough. The storyteller and the naked warriors had vanished into the night.

When the soldiers charged, Rianorix had grabbed her and tried to shield her. By the time they scrambled to their feet they found two Batavians with drawn swords standing guard over them. The soldiers had laughed-not kindly-when they recognized Rianorix.

She lifted her head. The moon was being assisted by smoky torches, and all around her the yellow light flickered over shapes huddled on the cold gravel, sharing whatever cloaks and blankets they had managed to keep hold of in an effort to keep warm.

The old man next to her heaved and coughed, the jerking of his head made visible in the darkness by the white stripe of bandage. When the doctors had been allowed in to treat the injured, she had feigned a sprained wrist, but the medicus was not there and Valens only had a chance to murmur, “Are you all right?” before assigning her to a bandager and turning his attention to the next person in the line.

She had wanted to talk to the medicus. To explain to him that these people did not deserve to be punished. They were ordinary families: farmers and weavers and carpenters gathered for a traditional celebration spiced with the excitement of secrecy-and, yes, with the camaraderie that came from sharing their complaints about the Romans. But the celebration had become something she could not have foreseen. Under the leadership of the Stag Man, or the Messenger, or whatever he called himself, these ordinary folk had taken the medicus prisoner, worked themselves up into a frenzy, and threatened to murder him. As the big soldier she remembered from the clinic looped a bandage around her thumb and back around her wrist, she tried to think what she could say in her people’s defense. There was not a lot.

Within what seemed minutes of arriving, the medical staff had been ordered to leave. “We just want them alive enough to talk,” one of the officers had explained to Valens.

“You know who they will want us to talk about,” she whispered to Rianorix.

“They won’t find out anything,” Rianorix assured her. “Nobody knows where he comes from. He’s very careful.”

“But they all suffer for him.”

“If we want freedom, sister, some of us will have to be prepared to suffer.”

It sounded like a speech he had heard at a meeting. “But not him,” said Tilla. “He is very careful.”

They paused as a guard walked past. When he had gone Rianorix hissed, “He is our best hope. What is the matter with you?”

“There is nothing the matter with me!” she retorted in his ear, frustrated at the constrictions placed on the argument by the need not to be overheard. “You are the one who needs to open your eyes. I can see that he is bringing nothing but trouble.”

“And what do your friends the Romans bring?”

She grabbed his wrist. “The Romans are not my-”

“No talking!” called out one of the guards. As one of the people translated the order for the benefit of those without Latin, he yelled again, “I said, no talking!”

Over in the corner, a baby began to cry. A small voice wailed, “I’m cold!”

There were several hisses of, “Sh!”

The old man began to cough again.

Thirty-four people. Children and mothers and grandparents.

He is our best hope.

Thirty-four people.

We just want them alive enough to talk.

“The Romans are not my friends,” she breathed. “But I am not fool enough to follow everyone who opposes them.”

“You are much changed, daughter of Lugh.”

“And you are just as stupid as ever,” she retorted.

“You there! Stand up!”

Tilla put a hand on Rianorix’s shoulder to urge him to stay down. She gathered up her skirt and got to her feet.

“Come over here!”

She was aware of heads lifting, frightened eyes following her, bodies shuffling to let her pass as she picked her way across to where the guard stood. Before she was near enough to be hit, she stopped. “I would like to see the commanding officer,” she announced in Latin, her voice clear in the silent courtyard. “I have some information to offer him.”