The Lion and the Lark (11 page)

     “That must have surprised him,” Bronwen said dryly.

     Claudius looked at her.  “No.  He had the greatest respect for his enemies.”

     “As long as he defeated them,” Bronwen countered.

     “He did not defeat them because they lacked courage.  Manpower, supplies, strategic advantages, yes, but not courage.  Vercingetorix, a Celt like you, was the subject of much discussion in Caesar’s commentaries on the Gallic wars...”

     Bronwen snorted.  “I know about Vercingetorix, the stories reached us all the way from Gaul.  The traders who came here talked of nothing but him for years.  He was my brother’s childhood hero.”  She took another sip of wine before saying, “He was strangled as a spectacle for the mob during Caesar’s triumph at Rome, after being dragged around in chains all over your territories as a living reminder of what resistance to Rome would bring.  And you have the nerve to call us barbarians?”

     “He was a defeated enemy.  Until recently your people severed the heads of defeated enemies and preserved them in cedar oil, keeping them in chests to display to visitors.  Or they placed the skulls in niches on their houses to warn anyone approaching of how many lives they had already taken.”

     “What’s your point?” Bronwen asked him, looking at him over the rim of her cup.  “That we are the same?”

     “That we are not as different as you seem to imagine,” Claudius replied quietly.

     “That idea must be a great comfort to you Romans as you carve a path of destruction everywhere you go.”

     Claudius shrugged.  “It’s the way of the world.”

     Bronwen stared at him.  “Is that what you tell yourself so that you can sleep at night?”

     “I tell myself that if our situations were reversed your father and his men would not hesitate to enslave me.”

     “That is not true!  My people were content to remain on our island, it was you who came across the sea with your weapons and your will to conquer everything that lies before you!”

     “Not my will.  I am a soldier.  I go where I am told and do as I am ordered.”

     “So you take no satisfaction in your role as conqueror?” Bronwen demanded.

     “I am proud that I am a citizen of Rome,” he said simply.  “I would be no other.  As for the rest I know that if we show weakness the empire will slip through our fingers as surely as sand slips through an hourglass.  Might wins out, always.”

     Bronwen was still considering his answer when the page Claudius had brought with him from the barracks appeared in the doorway.

      “Two centurions to see you, Tribune Leonatus.”

     “Now?” Claudius said irritably.  “I’m at dinner.  Can’t it wait until later?”

     “They said it was urgent,” the boy murmured nervously.

     Claudius sighed and stood up, wiping his mouth on a napkin.  “Very well.

Show them in.”

     The boy left and shortly afterward two soldiers came striding into the dining room, their cloaks damp from the weather, their helmets under their arms.  They gave Claudius the imperial salute, striking their breasts with closed fists.

     “What is it?” Claudius asked briskly.

     The taller man came forward and said something to Claudius in an undertone.

     Claudius nodded and dropped the napkin to his couch.  “Wait here,” he said, and left the room.

     The two men sneaked looks at Bronwen and then exchanged glances.  The first one whispered something and his companion laughed.

     Bronwen turned her back on them and pretended to be interested in a tray of dried fruit.  She could hear the centurions sniggering behind her, making remarks in a rumbling whisper.  

     Suddenly there was a loud crash and she whirled to see the taller man pinned to the wall with Claudius’ hands at his throat.

     “I heard what you said,” Claudius snarled at him.  The tray he had upended in his rush to get at the soldier came to settle on the floor with a tinny rattle.  “This is my wife, do you understand me?  If I ever hear you say anything like that again I’ll have you transferred to the mines in Numidia.  We’ll see how witty you’ll be when going salt blind in the desert,  supervising convicts who’ll cut your throat for a drink of water in the blistering heat and wishing that I’d had you crucified.”

     The terrified man stared back at Claudius, afraid to speak, while his companion looked on, swallowing hard, grateful that his own sallies had not been overheard.  Two servant girls lingered openmouthed in the hall, fleeing when Claudius stepped back from the centurion.

     Claudius picked up the leather courier pouch he’d been carrying, which had fallen to the floor.

     “Take this and get out of here,” he said curtly, handing it over, not looking at the men again.  “And from now on conduct yourselves like gentlemen in the presence of a lady.”

     The soldiers left rapidly, leaving Claudius alone with Bronwen, who had not moved throughout the incident.

     “I’m sorry,” Claudius said to her quietly.  “I should not have left them alone with you, I wasn’t thinking clearly.  It was stupid of me.”  He sat on the couch across from her and rested his elbows on his knees wearily, his head bent.

     “Claudius, it doesn’t matter.  I didn’t hear what was said.”

     “Good,” he replied shortly.

      “You made too much of it.  Do you think that’s the first time I’ve been subjected to a Roman insult?”

     “It will be the last time in my house,” he said firmly, picking up his goblet and taking a drink.

     Browen leaned forward and touched his hand.  He froze.

     “Why do you care?” she said softly.

     He stared at her, his dark eyes locked with hers.

     “You’re my wife, Bronwen,” he murmured.

     Moved by his words as well as what he had just done, Bronwen said, “Not really.  I’m not really your wife.”

     He curled his fingers around hers, his throat working.  “Do you want to be?” he whispered.

     One of the kitchen skivvies bustled into the room with a platter of vegetables, and the two separated as if caught in a secret tryst.

     “Leave us alone,” Claudius barked in Celtic, and the girl dropped the tray like a hot rock and scurried out of the room.

     But the moment had passed.  Bronwen, alarmed by her own unguarded impulse, rose abruptly and said, “I’m not hungry, I think I will retire early.  Please stay and finish, don’t let me stop you.  I’m sorry to be such a poor dinner companion.  Good night.”

     Bronwen tried not to run from the room, but her departure was hasty.  Claudius watched her go, his expression bleak.  He ignored the trays of food and refilled his goblet, a torrent of conflicting emotions surging inside of him.

     He wanted to get drunk, but was afraid of what he might do when intoxicated.  He needed all the control at his command to restrain himself from going after her.  This was the first glimmer of encouragement she had offered him in five weeks, and he knew that if he abused it and threw himself on her tonight his chance to win her would be lost forever.

     So he sipped slowly, wondering if she knew how much he wanted her, if she could possibly imagine what torment it was for him to be so close to her every day and not touch her.  He sat in the dining room until the fire went out and the servants had cleared away the meal, until he was sure she would be

asleep.

     Then he rose and went down to the bedroom, entering to find her buried under the woolen blanket, her fiery hair barely visible.

     He stripped off his outer clothing and lay down before the fire in his clout, wrapping himself in a Caledonian quilt stuffed with goose feathers and bound with leather piping.  He had drunk enough to make him sleepy, and in a short time he slumbered.

     When Bronwen heard his breathing become deep and even, she threw back the blanket and came to sit in the chair by the fire.  She watched Claudius sleep for the rest of the night, until the first light of dawn streaked the sky.  Then she crept back to bed as she heard the servants rising and preparing for the day.

     Lucia looked around the paddock, at the packed dirt floor and the stalls at the back strewn with fresh hay.  The obstacles made of clay cob were piled against one wall and the two horses were tethered and stamping impatiently to her left.

     “I can’t believe it,” she said in amazement to her father.  “You’ve made a riding circus right here in the middle of Britain.”

     Scipio nodded with satisfaction.

     “And it’s warm, as warm as our house!”

     “We used the same system here.  Next year we are planning to extend it to the troop barracks and the outbuildings.”

     “Next year?” Lucia said inquiringly, glancing at him.  “Will we still be here next year?”

     “We may not be, but some Romans will.  If Caesar recalls us he will send others to take our place.”

     Lucia looked at her father, at the hooked nose, broken twice during campaigns, the leathery skin tanned by the sun of Iberian summers spent at war.  “Why do we want this place?” she asked softly.  “Why not leave it to the natives, everyone says there is nothing here worth keeping.”

     “There are minerals here worth mining, and even if there were not, it’s land, territory, space.  You must learn to think like an emperor, Lucia.  The republic is dead, no matter what Cicero says, and it will not be revived.  We’re a military nation and the object is to conquer and expand the boundaries of the empire.  More and more and more, never enough until the whole world flies the eagle standard and takes as its motto the SPQR, the Senate and the People of Rome.”

     Lucia couldn’t tell if he were being sarcastic; his face remained expressionless.

     He clapped his hands together.  “Well, I must go.  The trainer will be along shortly.  I met him this morning and he seems a fit enough chap.  Not a lot to say but he’s not here to make speeches, is he?  You’ll let me know how he works out, he’ll be staying out back above the stables.  Ariovistus found him.  He’s a Celt from the west, an Ordovice I think.  Who knows?  They all look the same to me.”  He smiled.

     Lucia threw her arms around his neck impulsively.  “Thank you so much for this, Father.  It’s wonderful.”

     He hugged her back.  “Anything to keep you off the forest trails in this bitter weather.  And it won’t be wasted.  When we leave it can be used to train cart horses for military drills.  At least, that’s what I told Marc Antony when I requisitioned the money to build it.”  He winked at her, then gathered his cloak around him and strode briskly from the barn.

     Lucia walked over to the stacked clay blocks, arranging them to form obstacles of various heights.  She was absorbed in this activity when she realized that she was not alone.  She looked up to see a very tall man with a mane of wheaten hair and a full beard staring at her, his arms folded and his legs spread apart in an aggressive stance.

     “Are you the trainer?” she asked in Latin.

     “I am,” he replied in Celtic.

     “I didn’t hear you come in,” Lucia said, switching easily to his language.

     “I can be very quiet when I choose,” he replied cryptically, walking forward to join her.

     “I understand that Ariovistus found you in a slave market,” Lucia observed, looking up at him. She was trying to gain the upper hand immediately, unnerved by his size and his youth, which she had not expected.  Even though he was as woolly as a bear, a close inspection revealed unlined features and a slim body that told her he was only a few years older than she was.

     Had her father registered this, or was he so preoccupied with the contentious British and his own restive troops that he had seen only another towering, hairy Celt?

     Unsure how to take her last remark, Brettix replied, “It doesn’t matter where he found me as long as I can do the job.”

     “Can you?” she asked challengingly.

     Brettix did not reply, merely walked over to Lucia’s horse and began to stroke her flanks, murmuring softly.

     “What’s her name?” he asked Lucia.

     “
Stella
,” Lucia replied, watching him.

     He began to use the horse’s name, patting her nose and rubbing her ears, and Lucia watched the horse react.  In a short time he had mounted the animal bareback and was trotting around the ring, controlling Stella with his knees, his fingers tangled in her mane.  He slowly gathered speed, encouraging the horse as he leant forward talking to her, pushing her until she was at a gallop.  Lucia sucked in her breath as she realized he was urging the horse toward the highest makeshift obstacle she had erected.  She started to cry out, and then pressed her lips together when she saw it was too late to stop them.  The horse soared over the jump, mane flying, her rider so low on her neck he seemed part of her body.  They landed lightly, the horse slowing to a trot as her rider continued to praise and pet her.

     Observing them, Lucia was stabbed by a single thought: I wonder if he handles a woman so well.