Dark Horse (28 page)

Now, in the pulsing midday heat, Clio's reflection smiled in the fresh-water pool. Of all of them, that runt of a priest was the first to leg it down the hill, and by Croesus, could Llagos's skinny pins shift!

'Couple with me, priest,' she'd called after him. 'Lie with me and my sisters. For I know that in your soul you are one of us.'

A bloody landslide after that! Oh, yes, there'd be no more trouble from the islanders now. The stuff of their nightmares had been proved a reality. Vampires (gasp!) actually exist. Worse. Trolls, werewolves, all the shapeshifting creatures they had feared weren't just real.
They walked among them on Cressia!
From today, the islanders would take pains to

appease the vampire's bloodlust with sacrificial offerings and the upsurge in piglet breeding would know no bounds. Yes well. The sows might be exhausted, but whatever calamity might befall this beleaguered island in the future, one thing was certain. The blame would not be laid on
this
isolated doorstep!

In that respect, Clio had achieved her objective. Total privacy. But now, thanks to Leo, that's all she could expect. Privacy! None of the wealth, the triumphal homecoming, the new life she was expecting. Clio, goddammit, was stuck here on Cressia.

No wonder her reflection still trembled.

Not from fear, or reaction after last night's pantomime.

Her reflection trembled from rage.

They had been climbing only a few minutes when the last of the scrub petered out. Now it was just bare white karst, slippery and hard to get hold of. Azan's archers might be crap, Claudia thought, as the strap from the quiver grated away at the flesh on her shoulder, but a blindfolded elephant couldn't fail to score a bull's-eye on such a slow-moving target. The only conclusion she could draw was that, in retaliation for disabling his artillery, Azan wanted to take them alive.

'Progress would be a lot faster if I ditched the axe.'

'I'll be needing that,' Jason replied. Geta was strapped across his broad shoulders, and the effects of the additional cargo showed in the lines on his face. Perspiration dripped off him in rivers. Claudia tried not to think about why he might want to lug a corpse around, instead of leaving him back there in the pines.

'Then suppose I dump the sack?' she suggested. Just carrying it made her feel sick. 'Bumping around between the axe and the quiver, it unbalances me.'

He flashed her a dark grin. 'I doubt anything unbalances you,' he said. 'And ask yourself the question, do you really think I've gone to all this trouble to bring along stuff I'm not going to need?'

Which was enough to silence her. If Jason needed an axe plus a sackful of heads plus Claudia Seferius as well as a corpse with a thick thatch of red hair which would look particularly pretty dangling off a war spear, it didn't need Archimedes to work out what he was planning.

Grappling with the slippery handholds, she wondered just how she was going to get out of this. Behind her, the shouts of the posse grew louder by the second. Not for them progress

hindered by volleys of shrapnel, impeded by onerous burdens. They were scrambling up the hillside like millipedes. But assuming she escaped her pursuers, what then? Doubling back was out of the question - forget hailing a boat when the coast's in the hands of three pirate warships! While up here, the mountains were a desert. Without food. Without water. Without shelter. Without people. Just vast expanse of bare white rock after vast expanse of bare white rock. Like it or not, Jason was her only chance of survival, but the irony of her situation didn't escape her.

The very man who was keeping her alive was also the man intent on killing her.

Claudia climbed.

The track made in the mountainside by centuries of chamois and mountain goats was a narrow, boulder-strewn death trap, but for Claudia, loaded down by half her own body weight, walking along it was like being fitted with wings. Suddenly the peak was much closer, the pass between the mountains a realistic goal.

'That's far enough for the moment.'

Glancing back, she realized that Jason had eased Geta into a fissure in the rock and was letting the cliff absorb his own weight until his breathing returned to something approaching normal.

'Pass the quiver and bow,' he wheezed. 'High time we shortened some odds.'

Unlike Roman archers, who pulled their bowstrings back to the chest, Jason lifted his bow so his arm was parallel with his shoulder and pulled the string level with his ear. As the first of Azan's men took an arrowhead in the chest, Claudia understood why no Roman archer had beaten a Scythian. Jason's shot was on a par with Parthian bowmen. Accurate. Deadly. Every shot counts. Two more rebels tumbled down the hillside, then, just when things were going well, Jason replaced the lid on his quiver.

'Why don't you finish them off?' she asked, as he heaved Geta's body out of the crevice.

'I got in sufficient shots before they dived for cover. Any

more would have been a waste of ammunition, and before you say why don't we stay here and pick them off as they come up the hill, that's simply locking ourselves in a trap.'

Darkness, he explained, would allow Azan's group the opportunity to separate, spread out - and comprehensively seal off the goat track.

'My totem's the bull, not the sitting duck,' he added.

'Strange,' she murmured, 'I could have sworn it was the chameleon.'

If Illyria was one scenic surprise after another, then none was probably more so than the track on the other side of the mountain. Instead of a sea of sparkling turquoise spread out below her, Claudia was plunged into an ocean of dense forest and the first thing that struck her was the birdsong.

'Inverse vegetation,' Jason explained. 'Unlike conventional mountains, where the upper slopes are covered with spruce leading down to rich fir and beechwoods at the bottom, on the karst, in Dalmatia, this is reversed.'

As though to illustrate his point, a squirrel scampered across the track in front of her to shin up an oak tree in a red chattering blur. They paused in the shade to catch their breath, Jason laying Geta reverently against a beech.

'How far to the cave?' she asked. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad, hiding out here for a couple of days, and she pictured Jason's slingshot deer roasting slowly on a spit while Azan's frustrated gorillas gave up their search.

'What cave?'

The hairs on the back of her neck were the first to react. He seemed genuinely confused. Just as he might genuinely not remember how slowly and how painfully he had despatched Bulis and Leo. And suddenly Claudia saw herself roasting over that open fire . . .

'The one where you've stashed your booty,' she said nonchalantly.

'Oh, that one.' He chuckled as he wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. 'Well, there
are
caves in these mountains. Hundreds of them, in fact, as Geta knew full well. But as for the gold . . .'He ruffled the mop of red hair affectionately. 'It was the only story I could think of which

would make a plunder-hungry pirate drive his ship at full speed on to the rocks. That, and cutting the rest of the crew out of the deal.'

'What fairy tale were you planning to spin him once he was up here?'

'Hadn't actually thought that far ahead,' he admitted, hefting the helmsman back on to his shoulders. 'But I'd have thought of something.'

And Claudia thought, I'll bet you would. You must have had Bulis and Leo mesmerized, the poor misguided bastards. She caressed the stiletto still strapped to her calf and followed the Scythian deeper into the woods.

Orbilio wasn't sure how he'd get through the day. Time had never stood heavier. What he had wanted to do was jump in the saddle and scour the island for signs that could shed light on Claudia's disappearance, but there it was again. That old patrician millstone . . .

'You can't go charging off,' Silvia reminded him, tweaking her curls in the mirror. 'You're chief mourner at Leo and Bulis's funeral, and besides, you're Rome's representative on Cressia now. You have an example to set.'

'Bollocks to examples, bollocks to Bulis and bollocks to Cressia, frankly. These people didn't give a toss about Leo when he was alive, the hypocrites can't very well complain when—'

'You'll have to speak up, darling. Your voice is still terribly hungover from last night's binge.'

'That's not the drink,' he said. 'That's the swelling.'

'Good grief!' Big blue eyes jumped out on stalks as they noticed the bruising. 'What happened?'

A Gaul was what happened. Once Orbilio realized Claudia was missing, he'd released Junius and explained the position - only to take the full force of her bodyguard's fist. It was only because he knew how to roll with the punches that his bloody jaw hadn't been broken.

'I tripped down the steps.'

'Then I hope that will teach you a lesson about over imbibing,' she said tartly. 'But back to this morning, there

is no question of escaping your obligations, Marcus. Whether you like it or not, the needs of the many must be balanced against the need of the individual.'

'You're a fine one to dish out lectures on duty,' he snapped. 'Or have you forgotten those three boys of yours?'

'Marcus!'

'Think that's uncalled for, do you? That I shouldn't mention the subject. That you don't deserve it, because it was only the night before last that some bastard left you for dead on the dark shores of Hades and you're frightened, bewildered and pitifully vulnerable? Well, I'm sorry for you, Silvia, truly I am, but that doesn't give you the right to lecture me about marital obligations and denying my children their birthright.'

Silvia laid the mirror down, walked across the room and began to massage the stiffness out of his shoulders. 'You raised those points, darling, not me.'

Shit. 'I'm sorry.' He wiped his hands over his face. 'My nerves are shot to threads, I'm not thinking straight.'

'Understandable, darling. It's your cousin's funeral and that's a lot of responsibility, but you can't cry off simply because some little wine merchant's widow has taken it upon herself to have an adventure.'

Orbilio resisted the urge to finish the job on Silvia's throat. 'It's a little more serious than that,' he said levelly.

He was wasting his breath.

'It's not just the family who will expect you to fulfil your obligations.' Silvia hesitated. Smoothed the wayward curls at the back of his head. 'The thing is, darling, it wouldn't sit at all well with the Senate should word filter back that you'd turned your back on duty.'

'Hardly turning my back,' he retorted, shrugging her off. 'All I'm suggesting is postponing the ceremony.'

'Iss too late, I fear,' Llagos said from the doorway. His dainty hands were spread in a gesture of helplessness. 'Things hef not been so good for the islanders lately. Much temptation to return to the old ways. So! Thiss morning I gather the people together and tell them -' he coughed apologetically '- I tell them that the death of your cousin iss sacrifice to almighty Neptune.'

'What?'

'Iss something they can understand, Marcus. Do not angry.'

'The hell I—'

'Please listen,' Llagos pleaded. 'Lately there hef been much talk of superstition, bringing big gulf between Roman ways and Cressian traditions. So I use thiss to build bridge. I pretend Leo loved his people so much, he laid down his life for them and that, in return for his sacrifice, Neptune cast his special protection over the island.'

'Bloody hell, Llagos
.' Orbilio hurled a vase filled with roses against the wall and watched until the last of the petals had cascaded down the plaster to join the glittering shards on the floor. 'Then perhaps you wouldn't mind rushing the service?' he asked levelly.

With a nervous smile, the little priest nodded, but it was Silvia who had the last word. 'One cannot rush a funeral pyre, Marcus, it burns itself out. Now then.' She gave her black skirts a shake. 'How do we look?'

Llagos had not been exaggerating the effect of his pep talk.

'Long live the new governor!'

'Hurrah for Marcus Cornelius Orbilio!'

'Bloody rum way to be sent off, in my opinion,' Volcar grumbled from his litter. 'Anyone would think this was a victory procession, not a bleeding funeral.'

But for the islanders, that's precisely what it was. They hadn't swallowed the priest's story about Leo sacrificing himself on the altar on their behalf, but they had learned their lesson. With Jason on the loose, they needed Rome at their back like no time ever before.

'Long live Orbilio!'

'Long live our new protector!'

Ducking posies and garlands, and politely avoiding the attentions of young girls thrust in his path by their hopeful mamas, Orbilio kept his gaze focused on his cousin's bier. The undertakers had rouged Leo's cheeks, rendered pale through loss of blood, and softened out the rictus, drawing attention away from the face by dressing the corpse in scarlet

trimmed with silver, since gold was not permissible on the voyage to the Underworld. Leo's thick dark curls, the family trademark, were coiled artfully between a wreath of shiny laurel leaves. Frankincense, cinnamon and other rich embalming spices wafted in his wake.