Praetorian Series [3] A Hunter and His Legion (49 page)

I shook my head and pressed Felix to surge past them all.  He picked up speed and I found myself approaching Agrippina’s position near the head of our tiny marching formation.  Only thirty individuals had set forth from the camp an hour ago, two hours after dawn, including Archer, Vincent, Santino, Artie, Boudicca, myself, Agrippina, and the rest of our party consisted of her Praetorians.  Agrippina hadn’t indicated where we were going, only that it wasn’t far and that it was of vital importance.  In fact, she’d been rather cryptic about the whole thing, but I supposed I couldn’t blame her for being just as distrusting of us as we were of her.  Our temporary partnership was of mutual interest to both parties, although I wasn’t sure what exactly she hoped to get out of it yet.

As I rode up to her position, I thought of a dozen different questions to ask her, but foremost in my mine was the notion that finally, after months of growing fuzziness, I could suddenly think clearly again.  As we left the orb behind us, I could feel its presence less and less, and while I still felt a pang of longing for it, I wasn’t nearly as overwhelmed by it as I once was.  Its presence persisted within me, a distant reminder of its power and potential, but for now it was, literally, out of sight and o
ut of mind.

Felix
snorted obnoxiously, causing a thick cloud of mist to dissipate around me as I passed through it, but also serving to alert Agrippina of our approach.  She twisted her head just slightly, and while I knew she couldn’t yet see us, the slim smile tugging at her lips suggested she knew exactly who was approaching.

“Come for questions
, Jacob?”

I grunted silently under the noise of Felix’s stomping feet as I came up alongside Agrippina.  She rode a
startlingly white mare of ample size, its blank coat blending in with the snow so well that Agrippina seemed to float in midair.  She wore heavy robes that cascaded down her body in numerous, thick layers, but I could see that she had chosen to wear trousers as well. 

“If you don’t mind,” I answered.

She lowered her chin.  “I suppose you deserve them.”

“Do I?”

“You do,” she said, lifting her head.  “You may be the source of a great many negative things, but I am willing to accept that they were done inadvertently and out of your control, but that is why I have an inkling that your presence is essential to the task ahead.”

“What task?”  I asked, almost pleading for answers.  “Where exactly are we?  And how did you even end up here?
  How is it that I’m on the most aimless, directionless journey of my life, and yet I end up bumping into
you
of all people?”

She smiled.  “It seems pertinent to answer your
third question first.”

I jerked my head at her impatiently, prompting her to continue.

She looked away, almost distractedly.  “Quite simply, Britain was always where I intended to go.”

I looked at her suspiciously.  “Why?”

“I will get to that,” she replied, “but first, after the incident between us in Syria, I led my Praetorians north to deal with the Parthian insurrection.  Our reports indicated they were quite ready to invade Anatolia and push through Byzantium and into the West, but such claims were rather farfetched.  One particular upstart princeling had decided that Rome was in a more vulnerable state than reality reflected, and raised a rather sizable force against us, but when facing my Praetorians on the field of battle, with Vespasian having arrived to lead them, most turned and ran.  The rest held their ground, but I was able to… personally convince their general to head back to Parthia and never raise arms against Rome again.”

“Yeah,
” I muttered. “
Convinced
?”

She shrugged.  “I can be quite convincing at times, can I not, Jacob?”

I gulped and didn’t answering, knowing she certainly could be.

“
What happened to Vespasian?”  I asked, curious about the man.

“He returned to Germa
ny where I left a sizable portion of my Praetorian force to help with hostilities.”

“He didn’t want to come here?  With you?”

“No.  What cause would he have?”

“No cause, I guess,” I said quickly to cover my suspicious tone.  “
But that doesn’t answer why you came to Britain.”

“Most astute of you, Jacob,” she said and I forced myself not to roll my eyes.  “As I was saying, the Parthia
n threat was dealt with quickly, so I took my Praetorians west almost immediately.  There were still the Germans to deal with, and Gaul and Iberia were acting recalcitrant as well, but as we arrived in Dalmatia, one of my spies returned from Alexandria.”

I grimaced
at the memory and immediately rubbed my leg where the arrow had hit me when chasing Agrippina’s ninjas to the coast.  She noticed my action and pointed at my leg.

“They reported wounding one of you.”

“They sure did,” I said, the memory of my warped vision surfacing. “I’ve had worse, but it still hurts sometimes.”

A
grippina continued to look at my leg for a moment before she settled back on her horse and jerked herself forward in a manner that suggested she was exceptionally frustrated with something.

“By the gods, Jacob, I do not wish for t
his feud between us to continue!  There has already been too much death and pain.  My feelings, as I explained them to you last night, still ring true, but I have thought long on you and those with you for many months, and I truthfully do wish to end hostilities between us.”

“For just how many months have you been t
hinking about it?”  I asked.  “Because you seemed quite content to torture and murder me the last time we met.”

She looked angry for a moment but then seemed to push it away, but not easily.  “I am not without my
faults; I more than anyone understand this character deficit.  I am quick to anger and I am not averse to violence with permanent ramifications, but such actions have begun to haunt even me in recent…”

“Does V
arus’ death haunt you?”  I snapped.  “Because it haunts the hell out of me!”

“It does,” she admitted
quickly, “but I was not without reason in killing him.  He had committed treason and was an enemy of the state.  That, and I’d learned he had been able to manipulate the orb and was unwilling to use it in a way that aided me.  Again, treason alone may have not been reason enough to have him killed, but…”

She trailed off and I unde
rstood.

It wasn’t that I understood her reason
ing, but that I understood that she’d simply had him killed because she was an angry, venomous bitch.  But as our conversation moved to revolve around the orb, I couldn’t understand why it hadn’t affected her when she’d had two of them?  It had affected both Claudius and Caligula, and was apparently affecting me, so why not her?

I cleared my head
, hoping that I might find an answer to that question soon.

I turned back to her
.  “Treason?”

She didn’t immediately answer, but when she turned to meet my eye, her face almost looked apologetic.  “
My Praetorians found the note he’d left telling you to come to Britain.”

“So that’s how you knew,” I surmised stupidly, as if the answer hadn’t been obvious all along.

“Yes.”

“But how did you end up here?”  I asked, gesturing out to the bare trees we rode between.  It wasn’t a thick forest, but it was
still the densest one we’d encountered in days.

“
My spy indicated your destination was the Isle of Mona, so we marched straight there, only to be told that we needed to continue venturing north…” she answered with a smile, playfully reaching out to grab my arm in a teasing gesture.  “Were you not confused as to why the Druids were expecting you?”

I looked at my arm for a moment before plucking her hand off
of it.  “Wait, you told them I was coming?”

“I even gave them your name,” she said, giggling
like a little girl.  “I am not without a sense of humor, Jacob.”

“Yeah, like the Joker’s,” I murmured.

“Who?”

“A demented clown.”

“A what?”

“Never mind,” I said with a chuckle, unable to help myself.
  And here I thought the Druids back on Anglesey had possessed supernatural powers of precognition, divination, or any other kind of
-tion
associated with black magic.  Instead, they’d simply been told we were coming ahead of time, by someone who’d even given them my name…

It was almost funny.

Except for the indistinct memory of something bad happening to them.

“Something wrong?”  Agrippina asked, seemingly as observant as Helena was.

“Everything’s wrong,” I said quickly, the memory trying to knit itself back together in my mind.  “Remember?”

“I do, but it is
also good that you are willing to acknowledge such a truth.  I must admit that I grievously misjudged you before.”

“Yeah…” I whispered, memories of Helena dying in my arms, Bordeaux’s skull being shattered to pieces, Titus crushed in half, Vincent’s severed arm, the sight of Santino hanging from a cross, all memories I had because of nothing but Agrippina’s
misjudgment
, “…no biggie.”

“I had thought the orb to have completely warped your mind,” Agrippina continued.  “However, I am glad such a suspicion has been proven untrue.  I believe you would have been most difficult to work with had I been right.”

I supposed she had a point.

“So h
ow much further?”  I asked.

She held out a hand.  “We are already here, Jacob Hunter.  Behold.”

I could tell from my peripheral vision that we had just reached the edge of a clearing, but I was suddenly too nervous to turn my head and look.  In my mind, I envisioned a dozen different things that could be there in that clearing: something that looked like Stonehenge, some piece of long lost technology, an alien being, a time machine of some kind, and so many more.  My imagination was running wild as I forced myself to turn toward the clearing and discover what I’d waited all these years to find.

I moved slowly
, but eventually my eyes met the clearing and saw what it contained.

My eyebrows rose in complete amazement, sho
ck, and surprise.

It was a
simple cottage.

***

I looked at it skeptically before looking at Agrippina, back to the cottage, then back to Agrippina, but I wasn’t the first to voice my disproval.

“That’s it??” 
Santino asked angrily with a pointed arm as he came up beside me.  “A dinky little house?  That’s what was so important?”

Agrippina simply smiled.  “Come with me.”

Reluctantly, we did as we were told and followed Agrippina off to the left.  We rode for a few minutes around the perimeter of the cottage before she stopped abruptly and gestured back toward the structure.

“Behold,” she said.

I turned more quickly this time, half expecting the cottage to have disappeared and be replaced with one of my earlier predictions, but nothing had changed.  The cottage remained in its original, uninspiring, and mundane form. 

I turned to my friends.
  “See anything special?”

Archer shook his head and Santino shrugged
while Boudicca too seemed confused, but Vincent seemed to be looking at it intently.

“What?”  I asked.

He shook his head.  “I don’t see anything out of the ordinary, but the architecture of the building doesn’t seem contemporary with this time period.”

I returned my attention to the cottage and
noticed what Vincent was talking about.  There was an oddly distinctive medieval look to the cottage, straight down to the roof that looked to be made from an entire field of thatched reeds or wheat stalks, making it look like it belonged in
Braveheart
rather than
Gladiator
.

I shrugged.  “Familiar with British housing structures circa 40 A.D.?”

He glanced at me, at a loss.  “Not really.”

“Me neither.”

Only Artie looked at the cottage with any kind of real interest, but even then, she didn’t offer an opinion so I left her to think.  Instead, I turned back to Agrippina.

“We’ve long ago
established that you like to play games, Agrippina.  How about we just skip to the end of this one.”

Her smile
returned once again, a beautiful and beaming one.  “Do not concern yourself, Jacob, for this is not a game I am playing on you this time.  It took us quite a while to understand as well.  Come.”

She started forward again, and I couldn’t help but sigh and follow, the rest of my friends falling in behind me.  Once again, our ride didn’t last particularly long, but it ended when we reached the opposite end of the cottage from where we arrived.  I didn’t even bother to wait for Agrippina’s “behold” as I looked back at the cottage, noticing her Praetorians standing opposite us on the other side of the
building.

But again, nothing seemed to
have changed, and the cottage looked exactly as it had before.  Just a small, round building with a sloped, thatched roof.  I glanced at my friends, but while Archer and Santino continued to look just as confused as I was, Vincent now stared at it as though he was trying to piece together some complex puzzle in his mind, while Artie’s eyes were wide and clearly surprised at something.

“Artie?”  I asked.  “What is
it?”

She
raised a hand to cover her mouth and slowly turned to look at me.  “It… Jacob, look!”

I
did, but again didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.

I turned back to Artie.  “
What?
”

This time she gave me a frustrated look.  “Look at the door!”

I did, and at the same time heard Vincent whisper, “My God…” and seconds later, Santino say, “Holy shit…”

Now I was growing frustrated that my usually keen ability to notice details had apparently eluded me.  I was about to speak up and yell at Artie or Vincent or even Santino to just tell me what the fuck they’d seen, but then I noticed it.

The door.

There wasn’t anything particularly interesting about the façade.  It was boring and lacked any kind of detail or personal touch, but it wasn’t the
door itself that was of interest.  What I found interesting was that even though we had completed half of a rotation around the structure, now standing opposite the position we’d originally occupied, the face of the door was still there.

Every single time we
’d moved to look at the cottage, the door had moved with us.

“Huh,” I b
reathed.  “Well, that’s a thing.”

***

I looked at Santino.  “John, ride back to the Praetorians and let me know if you see the door.”

It seemed like a stretch of a concept, but it was th
e first thing I thought to do, and I wasn’t sure anything could possibly seem like a stretch anymore.

“Yeah,” he
whispered, still amazed.  “I think I’ll go do that.”

He kicked his horse and rode around the cottage, giving it an exceptionally wide berth as he returned to the Praetorians.  When he arrived, he didn’t even bother using his radio.

“There’s a fucking door over here!”  He yelled

I didn’t reply but waved a hand indicating he should come back
.

“Has it always been like that?”
  I asked Agrippina.

“Ever since we arrived at least,” she confirmed.  “It is quite amazing, is it not?  Were you to walk around the cottage, never taking your eyes off of it, you would observe the door rotating around the structure with you, but your mind
would hardly even notice the oddity of it, or even be aware of it.”

“I’ll take your word for it
,” I mumbled, unable to tear my eyes from the door.  “Have you tried going inside?”

She responded by kicking her horse into motion again.  “Come.”

Although I was starting to feel anxious at how odd the cottage seemed to be, I couldn’t help but follow, my curiosity bound to doom me sooner or later.

S
o why not now?

It was a short trip to the door, but I felt a strange sensation of nausea overwhelm me when we grew closer.  There was a light mist surrounding the cottage
, obscuring the snowy ground, but I couldn’t detect any odd smells or see anything ghastly that would make my stomach roil like it had.