Tubruk's expression eased a little, but Brutus was shocked at the depth of the bitterness and sadness he had seen revealed. Tubruk had always been a pillar of certainty in the lives of the boys. He struggled to find the right words to say.
“We will make a Rome that you can be proud of,” he said. Tubruk reached up and gripped his outstretched arm.
“Oh, to be young again,” he said, smiling. “Come on home, Aurelia will be thrilled to see you so tall and strong.”
“Tubruk? I . . .” Brutus hesitated. “I won't stay for long. I have enough coin to get lodgings in the city.”
Tubruk glanced at him, understanding. “This is your home. It always will be. You stay as long as you want.”
The silence stretched again as they walked toward the estate buildings.
“Thank you. I wasn't sure if you'd expect me to make my own way now. I can, you know.”
“I know, Marcus,” Tubruk replied, smiling as he called out for the gates to be opened.
The young man felt a weight lift from him. “They call me Brutus now.”
Tubruk put out his hand and Brutus took it in the legionary's grip.
“Welcome home, Brutus,” Tubruk replied.
He led Brutus into the kitchens while the water was heated for his bath, motioning him to a chair while Tubruk cut meat and bread for him. He was hungry himself after the axe work, and they ate and talked with the ease and comfort of old friends.
* * *
The heat seemed to batter at his skin as Julius inspected the six new recruits. The African sun even made his armor painful to touch, and anywhere the metal made contact with his skin was an agony until he could shift it.
Nothing of his discomfort showed in his expression, though the first doubts tugged at his concentration as he looked at the men he'd found. They were strong and fit enough, but not one of them had been trained as a soldier. For his plan to work, he needed a force of fifty at least and had begun to believe that he would get them. The trouble was, they needed to take orders and make war with the sort of discipline the Accipiter officers took completely for granted. Somehow, he had to impress upon them the simple fact that they would die without it.
Physically, they were impressive enough, but only two of the six had volunteered and these from the last village. He expected there to be more as they came to resemble a proper Roman half-century, but the first four had come because he had insisted on it, and they were still angry. The second village had seemed happy to be rid of the largest of them, and Julius guessed he was a troublemaker. His expression seemed set in a constant sneer that irritated Julius every time he saw it.
Renius would have beaten them into shape for him, he thought. That was a start. He had to think what Renius would do. Gaditicus and the others from Accipiter had followed him this far, hardly believing how easy it had been after the first settlement. Julius wondered how many Romans in all the hundreds of retirement farms had sons who could be taught to fight. There was an army out there and all that was needed was for someone to find them and remind them of the call of blood.
He stopped next to the troublemaker and saw how the eyes met his with polite inquiry and not a trace of fear or respect. He towered over most of them, his limbs long and lithely muscled, shining with sweat. The biting flies that tormented the officers of Accipiter seemed not to trouble him at all, and he stood like a statue in the heat. The man reminded him of Marcus to some extent. He looked every inch a Roman, but even the Latin he spoke was a corrupted mix of African dialect and phrases. Julius knew his father had died and left him a farm that he had neglected to the point of ruin. Left alone, he would have been killed in a fight or joined the pirates when the last of the money and wine ran out.
What was the man's name? Julius prided himself on learning them quickly, as he had once seen Marius do for every man under his command, yet under the cool stare, he couldn't think of it at first. Then it came to him. He had told them to call him Ciro, giving no other. He probably didn't even know it was a slave name. What would Renius do?
“I need men who can fight,” he said, looking into the brown eyes that returned his glare so steadily.
“I can fight,” Ciro replied, his confidence obvious.
“I need men who can keep their temper in a crisis,” Julius continued.
“I can—” Ciro began.
Julius slapped him hard across the face. For a moment, anger flared in the dark eyes, but Ciro held himself still, the muscles of his bare chest twitching like a great cat's. Julius leaned close to him.
“Do you want to take up a sword? Cut me down?” he whispered harshly.
“No,” Ciro replied, and the calm was back once more.
“Why not?” Julius asked, wondering how to reach him.
“My father . . . said a legionary had to have control.”
Julius stayed where he was, though his thoughts spun wildly. There was a lever here.
“You didn't have control in the settlement where we found you, did you?” he said, hoping he had guessed correctly about Ciro's relationship with the villagers. The big man said nothing for a long time, and Julius waited patiently, knowing not to interrupt.
“I wasn't . . . a legionary then,” Ciro said.
Julius eyed him, looking for the insolence he had come to expect. It was missing and silently he cursed the Senate for wasting men like these, who dreamed of being legionaries while wasting their lives in a strange land.
“You are not a legionary,” Julius said slowly, and saw the mouth begin to twist in response to the rejection, “but I can make you one. You will learn brotherhood with me and from me, and you will walk the streets of the distant city with your head high. If anyone stops you, you will tell them you are a soldier of Caesar's.”
“I will,” Ciro said.
“Sir.”
“I will, sir,” he said, and stood tall.
Julius stood back to address the recruits, standing with the waiting officers of Accipiter.
“With men like you, what can't we achieve? You are the children of Rome and we will show you your history and your pride. We will teach you the gladius and battle formations, the laws, the customs, the life. There will be more to come and you will train them, showing what it means to be of Rome. Now we march. The next village will see legionaries when they see you.”
The line of pairs was ragged and out of step, but Julius knew that would improve. He wondered if Renius would have seen the need in the new men, but dismissed the thought. Renius wasn't here. He was.
Gaditicus waited with him, falling in beside as they brought up the rear of the column.
“They follow you,” he noted.
Julius turned quickly to him. “They must, if we are ever to crew a ship and take back our ransoms.”
Gaditicus snorted softly, clapping his hand on Julius's armor.
Julius faltered and stopped. “Oh no,” he whispered. “Tell them we'll catch them up. Quickly!”
Gaditicus gave the order and watched as the double file of Romans marched away along the path. They were quickly out of sight around a bend and Gaditicus turned to Julius enquiringly. He had gone pale and shut his eyes.
“Is it the sickness again?” Gaditicus asked.
Julius nodded weakly. “Before . . . the last fit, I tasted metal in my mouth. I can taste it now.” He hawked and spat, his expression bitter. “Don't tell them. Don't . . .”
Gaditicus caught him as he fell, and held him down as his body jerked and twisted, his sandals cutting arcs in the undergrowth with the violence of their movement. The biting flies seemed to sense his weakness and swarmed around them. Gaditicus looked around for something to jam between Julius's teeth, but the cloth they had used on Accipiter was long gone. He wrenched up a heavy leaf and managed to get the fibrous stalk across Julius's mouth, letting it fall in as the mouth champed. It held and Gaditicus bore down with all his weight until the fit was over.
Finally, Julius was able to sit up and spit out the stalk he'd al
most bitten through. He felt as if he had been beaten unconscious. He grimaced as he saw his bladder had released, and thumped his fists into the earth in fury, scattering the flies before they darted back in at his exposed skin.
“I thought it was over.”
“Perhaps that was the last one,” Gaditicus replied. “Head wounds are always complicated. Cabera said it might go on for a while.”
“Or for the rest of my life. I miss that old man,” Julius said, his voice bleak. “My mother used to have shaking fits. I never really understood what it was like before. It feels like dying.”
“Can you stand? I don't want to lose the men, and after your speech they could well march all morning.”
Gaditicus helped the young officer to his feet and watched him take a few deep breaths to steady himself. He wanted to offer words of comfort, but the words didn't come easily.
“You will beat this,” he said. “Cabera said you were strong and nothing I've seen makes me think differently.”
“Maybe. Let's move on, then. I'd like to stay close to the sea, so I can wash.”
“I could say I told you a joke and you pissed yourself laughing,” Gaditicus said. Julius chuckled and Gaditicus smiled at him.
“There, you see? You are stronger than you realize. Alexander the Great had the shaking sickness, they say.”
“Really?”
“Yes, and Hannibal. It is not the end, just a burden.”
* * *
Brutus tried to hide his shock when he saw Aurelia the following morning. She was plaster-white and thin, with a web of wrinkles that had not been there when he'd left for Greece three years before.
Tubruk had seen his distress and filled the gaps in the conversation, telling Aurelia the answers to the questions she did not ask. The old gladiator was not sure she even recognized Brutus.
Aurelia's silence was covered by the laughter of Clodia and Cornelia as they tended Julius's baby at breakfast. Brutus smiled dutifully at the child and said she looked like her father, though in truth he could see no resemblance to anything human. He felt uncomfortable in the triclinium, aware that these people had formed bonds that excluded him. It was the first time he had ever felt like a stranger in that house, and it saddened him.
Tubruk left with Aurelia after she had eaten only a little food, and Brutus tried hard to take part in the conversation, telling the women about the blue-skinned tribe he had fought in his first few months with the Bronze Fist in Greece. Clodia laughed when he told them of the savage who had waved his genitals at the Romans, believing he was safe. Cornelia covered Julia's ears with her hands and Brutus blushed, embarrassed.
“I'm sorry. I am more used to the company of soldiers. It has been a while since I was in this house.”
“Tubruk told us you grew up here,” Clodia broke in to put him at his ease, knowing somehow that it was important she did so. “He said you always dreamed of being a great swordsman. Did you reach your dream?”
Shyly, Brutus told them of the sword tourney he had won, against the best of the legion centuries.
“They gave me a sword made with harder iron that keeps a better edge. It has gold in the hilt. I will show it to you.”
“Will Julius be safe?” Cornelia asked without warning.
Brutus responded with a quick smile. “Of course. The ransom has been paid. There is no danger for him.” The words came easily and she seemed reassured. His own worries were untouched.
* * *
That afternoon, he walked back up the hill to the oak with Tubruk, each of them carrying axes on their shoulders. They took up positions on each side of the trunk and began the slow rhythm of blows that ate a deeper and deeper gash into the wood as the day wore on.
“There is another reason for my coming back to Rome,” Brutus said, wiping sweat from his forehead with his hand.
Tubruk laid down his axe and breathed heavily for a few moments before replying.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I want to find my mother. I am not a boy any longer and I want to know where I came from. I thought you might know where she was.”
Tubruk blew air out of his lips, taking up the axe again.
“It will bring you grief, lad.”
“I must. I have family.”
Tubruk hammered his axe blade into the oak with enormous power, wedging it deeply.
“Your family is here,” he said, levering it out.
“These are my blood. I never knew my father. I just want to know her. If she died without me seeing her, I know I would always regret it.”
Tubruk paused again, then sighed before speaking.
“She has a place in the Via Festus, on the far side of the city, near the Quirinal hill. Think hard before you go there. It could disappoint you.”
“No. She deserted me when I was only a few months old. Nothing she could do would disappoint me now,” Brutus said softly, before taking up his axe again and continuing to cut at the old tree.
As the sun set, the oak fell, and they walked back to the estate house in the twilight. Renius was there, waiting in the shadow of the gate.
“They've built where my house stood,” he said angrily to Brutus, “and some young legionaries marched me out of the city as a troublemaker. My own city!”
Tubruk let out an explosive shout of laughter.
“Did you tell them who you were?” Brutus asked, trying to remain serious.
Renius was clearly nettled by their amusement and practically snarled, “They didn't know my name. Pups, fresh from their mother's milk, every one of them.”
“There is a room here, if you want it,” Tubruk said.
Renius looked at his old pupil for the first time then. “How much are you asking?” he said.
“Just the pleasure of your company, old friend. Just that.”
Renius snorted. “You're a fool then. I'd have paid a fair rate.”
At Tubruk's call, the gate was opened and Renius stalked in ahead of them. Brutus caught Tubruk's eye and grinned at the affection he saw there.
CHAPTER 11
Brutus stood at the crossroads at the base of the Quirinal hill and let the bustling crowd pass around him. He had risen early and checked his armor, thankful for the clean undertunic Tubruk had laid out. Some part of him knew it was ridiculous to care, but he had oiled each segment and polished the metal until it shone. He felt garish in the darker colors of the crowd, but he took comfort from the solid weight, as if it protected him from more than weapons.
The Bronze Fist had their own armorer, and like everyone else in the century, he had been the best. The greave Brutus wore on his right leg was skillfully shaped to follow the muscles. It was inscribed with a pattern of circles cut with acid, and Brutus had given a month's pay for it. Sweat trickled behind the metal sheath and he reached down to try to scratch the skin beneath without success. Practicality had made him leave the plume of his helmet back at the estate. It would not do to be catching it on lintels inside the house where his mother lived.
It was the sight of the building that had made him pause and take stock. He had been expecting a tenement of four or five stories, clean but small. Instead the front was covered in a façade of dark marble, almost like a temple. The main buildings were set back from the dust and ordure of the streets, visible only through a high gate. Brutus supposed Marius's house had been larger, but it was difficult to be sure.
Tubruk hadn't told him anything more than the address, but as he took in his surroundings Brutus saw it was a rich area, with a good part of the crowd made up of servants and slaves running errands and carrying goods for their masters. He had expected his mother to be impressed by the son who had become a centurion, but when he saw the house he realized she might think of him as just a common soldier, and hesitated.
He thought of going back to the estate. He knew Renius and Tubruk would welcome him without judging his failure, but hadn't he planned the meeting all the way from Greece? It would be ridiculous to turn back with
the grand building in sight.
He took a deep breath and checked his armor one last time for imperfections. The leather laces were tied and there was not a blemish to be seen. It would do.
The crowd parted around him without jostling as he moved forward. Up close, the gate brought back memories of Marius's house on the other side of the city. He had barely reached it before it was swung open before him, a slave bowing and waving him in.
“This way, sir,” the slave said, fastening the gate closed and walking before him down a narrow corridor. Brutus followed, his heart thumping. Was he expected?
He was taken into a room that was as lavish as any he had ever seen. Marble columns supported the ceiling and were gilded at the head and foot. White statues lined the walls, and couches were gathered around a pool in the center, where he caught a glimpse of heavy fish swimming almost motionlessly in the cool depths. His armor seemed clumsy and loud in the stillness, and Brutus wished he had unlaced the greave to have a good scratch before coming in.
The slave vanished through a doorway and he was alone with only the soft rippling of the water to distract him. It was peaceful enough, and after a moment's thought he removed his helmet and ran his hands through his damp hair.
He felt the air move as another door opened behind him, and then stood abruptly in surprise as a beautiful woman walked toward him. She was painted like a doll and about his age, he judged. Her dress was of some fabric he had never seen, and through it he could see the outline of her breasts and nipples. Her skin was perfectly pale and the only ornament she wore was a heavy chain of gold that ran around her throat.
“Do sit,” she said. “You should be comfortable.” As she spoke she sat down on the couch he had leapt from and crossed her legs delicately, making the dress move and reveal enough to bring a flush to his cheeks. He sat down beside her, trying to find a scrap of the resolution he had summoned before.
“Do I please you?” she said softly.
“You are beautiful, but I am looking for . . . a woman I used to know.”
She pouted and he wanted to kiss her with a terrible ache, to gather her into his arms and make her gasp. The image of it made his senses reel, and he realized the air had filled with a perfume that made him dizzy. Her hand reached out and touched him just at the top of the greave, where inches of his bare brown leg were revealed. He shivered slightly and then came to his senses in shock. He rose to his feet in a sudden movement.