The Dog and the Wolf (20 page)

Confluentes lay around him, the town he and Corentinus had brought into being. A visitor from a city would find it unimpressive. It amounted to less than a hundred buildings between two streams and a breastwork with ditch, in a corner of cleared land whereof the rest would now be devoted to subsistence agriculture. The buildings were wood and clay under thatch roofs. The largest, oblongs of coarsely squared timber, held three or four rooms and had windows covered with membrane; the least were cylindrical wattle-and-daub shielings. Shops and worksteads were few, tiny, primitive. There was no marketplace, basilica, church, ornamentation; everything still centered in Aquilo. At this hour there was hardly a sign of life.

Nevertheless … the houses were well built, neatly kept. The streets ran in a Roman grid, with gravel on them. If men, women, children slept yet behind these walls, it was because yesterday they had rejoiced at what was done here and what might be done in years unborn.

He passed a house as long as any. It was for unmarried women, chief among them those who had been vestals of Ys. The door stood ajar. It opened, and Runa came out.

He stopped at her signal. For a moment they regarded each other. The daughter of Vindilis and Hoel wore a blue cloak over a plain gray gown. Its cowl was thrown back and the raven hair flowed free from under a headband, past the narrow face and the shoulders. “Well,” she said at length, low and in Ysan.

“How are you?” he replied awkwardly, in Latin.

“Whither fare you this early?”

He shrugged.

“Restless, as often aforetime.” From beneath the high arches of brow, her dark gaze probed him. The whiteness
of her skin made that look appear doubly intense. “I too. May I walk along with you?”

He wondered if she had thought him likely to come by and had waited. “I’d in mind to go hunting,” he said brusquely.

“You may change your mind after we’ve talked. A private hour is rare for us.”

“Well—as you wish.” He set off again. She accompanied him without effort. The long skirt billowed and rustled.

“They missed you after you left last eventide,” she said presently. “They wanted their King among them. It was a hallowing, after all.”

“The Kingship is dead. Those Gods indwell no longer.” He observed in faint surprise that he had also gone over to the Ysan tongue.

“Are you altogether sure, Gratillonius?” She seldom shortened his name as most people did. “I stayed not late myself. Drinking and dancing are not to my taste. But I’d heard the regret. You cannot abdicate.”

“What do you want of me?” he growled.

“Why must you suppose I have a petition?”

He grinned lopsidedly. “From you ’twould be a demand. Ever has it been. Oh, I understand and respect. We clash, but we work toward the same end, and you’ve been a strong help. Shrewd, too.”

Especially had she done what neither he nor Corentinus could, taken chieftainship among the women, spoken for them, found places where they could work with a measure of dignity, pressed in her acid fashion for a little of the freedom they had enjoyed in Ys. The bounds now around them were high and strait.

Runa sighed. “That nears an end. One by one they settle in, marry or find service that will endure and is endurable. Aye, you can grant me something. But ’twill be for the colony as well.”

“What?”

“I suppose you’ve heard that I won myself paid occupation.”

He nodded. “I’ve seen some of what you’ve done. Apuleius showed me.”

Skilled copyists were always in demand. Runa was not
only literate, she could do calligraphy. Apuleius was eager to have duplicates of books on his shelves. He could trade them for volumes he did not possess—or, rather, trade the older editions and keep hers. She was well along with the
Metamorphoses
in spite of adding flourishes and figures that delighted the beholder.

“Corentinus admired it too when he returned,” Gratillonius added. “I happened to be there. In fact, he asked whether you might replace the church’s worn-out Gospel—I forget which one—after you’ve become a Christian.”

“He takes much for granted, does he not, the holy man?” she murmured.

He threw her a startled glance. She gave him a look of—expectancy? “What would you of me?” he blurted.

“Apuleius has told me the family will no longer use the fundus. ’Twas never a profitable property; in the main, a retreat the children enjoyed, and they are growing up.”

Gratillonius nodded. “Aye. The house lies outside the defense, you recall. Natheless, men have suggested I occupy it—for my palace? I’m content with my cabin in Confluentes. Still, I have thought—we’ll hold occasional meetings, business concerning this community alone. The manor house our basilica? ’Twould be worthier than aught else we have.”

“A good thought. In between, though, shall it stand deserted save for a caretaker? Nay, let me dwell there. I’ll assemble a proper staff for its maintenance and for the reception of your … council. I’ll have space and peace to carry on my work—which is more than copying books, Gratillonius.”

Taken aback, he considered her proposal. It did look like having merit. True, tongues would wag. What of it? Females—widows, for instance—had commonly enough taken charge of places. “What more do you mean?” he inquired cautiously.

“Guidance,” she said. “Counselling. I was a leader in Temple affairs. Let not my experience go to waste.”

He harked back. After her vestalhood ended she had in fact made herself useful among the Queens until she married Tronan Sironai. Whatever happiness the pair had was brief. While no open breach occurred, most Suffetes knew
she was soon ill content with the part of wife. She was much in company with the more intelligent young men of Ys; for them she put aside the dourness she bore at home. Rumor did not, though, make any of them her lovers. At last she took minor orders and busied herself in the Temple, where she handled her duties well. During the conflict between King and Queens she was wholly and bitterly of the latter party. However, since the whelming she had reconciled herself with Gratillonius. Sometimes, as today, she was outright amiable.

“Among females, I suppose,” he ventured.

She frowned, parted her thin lips as if to retort to an insult, closed them again. When she spoke, it was stiffly. “Whoever may have need. ’Tis a cruel change we’ve all suffered. Many are worse wounded than you know.” The tone softened. “Such as your child Nemeta.”

He stopped in mid-stride and faced her. His heart stumbled and began to race. “You have news of her?”

Runa took his arm. “Walk onward. Folk will be astir. Best they see naught to make them wonder.”

He fell into a mechanical gait. His throat felt engorged. “What can you tell me?” he demanded.

“First give me what information you have,” she replied calmly.

“What? Why?”

“That I may know if any confidences remain for me to honor.” After a moment she went on, against his outraged silence: “A girl can open her heart to an older woman as she cannot to her mother, or her father. Shall I betray her? Would you spill what a boy told you as he wept?”

He waged a struggle before he could answer: “Well, you recall I gave out she’d left to take a position offered her elsewhere, as nurse to the children of an honorable Gallic family. That was to shield her name.”

“And yours,” Runa said tartly. “Yet a clever story. With their educations, doubtless a number of well-born Ysan women will find themselves thus invited, once they’re christened. Of course, Nemeta is fierce in her refusal to submit. What did she give you?”

“A scrawled note. I found it tucked into the sheath with
my sword, days after Rufinus and his men were scouring the woods for any spoor of her.”

“They were? I was unaware. Everybody was.”

“You were meant to be Rufinus is cunning.” Gratillonius sighed. “The note said she would suffer no more humiliation but had gone off to a better fate. That was all. Since then, naught.” His jaw clenched till it hurt. “Now, by Ahriman, tell me what you know ere I wring it out of you.”

“I’ve lately had word from her,” Runa said. “Ask me not who bore it. She’d fain come back, but it must be on her terms. No questions, ever. A house built on a site away from these towns, which she will choose. Freedom to make her own life. That’s a freedom you must stand guarantor of, Gratillonius, because ’twill defy the Church. Oh, no whoredom, naught sordid; but what Gods she serves will be old ones.”

“Where is she? I’ll go speak to her.”

Runa shook her head. “My faith is plighted.”

Again he stopped. They had passed out of Confluentes, through a gap in the north wall and a ridge of shored-up earth that led across the ditch, onto the path beyond. The sentries there had also saluted him. The manor house gleamed from behind a callous loveliness of autumnal trees. He seized her by the upper arms. “Dare you stand between me and my daughter?” he snarled.

The grip was bruising, but she held firm. “Let me go,” she said: a command.

He dropped his hands. “That’s better,” she told him. “Henceforward give me my due respect, if you’d have any good of me; and God knows you need all the good you can find in this world, Gratillonius. My counsel is that you give Nemeta what she wants. Else you’ve lost her forever.”

They stood a long while under the climbing sun. Finally he muttered, “I pray your pardon.”

She smiled in her prim fashion. “I grant it. You were overwrought. Come, shall we seek the house, look it over, mayhap take an early stoup of wine? You’ll require a span of ease ere you can realize your happiness is coming home.”

He stared at her. How stately she stood. Beneath that gown was a body lithe and strengthful—

No! he cried at the sudden tide of lust. My Queens not a year dead, and she the daughter of one of them!

But likewise was Tambilis, for whom I put her mother Bodilis aside.

But that was at the behest of the Gods of Ys, Whom I have disowned.

But the law I think of is the law of Mithras. But it was never clear about this matter. Besides, I have disowned Mithras too.

But I was bound for life to my Queens alone.

The chill in that thought helped him master himself. “Aye, let’s do so,” he said. “And thank you.”

3

Where the River Vienna joined the Liger they made a broad stretch of water always peaceful. Forest enfolded it and a small human settlement. To this place came Bishop Martinus at the beginning of winter’s pastoral rounds.

He loved these journeys. They were not long and arduous, with strangers at the far end, like many farings he perforce made, as far as the praetorian seat at Augusta Treverorum; then old bones ached and thin flesh shivered for weariness. They took him from the cares of his episcopate both in the city and the monastery. Those were heavy of late. Bricius, his disciple whom he had named to be his successor, now looked on him as a crazy dotard clinging to notions of poverty which might once have brought men nearer God but surely no longer served the needs of Mother Church and her princes. In the countryside harvest was ended, weather still mild, ordinary folk and the little children had leisure to meet him on his way, listen to him talk in language they understood, receive his blessing and mutely give him theirs.

But this year trouble pursued him even there. Word had come of a vicious quarrel in the presbytery where the
rivers met. He would compose it if he could. With a few companions he set off down the Liger in his barge.

They arrived beneath a low gray sky. Trees raised bare arms from the banks. Water sheened dully. Fisher birds dived and bobbed back into sight. Their cries rang loud in the stillness. Martinus pointed. “Behold,” he said. “The demons are like that, ravenous, never sated.” He lifted his voice. “Begone!” Feeble though the shout was, they immediately took off, a racket of wings through the wet air. Once up they made a military-like formation and flew out of the watchers’ ken.

“A holy omen,” breathed young Sucat.

The elders received the bishop with full reverence and took him uphill to lodge at the church. His attendants found pallets in their quarters or among humble families nearby. In the next pair of days, Martinus brought the factions to amity. “Put down your pride,” he told them. “For your sake, Christ let Himself be mocked and scourged and nailed to the Cross between two thieves. The least you can do is humble yourselves before one another.”

Even as he labored, fever was in him. When time came to go on, he could not He lay burning hot, lips cracked, eyes stabbed by what faint light entered the room. He allowed none to touch him, and refused straw to lie on; he would keep with his wonted sackcloth, and ashes thereto.

It was not that he wished to die. Too much remained to do. Once those who held watch on him heard the quavered prayer: “Lord, if my people still have need of me, I am ready to go to work again. But Your will be done.”

In the days that followed, as word got about, a swarm arrived, monks, nuns, grief-stricken common folk. Nearly all must needs do without a roof, bleak though the season was, and live on whatever crusts they had brought along. Yet they were determined they would follow their shepherd to his last resting place.

When the presbyters saw death nigh, they asked Martinus if he would like to be shifted to a more comfortable position. “No,” he whispered. “Leave me looking toward Heaven.”

Then his tone strengthened. Wrath called out: “Why
are you standing there, you bloody fiend? You’ll get nothing from me. I’m bound for Abraham’s bosom. Go!”

He sank back. Breath rattled into silence. God’s soldier departed, obedient to orders.

1

Axes rang in the forest, picks and spades grubbed at stumps, oxen hauled logs and bundles of brushwood south to Confluentes. Some land had been cleared during the summer, but that was for timber to make houses. Now men were readying a much wider ground to cultivate.

When nothing else claimed his attention, Gratillonius was there. In hard labor and rough comradeship lay healing of a sort. He did not lose prestige—Kings of Ys had been more like Ulysses or Romulus than today’s Emperors—but rather gained admiration by strength, skill, and helpfulness. Besides, the faster the colony grew and began to export such things as lumber, the sooner his own position would be secure. At present he had scarcely a solidus to his name, nor any revenues to support himself in office and whatever public works might need undertaking. He could not continue much longer living on Apuleius’s kindness. Indeed, the senator might find himself in trouble were it known that he put funds at the disposal of a man who had no clear Imperial standing.