Julian, last to join us, called after me. “Succat, what are you doing?”
“Bannavem is burning!”
THREE
I REACHED THE TOP of the last hill and paused to look down upon the town below. Gashes of flame streaked the filthy sky. Along with the stench of smoke came a thin, almost ethereal wail, snaking along the trail to reach us as a cry of terror that chilled the warm marrow in our bones.
Behind me I heard Scipio suggest, “Someone has been careless with a lamp.”
I turned on him. “Fool!” I cried. “Bannavem is attacked!”
I started down the slope, but the others hesitated.
“Follow me!” I shouted.
Still they hung back.
I wheeled my horse and urged them to follow. “Hurry! The town is attacked!”
The three looked uneasily at one another. None made a move to join me.
“What can we do?” said Rufus.
“We have no weapons,” added Julian.
“It won’t help anyone if we get ourselves killed down there,” Scipio pointed out.
Their stubborn refusal angered me. “Cowards!” I shouted, and left them behind.
“It is too late for them,” Julian called after me. “We can only help ourselves.”
“The devil take you!” I shouted. “The devil take you all!”
Heedless of the danger, I rode for the town, fearing only that I would come too late to help save our lands, and that my mother would be worried about me. As I came nearer, I could hear shouting and the sporadic clash of weapons. In the darkness I could make out the walls and what appeared to be a knot of men on the road: raiders. I glimpsed flames through the broken gates and knew that the town was lost. I turned Boreas off the trail and raced for Favere Mundi.
The countryside between the town and our estate was quiet; so far as I could see, none of the smallholdings outside the town had been attacked. I arrived at the entrance to find the gate securely barred and locked. My shouts failed to raise anyone, so I left the trail and continued along the boundary hedge to a particular place I knew—I had long ago discovered how to enter and leave the estate when the gates were shut after dark—and, pausing to listen one last time, urged Boreas through the hawthorn gap and into the grain field behind the house.
Sliding from the saddle, I ran for the open archway leading into the courtyard, where, to my great relief, my mother stood calmly ordering the packing of the family treasure. “Mother!” I shouted, running to her.
“There you are, Succat,” she said, turning from a wagon which was being loaded with various objects from the house. “You came back.” A frantic servant tossed a carved box into the wagon and hurried away again.
“Bannavem is attacked. They will come here next.”
“Yes, of course, my darling boy. As you can see, I have grasped that much.”
“We must flee.”
“All in good time.”
“No, Mother. Now. We must go now, while there is still time to get away.”
“I will not have my precious things dumped into a hole like so much rubbish.”
“There is no time,” I said. An elder servant, a man named Horace, hurried past carrying one of my mother’s fine glass bowls. I grabbed him by the arm and took the bowl from his hands. “Saddle the horses, Horace,” I ordered. “Run!”
I placed the bowl on the ground, took my mother by the elbow, and pulled her away from the wagon. “We are leaving. Where is Father?”
“He rode to town to help the militia.”
“You let him go?” I cried.
“He is leader of the council,” she replied. “It was his duty.” She picked up the bowl and turned to place it carefully in the wagon.
“He will be killed,” I said. For the first time a quiver of fear passed through me. “The town is overrun.” Snatching the bowl from her hands, I threw it against the trunk of the nearby pear tree. The bowl smashed, scattering pieces everywhere.
“Succat!” shouted my mother, aghast at my action. “Can you even imagine the value of that bowl?”
“Leave it,” I told her, pulling her away again. “Leave it all.”
“I will not have you shouting at me like this.”
“Go to the stable, Mother, and get on a horse. I know a place nearby where we will be safe until the invaders have gone. I’ll look after this.” I pushed her away from the wagon. “Hurry!”
She seemed to understand at last and moved off toward the stable. Frantic now, I turned and ran into the house in search of a weapon. My father and the men of the estate had taken all the swords and javelins, of course, and the shields, leaving only a few light hunting spears behind. I took two of these and ran through the house shouting for everyone to abandon the place.
Then, with the help of one of the servants, I pulled the wagon to the end of the courtyard and pushed it out into the field, where, at the near end, lay a pile of straw. “There!” I said, indicating the straw. We pushed the wagon to the pile and then heaped straw over it until the wagon and its cargo of valuables could no longer be seen.
Returning to the courtyard once more, I found my mother holding yet another of her large glass bowls. I was about to shout at her to drop the damned thing and get back to the stable when I heard a sound which seemed to come from the front of the villa. I darted inside and ran to the entrance hall, opened the door, and looked out to see a dozen or more men on the path leading to the house. My heart leapt to my throat.
I fled at once to the courtyard, took my mother by the arm, and led her away. “I thought we were to take the horses,” she complained.
“No time.” At the archway I stopped and shouted a last time for everyone to flee. Horace reappeared, and several of the younger women servants ran from the house. “This way!” I shouted, desperate to get everyone clear of the house. “Follow me, everyone. Horace, see to my mother. I will lead the way.”
At the end of the field stood a small grove of beechnut trees; they grew low to the ground, their branches forming a screening breastwork of dark leaves. In the full leaf of summer, no one would know we were there—a fact I often put to good use in trysts with one of my mother’s handmaids. Inside the hollow of their protecting branches was an old disused well that still held water. This would be useful if we were forced to stay any length of time. The ground sloped sharply down behind the grove where a small brook ran to the woods from which our fields had been cut. If worse came to worst, I thought, we could make an unseen escape along the shallow waterway and into the woods.
We reached the grove and settled down to wait. I crept to the low-sheltering edge of the branches and lay down on my stomach, staring at the house and straining for any sound. The small ticks and chirps of the night creatures and insects seemed to fill the entire valley. The servants grew restive, and the sound of their scratching and twitching distracted me. “Quiet!” I hissed. “Keep still.”
As I spoke, I heard a door slam. Instantly everyone froze. A long moment passed, and then I heard someone shouting from the courtyard.
“…Succat!…Concessa!…Succat!”
“It’s Calpurnius,” I said.
“There. You see, dear?” replied my mother. “We are saved.”
“Perhaps.”
“We can go back now.” She started to her feet.
“Wait,” I said, taking hold of her arm. “I’ll go and look. Stay here until I come for you.”
Leaving the spears with the servants, I darted out from the grove and ran back through the field to the villa. I paused at the archway and heard my father call again, whereupon I entered the courtyard and ran to him. “Here! Here I am!” I shouted.
“Thank God you are safe.” His face was smudged black with soot, and he was bleeding from a cut to the side of his neck, but he appeared unharmed otherwise. He looked behind me. “Where is your mother?”
“At the old well,” I told him. His smoke-grimed face wrinkled with incomprehension, so I added, “In the beech grove. Remember?”
/> “Ah,” he said, “good thinking.”
“Shall I go get them?”
“No,” he said, turning away. “Leave them. They are safer there.”
“Father, wait,” I called, hurrying after him as he dashed to the house.
He turned to me abruptly. “Where were you tonight?”
“In Lycanum,” I answered, “with the others.”
“Was it attacked?”
“There was no trouble when we left.”
“Good. We still may have a chance.” He placed a hand on my shoulder. “I want you to go to Lycanum and bring the soldiers—bring as many as you can.”
“But I could never reach—”
“I sent two riders to Guentonia,” he said, hurrying on, “but they will not reach the garrison in time.”
“Father, listen, I—”
“Go, Succat. We do not have much time.”
Still I hesitated. “What should I tell them?”
“Bannavem is lost,” he said. “But there is still time to save the outlying settlements if they hurry. Tell them that.”
There came a sound from inside the house. “Come with me,” I said, and made to pull him away. “They are here already.”
“It is the militia,” he said, removing my hands. “I brought them here. We will hold the villa until you return with troops to aid us.” He saw my indecision and put his hand to my shoulder once more. “You can do nothing here,” he said. “Ride to Lycanum and bring soldiers. These Irish thieves will not stand against legionaries. Go. Quickly.”
“Very well,” I said, accepting his judgment at last. I turned and rushed away.
“Take Boreas!” he called after me. “And God speed you, my son.”
I paused at the bottom of the courtyard and called farewell, then hastened through the arch once more. Boreas was still in the field where I had left him. He would be tired from the evening’s ride, but he was young and his strength green; I reckoned that, even fatigued, Boreas was still the fastest mount we had.
Snatching up the reins, I leapt to the saddle and streaked across the field to the break in the hedge wall, passed through, and raced out across the open countryside to the place where the path from our villa joined the coast road. I flew along the gently rippling road: dark hills on my right hand, the wide, moon-speckled sea on my left, and the high, bright, star-dusted sky above. My heart pounded in my chest, thudding with every beat of brave Boreas’ hooves.
I drove that good horse hard and reached Lycanum far more swiftly than I imagined possible. Because of the rumored trouble, there was a watch before the gates: six legionaries standing around a fire, leaning on their javelins. They started from their gossip as I clattered up, and three of them ran to meet me with weapons ready.
“Help!” I cried. “Bannavem is attacked! We need soldiers!”
“Is that Succat?” said one of the men.
I looked down and recognized Darius. “Hurry! The town is overrun. My father sent me. We need soldiers.”
“How many?”
I stared at the man. “All you have!” I shouted.
“I mean,” replied Darius evenly, “how many raiders? How big is the attack force?”
“I cannot say. Hundreds. Maybe more.”
“Ships?”
“I did not see any.”
“Did you look?”
“Of course I looked.”
Darius regarded me with a stern, searching expression. “Do not lie to me, boy. Did you look?”
“No, but—”
One of the soldiers spat a curse of exasperation. Darius remained unmoved. “How many militiamen do you have?”
“A dozen, I think, maybe a score.”
“Bannavem is lost, boy,” said one of the soldiers, turning away.
“Sorry, Succat,” said Darius.
“You will not help us?”
“We cannot, lad,” replied the legionary. “Most of the troops were sent to Guentonia. There are only two cohorts left behind to protect the town.”
“Then bring them, for God’s sake!” I snarled. “There is still time to save the settlements. Hurry!”
“Know you, if it was my decision, I would,” answered Darius. “But we cannot leave Lycanum unprotected.”
“Besides,” added the other legionary, “with those odds it would make no difference.”
“You mean to do nothing?” I said, my voice growing tight with disbelief. Tears of frustration welled in my eyes.
“I am sorry.”
“Not as sorry as the dead of Bannavem.” Wheeling my horse, I made to gallop away before the soldiers could see I was crying.
“Stay, Succat,” called Darius. “We can protect you here. You will be safe.”
“Damn you to hell!” I cried, my voice shaking with rage as I blindly lashed Boreas for home.
Back we raced, over the empty, night-dark road. Boreas—lathered, sweating, his sides heaving—gamely answered my command. Foam from his muzzle spattered my leg; I looked down and saw the white flecks streaked with blood. Still I did not relent. I would not leave my family to face the marauders alone. Help was not coming; it was time to abandon the villa and save ourselves.
On and on we went, at length reaching the slope rising to the last hill above our estate. Boreas labored up the long incline, gained the top, and galloped headlong into a swarm of Irish raiders.
Before I could dodge or turn, I was in among them. With a cry of surprise, the dark heathens scattered, leaping in all directions.
I put my head down and lashed Boreas hard so as to drive through them.
Two great half-naked hulks appeared directly in my path, running, screaming, the blades of their spears glinting in the moonlight.
I threw the reins to the right; Boreas, frightened now, tried to swerve, but his strength was gone. His legs tangled; he stumbled and fell. I slid from the saddle as he went down, rolling free of his flailing hooves. Still holding the reins, I scrambled to my feet and tried to pull him up. “Hie! Boreas! Up!” I shouted, pulling with all my might.
The poor exhausted beast made one last effort, and then his heart gave out and he collapsed. His head struck the road, a shudder passed through his body, and he lay still.
A strong arm encircled my waist, and I felt myself lifted from the ground. I kicked the heels of my boots—aiming for his knee or groin. Instead, I caught his thigh. He gave out a roar and threw me down on the ground. I hit hard; for a moment I could not breathe.
Gasping, gagging, I squirmed onto my knees and tried to gain my feet. I heard a whiffling sound behind my ear and felt a jolt that seemed to take off the back of my head. I was lifted up and hurled facefirst into the dust. Flaming black stars burst before my dazzled eyes. My head was filled with the sound of a thousand angry hornets.
Hands grasped me by the hair and arms. I was yanked upright and half dragged, half carried away down the hill. When my vision cleared somewhat, I saw that I was being lugged toward the shore. I tried to wriggle free and received a sharp cuff across the side of my face.
As we descended to the coast, I twisted my throbbing head around and saw, over my shoulder, a dirty red-orange glow in the sky. Our villa was aflame. I cried out at the sight and struggled once more to free myself. “Mother!” I screamed. “Father!”
My shouts were silenced by a crack on my skull which rattled my teeth like dice in a cup and knocked all sense from me. My stomach, bladder, and bowels emptied themselves at once, and all strength fled. The raiders bore me up between them and dragged me down to the sea.
FOUR
I LAY ON THE strand with a mouth full of sand and the roar of the sea in my ears. Knowing I should get up and run away while it was still dark, I lacked both strength and will, and instead writhed on the beach, panting and groaning, my eyes squeezed shut against the pain. The darkness was filled with rushing and shouting and cries of terror, but I paid no heed to any of it. Gradually, the frenzy and noise receded, and I sank into a dark, empty silence.
&nb
sp; Sometime later I opened my eyes on a dawn raw as an open wound, to find that I was lying on a heap of rotting seaweed with no memory of how I came to be there.
My horse threw me, I thought. Boreas had thrown me and bolted. I must have crawled down to the strand from the road. Or maybe I had fallen and rolled down. We were at the inn—my friends and I. But where were they now? And why had they deserted me when I needed them?
These thoughts, fragments only, circled lazily in and out of my hazy memory. There was something else…the sound of breaking glass…a cry for help…someone whimpering…the moon glowing red through a dark pall of smoke.
Smoke…
With the word came the scent in my nostrils—and with that, the awful memory of what had happened: the attack…the villa ablaze…my home destroyed.
I raised my head, which started a cascade of pain. When it passed, my vision cleared and I looked around. In the dim dawn light I could make out the huddled forms of others nearby. I heard the sound of sobbing and carefully turned my head to the left, where a young girl was sitting—knees to chin, arms wrapped around her legs, hugging herself, rocking back and forth, whimpering in her misery. Her eyes were closed, and tears glistened on her thin, dirty face.
“Who are you?” I croaked. The voice which issued from my mouth was as dry and feeble as an old man’s, but the girl opened her eyes and gazed at me.
“I thought you dead,” she said after a moment.
“Not yet,” I gasped.
She regarded me with an expression that said she was far from persuaded.
“Where are we?”
“They killed my mother,” the girl replied, her lips quivering. She sniffed back the tears. “They came for us at night. I don’t know what happened to my father.”
“Where are we?” I asked again, raising my voice slightly. Even that sent spasms of pain spinning though my head. I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth.
“Are you injured?” asked the girl.
“My head hurts,” I replied between breaths. When the pain subsided, I opened my eyes and said, “What is your name?”
“Drusilla,”