The Singing Sword

XXVII

The newly wedded pair were escorted in the direction of the Council Hall, and I saw Luceiia's chair being carried there, too. I was surrounded by congratulatory friends, as were Ullic and Caius, but eventually Ullic and I were able to come together again, with Caius only a pace away, talking to one of his friends.

"Well, Roman, it was well done, I think?"

"Aye, Ullic, it was. It was well done."

"Your bishop friend spoke well. I was glad he was here."

"I was, too. He summed it up better than even Caius could have. And he surprised me, I have to admit. I have known Alaric for many years, but I don't think I have ever heard him speak in public before. I didn't know he was an orator. He played with the crowd, and with me too, the way your Druids play their instruments."

"How do you feel, now that you own my lands?" There was a slight smile on his face.

"Responsible," I replied with a matching smile. "I wonder what will result from this start."

Ullic heaved a great, sharp sigh. "Who knows, my friend? We have sown the seeds, that's all. There is no more we can do. Now it all depends on how the wind blows, and on how well young Uric sows his own seeds."

I nodded my head gravely, teasing him. "Aye, that's true. The last thing needed here is a great crop of daughters."

"Hah! No fear of that! We Pendragons are famed sir-ers of strong sons. Only effete Romans produce daughters with regularity."

"Then thank your gods, pagan, that they do!" I turned and reached my hand to Caius, breaking him away from his conversation and talking back across my shoulder to Ullic. "They'll give your stallion sons plenty of fields to plough in years to come."

I winked at the man whose conversation with Caius I had interrupted and drew Caius towards me. "Pardon us, my friend," I said to the man, unable to recall his name. "I must interrupt you and steal your listener, for it is almost time for us to go to the festive hall and join our ladies, and we have to drink, we three, to years to come."

Ullic was looking around at the almost-empty courtyard. "Everybody has gone in. They'll be waiting for us. Are you ready?"

"No," I said, "I am not. It will be crowded in there and I am already stifling in this ridiculous outfit. I think what I would like to do is shed this heavy cloak, dump all this armour and be comfortable. In fact, the more I think of it, the more I'm sure that it's exactly the most sensible thing to do. Where did Picus go? I see his horse there."

Caius spoke. "He is probably inside the hall." As he said the words, one of his household servants emerged from the festivities, saw us and came straight towards me.

"Lord Varrus, the Lady Luceiia sent me to find you. She asks that you join her in the Council Hall."

I made a wry face at Ullic and Cay. "Well, it seemed like a good idea." I returned my attention to the messenger. "Please inform the Lady Luceiia that King Ullic, Caius Britannicus and I will join the party shortly. In the meantime, please ask that they proceed as though we were already there. We will not be long." He turned to leave and I stopped him. "Wait. Is General Picus there?"

His face went blank. "I don't know, sir. I didn't see him, but I was not looking for him."

"No matter. I will find him later." The fellow went on his way and I turned back to my companions. "We had better go in to the proceedings, I suppose, but before we do I think we should set aside a time while we are all three here — four, if we count Picus — to talk of planning, of strategy. We have set some things in motion here today that should not be left untended. Uric should join us, too. When would be a good time?"

"When would you like it to be?" said Ullic. "I have nothing else to do while I am here."

Caius raised his eyebrow. "Tomorrow?"

I nodded. "Aye, in the afternoon. Alaric has the morning set aside for prayer."

Ullic blinked his eyes at that and stared at me strangely. "Prayer? Is that what you said? Why? What's going on?"

"Merely a Christian service, Ullic. In the Council Hall. Alaric has dedicated a special altar-stone to the Colony's use. He will use it for the first time tomorrow. Would you like to attend?"

"Aye, I might. A sacred stone, you say? Like ours?"

"Almost," I said with a smile, and Cay added, "But not as big, and not as phallic."

"What do you mean?"

I grinned at him. "Phallic, he said. You know what that means, don't you? Like a phallus. Your people, in your olden days, were very fond of raising great erections everywhere."

"Erections? You mean temples? Like Stonehenge?"

"No, Ullic, I mean erections, as in penises. Stonehenge has lintels across the top of its uprights, forming a circle, but the other stones I have seen are just like great stone penises, thrust into the air all over Britain."

Ullic was suddenly looking around him, almost furtively. "Watch what you say, Publius," he muttered hoarsely. "Priests are not famous for their tolerance when mocked."

His comment surprised me and made me feel slightly ashamed, as though he had caught me doing something beneath my dignity. I cleared my throat to cover the sudden confusion he had stirred in me and made amends immediately.

"Come, Ullic, I would not mock your priests, nor your beliefs, I merely said what I have often thought, in the hope that it might amuse you. I can see that it was thoughtless of me. Forgive me."

Cay spoke up. "Where will we meet tomorrow? Must it be in private?"

"No," I replied, "not necessarily, although I would rather keep the content of our talk among ourselves at this stage."

"Well then, why don't we all ride down to the villa? We can talk on the way, have a cup of wine there and then ride back."

"Sounds fine to me," Ullic said. "But why go to the villa? We could take a wineskin with us and ride overland."

"True, we could," I agreed. "But it suits me that Cay would want to go to the villa. While we are down there, I have something I would like to show both of you. Don't ask me what it is, for I won't tell you. I'll show you what it is tomorrow. Now, let's go and do our duty as fathers of the father and mother yet to be."

"That leaves me out!" Cay sounded aggrieved.

I laughed and threw my arm around his shoulders. "Don't be silly, Cay, you're an honorary father for the day."

As we approached the entrance to the Council Hall, someone called Ullic by name. He glanced over his shoulder and stopped. When Cay and I stopped too, he waved us on.

"You two go ahead, I'll join you presently. I have to talk to Cymric here."

We continued walking, and I found myself shrugging mightily in a vain attempt to get my cloak to hang more comfortably. I felt like a walking anvil, so great was the weight of metal I was carrying, and I was looking forward now to getting into the shade of the Council Hall, out of the hot, strong sun.

Cay and I stepped through the main entrance and stopped there, blinking our eyes to adjust to the gloom after the brightness of the sunshine outside. There was a false wall, or partition, just inside the entrance, creating the semblance of an entrance vestibule and serving also to shield the interior from outside when the main doors were open. Picus was standing there, one arm outstretched, leaning his weight on the partition, and between him and the wall was Ullic's sister, Enid. Picus still wore his helmet and his cloak and both he and Enid were oblivious to our entry, having eyes only for each other. The tension between them was almost tangible, an aura of taut sexuality apparent in their very stance. I looked at Caius and found he was already looking at me, his eyebrow riding high on his forehead. Wordlessly, we made our way around to the other side of the partition without disturbing the couple. I am not normally perceptive of subtleties, my wife has often told me, but even I could pick up on the situation between Picus and Enid. It was as subtle as a kick in the groin.

As I was passing out of their sight, however, it occurred to me quite forcibly that if Ullic stepped through that door as we had done, and received the same impressions that had come immediately to me, he might be moved to react in a way that could be regretted by everyone concerned. The sexual force these two were generating by just standing together was that strong. I started to turn back, but then stopped myself. These two were full-grown, old enough to do whatever they wished to do. He was an imperial legate and a commander of cavalry, and she was a princess and a ripe, mature woman. What they did was no business of mine. I left them to their own devices.

Caius and I joined the revelry; Picus joined us shortly after, showing no sign of anything unusual, but every now and then I could see him looking off across the hall, and there she would be, looking straight back at him. The thing that amazed me most about this was that I seemed to be the only person present who was aware of the sparks flying back and forth across the gathering. I passed a remark to Luceiia about it and completely failed to stir a spark of interest in her. She looked around cursorily to find Enid seated some tables away, engaged in conversation, as chance would have it, with the fellow next to her. Picus was likewise talking at the time with someone else and looking nowhere in Enid's direction. Luceiia frowned at me in some perplexity and started to say something, then changed her mind and gave my hand a squeeze and launched into a retelling of the conversation she had had with two of the Council members' wives after the wedding ceremony. I sat there feeling foolish and let her words pour over me, in one unlistening ear and out the other, thinking that women, even the best of them, could be unutterably blind, even when telling us how blind we are.

My other recollections of that day's proceedings are like my memories of a fight; fragmented, frozen images: the bride, my daughter, radiant with joy, holding her husband's arm tight to her side, laughing into my eyes; the great, brown hill bear I had seen outside, dancing and beating on a tambourine; some of Ullic's men tumbling and spinning, turning somersaults in the air; a roasted swan, its flawless feathers back in place, surrounded by a flock of roasted ducks and geese, passing before me on a massive board carried by several men; and my own owlish eyes peering back at me from the surface of the wine in the goblet I was peering into. It was a grand feast, I gather; for perhaps the third time in my life, I was carried senseless to my bed. But then, I was the father of the bride.

I awoke in pitch-darkness, with no idea of where I was; I knew I was abed, but that was all. I could hear people singing drunkenly, off in the distance, and my memory came back to me slowly. I was in our tent, outside the walls of the new fort. I reached out slowly for Luceiia, but she was not there, and that left me wondering what hour of the night it was. I struggled upright to a sitting position and immediately wished I hadn't done so; my head felt as though all the smiths of Vulcan's forge were pounding inside it.

I was groaning unashamedly, in a fine stew of self-pity, by the time I got to the opening of the tent, and there I stopped, stung by the cool night air into realizing that I was wearing nothing more than my tunic. I wondered who had taken off my armour and my clothes. And then I wondered how.

Going back to the pile of furs that was my bed, I fumbled about in the darkness and finally found the cedar chest that contained my clothes. Luceiia had insisted I bring my sheepskin tunic, knowing that the nights would still be cool up here on the hill. It took a minute or two of ill-natured groping and fumbling in the dark before I located the heavy sheepskin, but then I pulled it over my head and went back to the entrance of the tent, throwing the leather flaps wide to admit the moonlight. The improvement was great and immediate. I then found my sandals and took down a woollen cloak from a peg on the tent pole before going outside to sit on the ground and lace up my sandals, realizing that even the light from the crescent moon was painful to my eyes. I was not happy; in fact, I could not remember ever having felt quite so awful as the result of what were supposed to be pleasurable activities. The ground felt cold against my backside, too, so I struggled back to my feet, groaning again, and re-entered the tent to pull a couple of skins from the sleeping pile. There was a tree of some kind no more than a few paces from the front of my tent. I threw the skins down at its base and seated myself carefully upon them with my back to the trunk, my cloak wrapped tightly around my shoulders as I breathed very deeply, gulping great draughts of the cool night air and squeezing my eyes tight shut.

A dog began to howl quite close by and my mind cringed at the sound. I swore if the cur came any closer I would find it and choke it to profound, permanent silence. And then I heard footsteps approaching me, and someone began to sing in a loud, drunken voice, to be joined immediately by his equally drunken companions. I scrambled to my feet and fled into the night, clutching the fur I had been sitting on.

I must have walked a good half-mile along the hillside, paralleling the walls that loomed above me, tilting my body upward against the steep slope that fell away downhill on my right. I could still hear an occasional shout of laughter from late revellers within the walls, but I was soon far enough away from the level tent area to leave all noise there completely behind and my head was thankful.

Eventually I found myself another tree to lean on and sat down, bracing myself slightly against the fall of the slope with my heels, resting my elbows on my upraised knees and pressing the heels of my palms against my pounding temples. I felt as sick and miserable as I had when, as a green recruit, I had first drunk too much of our thin, sour legionaries' wine.

I have no idea how long I sat there. It might have been an hour — perhaps more, perhaps less — but I eventually dozed off and scared myself back to wakefulness when my head slipped from the crutch of my hands. I blinked and growled and muttered and peered around me at the darkness on all sides. In front of me, low on the horizon, the moon was almost gone from sight. I was chilled to the bone, but I felt decidedly better than I had earlier. I cursed, knowing that my bad knee was going to cause me agonies when I tried to stand up, and hugged my cloak closer, seeking warmth that wasn't there. I had been sitting too long. Grimly, I pulled myself to my feet, gritting my teeth against the fierce pain now in my knee. It felt as though all the bones in the joint were brazed together, but I forced myself to walk, limping outrageously, staggering and at one point almost crawling, supporting my weight on one hand against the hillside where the slope was particularly steep.

After a few minutes of movement, as the exercise restored the flow of circulation, the pain began to lessen and I began to make better progress, although the going was still much harder than it had been on the way there because the slope of the hill was now against my bad leg. It was no use berating myself for not having thought of that earlier, for then I had been too sick to think or even care. I simply bit down on my teeth the harder and took advantage of every tree I came to, stopping to lean against each one and rest my aching leg.

I was perhaps half-way back to my tent when I paused to rest against a large tree and my bladder let me know that it was under pressure. Fumbling at the binding of my breech-clout, I was noticing the silence now from the walls above me when an unearthly moan seemed to issue from the ground at my feet and the hairs on my neck and arms stirred in horror. I am not a superstitious man, but that sound, on a bare, empty, dark hillside, turned my guts to water. I froze, my bladder forgotten, my ears straining in the absolute stillness that followed the shocking sound. Nothing stirred, anywhere, and then it came again, a long-drawn, sighing moan, less loud this time and much, much less unearthly. This time I recognized it as coming from a human throat, and I also placed the direction of its source. There was a dip in the ground in front of me, down to my left. Whoever had made that noise was down there in the hollow. I was highly aware of feeling much better now that I had found relief and identified both sound and location. I moved out from my tree slowly, approaching the lip of the hollow with great caution, and there I stopped, feeling my flesh crawl again.

There was no one there. No one at all. It was an empty, grassy bowl, inky dark and empty. And then I saw a pale flash and realized what I was looking at: two people lying hidden, covered and totally concealed by a dark blanket. The darkness of the night had blended it into invisibility until one leg had come briefly into view before being withdrawn again. And then I heard whispering and the man laughed, and my stomach turned over.

The dark blanket was a black cloak, the cloak of Picus Britannicus, for it was he who had laughed, and I had no need to guess who the other person under that cloak with him might be. I backed away from there with a feeling akin to panic in my breast. What would they think if they found me there, spying on them like this? And then my heel caught on a tussock and I overbalanced, unable to catch myself on my bad leg, and I fell heavily on my backside. It seemed to me that I came down with the noise of a landslide, loud enough to wake the dead, but the two people below me were too caught up in being alive to hear me.

I got to my feet again slowly and with caution and hobbled away, hearing the noises of their coupling growing louder and more passionate behind me until the distance I gained was great enough to permit them their privacy. Sweet Christ on His Cross! This could be a pretty mess, I thought, if Picus handled it wrongly. I had no idea what I should do, or how I might proceed in order to make the seriousness of his conduct clear to Picus. Enid was Ullic's sister, and one of his favourite people. An insult to her might be unforgivable; that would not surprise me at all. Though it was as little Ullic's affair as it was mine, that meant little. I suspected that he might be more than simply angry.

And yet there was nothing wrong or unnatural about the attraction or the natural lust that Enid and Picus had sparked in each other, nor was there anything unusual in their gratification of their feelings. So why was I feeling so apprehensive? I did not know, but my mind kept feeding me images of their two bodies grappling with each other, uncovered by the cloak. I visualized Enid's face twisting with the pleasure of what she was feeling and then suddenly it was I, not Picus, who was above her. The realization of what I was thinking brought me up short, and only then did I perceive the reason for my state of mind. It was caused by envy! I was jealous!

I stopped again, this time by an outcrop of rock, and tried to take stock of this new discovery. It was a novel one, for I could not remember ever having dedicated a thought to any other woman, apart from Cylla Titens, since I had wedded Luceiia. Not a serious thought, at any rate. I had remarked the occasional voluptuous breast or swelling hip from time to time, but only in passing. And now, all of a sudden, I was jealous? From somewhere, I found the strength to laugh at myself and recognize both the humour and the truth of the situation. This beautiful, ripe woman had simply reminded me of my lost young-manhood. That is why no one else had noticed their mutual attraction; it was so normal, so natural, that it had gone unremarked. Only I had seen it because, without my knowing it, I had been looking for it and resenting it.

All at once, I felt much better. My aching head had been forgotten, and now my aching leg stopped hurting as if by magic and my swollen bladder reasserted itself. I relieved it and made my way back to my tent, where I found my wife asleep and a lamp burning to light my way to bed. I put out the lamp and climbed in beside Luceiia, snuggling close to her welcoming warmth and hardly even sparing another thought for Picus and Enid and their coupling before I fell asleep.