I think if I had sent her away, she would have gone. No doubt that is what I should have done. Oh, but sending her away was the last thing either of us wanted just then.
So I rose and, taking her hand, drew her close. We stood for a moment, gazing at one another, savoring the delicious thrill of anticipation. Then, placing my hands on her hips, I pulled her body to me. I felt the heat of her flesh through the thin stuff of her dress. I kissed her again.
The large window was open, allowing a little light from the night sky to spill into the room. She unclasped the brooch at her shoulder, then reached around behind her back and untied the laces of her girdle, unwinding it carefully, before tossing it lightly aside. Her mantle slid down over her waist and hips to the floor. The sight of her long, elegant legs stepping from the ring of crumpled cloth at her feet took my breath away.
She moved to embrace me, but I put out a hand. “Wait,” I whispered. “Let me look at you.”
I let my gaze fall slowly down the long, supple length of her body, from the column of her graceful throat over her ripe, luscious breasts and down along the shallow, sloping curves of her waist and hips, taking in the gently rounded mound of her stomach and the tapering fullness of her thighs.
Slender she was, true, with little enough flesh to cover her bones. Oh, but that flesh possessed a potent charm nonetheless, and I felt myself quicken at the sight.
In the dim light she seemed a creature carved of the same fine white alabaster as the swan in the garden—until she shivered. “I’m cold,” she said, her voice trembling. Her eyes glistened; her lips quivered. “I’m not sure I know what to do.”
“Then come to bed,” I said. “I’ll show you.”
I gathered her into my arms and drew her down into the sweet, warm darkness.
FORTY-EIGHT
ORIANA AND I made love that night and every night from then on, and often in the day, too. Any reluctance I might have felt in ravishing the vicarius’ virginal daughter melted away in the white heat of our combined passion. There was no stopping us. At first awkward and uncertain, she quickly became an accomplished and enthusiastic lover, and her ardor awakened in me a genuine desire so long dormant I thought it had deserted me forever. There was much I loved about Oriana, but I did not love her—at least not the same way I had loved Sionan. Still, I did like her, and I would have crossed a lake of fire to avoid hurting her. I imagined that, in time, I could grow to love her with something of the same intensity I had once held for Sionan.
“My family returns the day after tomorrow,” she sighed one afternoon. We were sitting together in the courtyard, drinking cool lemon water from the same cup. Despite the warmth of the day, Oriana had curled herself onto the couch and wrapped me around her. “What shall we do then?”
“Well,” I said absently, “I suppose we shall just have to get married.”
She turned around so fast that I spilled most of the drink down the front of her mantle. “Do you mean it?”
I thought for a moment. “Yes,” I decided at last. “Why not?”
“Do not tease me, Succat. Did you mean what you said just now?”
“Every word.”
In truth it was not so much that I was eager to marry her but rather that I had no other prospects whatsoever. I suppose I had grown accustomed to the Columellas and thought to keep myself within the circle of their influence by whatever means possible. Marriage seemed as good a tool as any.
“My love!” She kissed me full and hard.
“Anyway,” I suggested, “if I did not, your father would likely gut me and parade my worthless skin through the streets of Rome.”
“You would marry me just to save your skin?”
“Of course,” I confessed. To be sure, I did not relish the idea of returning to the murderous forests of Germania. “I have grown fond of this hide of mine. Almost,” I added, “as fond as I am of yours.”
“Well, it is a handsome skin after all,” she conceded, drawing her fingertips lightly over my chest. “It would be a shame to see it bruised. I suppose I could marry you.”
“Thank you,” I said.
We kissed again, and she sighed, “Oh, Succat, just think. We shall have the grandest, most dazzling wedding you have ever seen.”
“That would not be difficult,” I said, “as I have never been to a Roman wedding—or any other wedding, come to that.”
Even as I spoke these words, a strange sensation of dread flooded my soul. The face of Sionan floated into my mind, she whom I had used and forsaken—much as I was using Oriana to get what I wanted now. I thrust the image angrily aside. That was my old life, I told myself, a different life. That life was over. I was not the same man.
“What is wrong, my love?” asked Oriana, sensing the sudden change in my mood. “You look so disgusted.”
“Do I?” I forced a smile. “If I do, it is only because I did not think to ask you properly.”
“Then ask me now.”
I took her hand. “Oriana, dearest heart of my heart, will you marry me?”
“Am I really your dearest heart?”
“There is no one else.” Again, even as I spoke, my thoughts turned to Sionan, changing the words in my mouth to a lie.
“Then, yes, my love, I will marry you.”
Oriana spent the rest of the day planning how she would tell her parents. I left her humming to herself with delight as she concocted her scheme, and I went to the garrison to search out Rufus.
Although lacking any formal duties, he had not been entirely idle during his stay. To my surprise—and mild embarrassment—he had found Scipio. I had intended to search out our old friend first thing on my arrival in the city. But that, like so much else, I had let slip away.
“Good,” Rufus said when he saw me. I was sitting in the guardroom, where I had been told to wait while one of the Praetorian servants went to bring him. “I found Scipio—did Julian tell you?”
“I have not seen Julian since we passed the gates on our way into Rome.”
He shrugged. “Well, it doesn’t matter. I am meeting Scipio tonight at a tavern in the city. You’re to come, too. We are all going to be there.”
“The four of us together again,” I remarked, wondering how that would be. “It will seem like old times.”
That evening I met Rufus outside the garrison gate, and we went along to the tavern, a place much frequented by Praetorian officers and ambitious young functionaries—men, as Rufus said, to whom a nodding acquaintance with the upper ranks of the imperial guard could be useful. The place was small and low-roofed like a cow bier, yet clean and well maintained. The owner served good wine for a tidy price, Rufus told me, and cooked chops of pork, lamb, and whole spitted fowls over iron braziers in the stone-paved courtyard.
Julian and Scipio were already there waiting for us. Julian had taken a table in a dim corner of one of the smaller rooms, where we could talk more easily. I saw Julian at once and then looked for Scipio, recognizing him at last as the balding, stooped fellow sitting opposite in a toga.
“Rufus! Succat!” cried Julian, waving us over as we came in. “Come. Sit. The wine is on its way.”
“Scipio, is it you?” I said, standing over him.
“By God’s holy name,” said Scipio, jumping to his feet. “Is that Succat? I never would have known you.”
We embraced somewhat awkwardly, patting one another on the back. He was shorter than I remembered and thick around the middle where the beginning of a paunch was starting to spread beneath his fresh, white garment. “God’s teeth, man, it is good to see you! Look at you now! Rufus says you are a centurion. I always knew you’d make a good soldier. Didn’t I often say it?”
Of course he had never said anything of the kind. “It is one of the few genuine talents I possess,” he continued, tapping his nose knowingly. “I can tell a man’s character simply by looking at him.” He winked. “Why, I would not be at all surprised to see you a tribune one day—and you as well, Rufus, yes, you as we
ll. I am certain of it.”
Every inch the smooth Roman official, a small, well-greased cog in the machinery of imperial government, Scipio smiled with oily false sincerity and talked nonsense to flatter his listeners.
“A very prophet,” I told him.
“It is, as you can imagine, a great asset in the senate.”
The tavern keeper arrived just then and placed two jars and a stack of cups on the table. He paused to exchange a few words with Scipio, who, I gathered, was a regular patron of the establishment.
“Come, pour the wine,” cried Julian impatiently, “before we die of thirst!”
“Good old Succat,” Scipio chuckled, shaking his head in merry disbelief. “Yours is a face I never thought to see again.” He took my arm and pulled me to the bench. “Well, now that we’re all here, we can begin properly.” He splashed wine into the cups and handed them around.
Rufus stood and lofted his drink, saying, “I raise a cup to friendship. May we never grow too old to remember the green years of our youth.”
Julian made a wry face. “Rufus the poet. Sit down, you sentimental sop.”
“To friends!” Scipio and I replied, and we drank a long draught.
“What do you think of Rome?” asked Scipio when we had drained the first cup.
“It is magnificent,” I replied.
“If you like gaudy spectacle and the continual reek of garlic,” muttered Julian, tilting the contents of his cup down his throat.
“Yes, I suppose it does give an impression of magnificence at first,” allowed Scipio indifferently. He turned to Rufus. “You have seen something of the world, my friend. What do you think?”
Rufus had never been to Rome either, but he shrugged, affected to be unimpressed with anything he saw, and declared himself bored with its vaunted attractions. “You find them tedious?” I challenged. “How is that possible? Have you seen Trajan’s Column? It is over a hundred feet tall! How can you call that tedious?”
“Rufus is right,” observed Julian. “One column is very like another.”
“And we have no end of columns here,” put in Scipio. “You cannot move without bumping into one triumphal something or another.”
“You all feign indifference,” I said, “but you are just as delighted by this marvel of a city as I am.”
“Marvel of a city?” hooted Julian. “You can have it, then, and with my blessing. It is crowded, noisy, stinking, and hot. More sewer than city, if you ask me.”
“An expensive sewer,” added Scipio. “Since the last invasion the city has become a pit for the empire’s refuse. I am moving to Constantinople as soon as I find a buyer for my house. Trouble is, all the best Romans are selling up, too; it drives the property prices down. If I’m not careful, I’ll realize only a fraction of what the place is worth.”
I could not believe the way they talked; their world-weariness made me feel stupid for enjoying the splendors of the still-splendid city. I drank from my cup and said no more. A prickly silence settled over us.
“This reminds me of the last time we were together,” observed Scipio. “It was at the Old Black Wolf, as I recall. I wonder whatever became of the place.”
“A blacksmith owns it. He keeps a forge there now,” I said.
“Does he indeed?” wondered Scipio, shaking his head as if such a thing were unimaginable. “Well, much has changed.”
His bland observation angered me. “It was also the night of the Great Raid,” I replied sharply. “We were at the Old Wolf, and the soldiers told us to go home. By the time we got back, Bannavem was in flames. Over a thousand of our kinsmen disappeared on that night, and hundreds more were killed. Estates were burned and whole towns destroyed.” I paused, gazing at him with disgust. “Yes, you could say much has changed since that night.”
Rufus sat looking into his cup, his expression vacant; he said nothing.
“Are you going to drag up all that again?” said Julian. “That was a long time ago. It is over. Finished. For your own good, let it go.”
“Finished? Ha!” I slammed down my cup. “I wore a slave collar for seven years, and I carry the weight of it always.”
Julian regarded me icily as he set his cup on the table. “You hold us somehow to blame for your misfortune?” A smirk slid across his fat face as he appealed to the others. “No doubt Succat’s captivity has confused his memory somewhat. We cannot be held to blame for what happened that night.”
Rufus and Scipio looked on, mute, uneasy.
“I do hold you to blame,” I answered tersely. “Now that you say it, I do blame you.”
“How, in the name of Christ, do you imagine we are to blame?” wondered Scipio, adopting an air of shocked innocence. “It was an unlucky accident. It could have happened to anyone.”
“We were friends,” I said, the heat of anger rising to my face. “We were friends—all of us together—and you abandoned me.”
“We did not abandon you,” Julian asserted blandly. “You rode off all in a lather on a fool’s errand.” He regarded me with barely concealed scorn. “Did you really expect anyone to follow you?”
Scipio, uneasy with the acrimony swirling around him, raised his hands in a gesture of appeasement and uttered a thin laugh. “We would have followed you, of course—if we had known.”
“No,” Rufus said, breaking his stony silence, “we would not have joined him. We were boys. We were frightened. We had our own lives to think about.” Hunched over the cup between his hands, he regarded me from under his brows. “I am sorry, Succat, but that is how it is. Nothing we can say will change it now.”
His blunt confession did little to salve the raw, aching wound of their betrayal.
“How could we know what would happen?” asked Scipio. “Anyway, it was all a long time ago. Forgive and forget, I say.”
“Forgive? Gladly, if you ask it. Forget? Never!” I spat, tasting bitter bile on my tongue as a long-denied rage surged through me. “Seven years I spent as a slave in Ireland. Seven years!”
“Life goes on,” offered Scipio blithely.
“Not for me. I remember it as if it were yesterday, and I will bear the scars forever.”
“We all have our hardships,” Julian snarled, his voice an ugly sneer. “It is over and done and best forgotten. You haven’t done so badly for yourself.”
“Easy for you to say, Julian,” countered Rufus, tossing back the dregs. “Your father made a fair bit out of Succat’s estate. I don’t suppose you offered him anything from the sale, did you?”
I stared in shocked amazement. “What did you say?”
“Didn’t you know?” said Rufus, pouring more wine into his cup. “Julian didn’t tell you?”
“He told me nothing.” I said, staring at Julian, who sat with averted eyes, gazing off into the room.
“After Calpurnius died, Julian’s father had your estate confiscated for nonpayment of taxes. He packed your mother off to a small house in Lycanum and sold off everything. Since he was magistrate, the greater part of the proceeds went into his own pocket.”
I turned to Julian. “You thieving bastard! I could kill you for that!”
Julian put out a hand to me. “It wasn’t like that, Succat, believe me. Your mother was sick. She couldn’t manage the estate anymore. She needed help….”
“You lying filth,” I snarled. “‘Forget the past, Succat, look to the future. A man can find himself in Gaul, Succat.’ Little wonder you were so anxious for me to leave Britain.”
“The circumstances at the time—” blustered Julian, trying to defend himself. “You have to remember how it was—”
I had heard enough. I stood and turned from the table. “The devil take you, my friends. The devil take you all!”
Striding from the room, I heard Scipio call after me, but I did not turn. I never wanted to see any of them again.
It was dark, and the streets were all but deserted, so I walked awhile, thinking about what had happened. Try as I might, I could not make
myself feel sorry for anything I had said. In fact, I kept thinking of things I might have added to make them truly feel the lash of my rage.
After a time I found myself in a street where prostitutes prowled for drunken carousers—a wretched, dark, unsavory place that more than matched my mood. However, as I listened to their moans and sighs and deceitful pledges of love, I decided I had a better place to go and something better to do. I returned to Domus Columella, where Oriana was waiting.
The anger and frustration, so long suppressed, surfaced in our lovemaking that night. Oriana took it all, absorbed it, transmuted it, and returned it as tenderness, solace, and warmth. Her willingness to spend herself in this way both awed and shamed me. If I did not love her before, that single, selfless act turned my heart. Our true marriage began in that moment.
Afterward she lay in my arms and I stroked her hair. “I hope,” she said, her voice quivering from the violence of our exertion, “whatever demons you brought to bed with you have been banished.”
“They are gone, my love,” I told her, thinking of my false friends. “We will never see them again.”
FORTY-NINE
LADY COLUMELLA COULD not abide the thought of her daughter marrying a soldier. Her refusal sent a tearful Oriana running to her father, who came storming into my room. “My daughter says she wishes to marry you. Is this true?”
“It is.”
“You’re a soldier!”
“I am that.”
He turned his back to me and stalked to the other end of the room, turned, and came back. “How dare you!” He thrust an accusing finger into my face. “I take you in, feed you, clothe you, treat you like my own son…” He faltered, lost for words. “And this is how you repay my kindness! You seduce my only daughter!”
Of all the things I might have said just then, none seemed particularly apt, so I kept my mouth shut.