The Songs of Slaves (56 page)

             
“What are you sitting around for?” Gaiseric said, approaching with Henric from the left.

             
“Why are you walking around in this heat?” Connor said, shielding his eyes from the sun as he looked up to them.

             
“We came by to catch a glimpse of that pretty woman of yours.”

             
“She’s fetching more water,” Connor said.

             
“More’s the pity,” Gaiseric said. “We’ll just have to wait till she gets back. Why yes, I’ll have a drink, thank you.”

             
“Go get it,” Connor said, indicating with his thumb.

             
“Put a shirt on, man,” Henric said, sitting down beside Connor. “You may look like the marble Perseus in Athens, but you’ve got hardly any scars on you yet. Nobody will take you seriously when they see that baby skin.”

             
“Baby skin?”
Gaiseric quipped. “A baby leopard for the
Coliseum,
freckled as he is.”

             
“They will just know how lucky I am,” Connor chuckled. He knew he was lucky – not only that he had first killed most of those who had tried to kill him, but in that the Jutes and Angles in Britannia had favored rods and fists over the distinctively-scarring Roman whip. A striped back was almost as much a stigmata of slavery as a branded face.

Gaiseric came out of the tent with the wine. Not having enough cups, they passed the amphora.

             
“Well, this is it, brother,” Henric said. “There is a rumor out that things happened today.”

             
“What?” Connor asked.

             
“Don’t know yet. Valia went to talk to Ataulf. People think there will be some sort of announcement tonight. They may have done it. They may have a treaty ready.”

***

             
Connor sat upright in the dark; his eyes wide-open, his chest heaving as he caught his breath.
Another nightmare.
He rested his hand on
Lucia
’s back, comforting himself with her steady breathing. She did not stir.  He reached his other hand towards
Archangel
and gripped the hilt, finding reassurance there as always. Letting go of his weapon he laid his head back down. The shards of the dream dissipated readily as he worked to banish them from his mind, but as the minutes passed Connor found that he was not much calmer. His heart still thumped and he could feel his own pulse in his ears. Sweat covered his bare chest. His mind looped over and over again. He was not sure how late it was – perhaps it was three or four in the morning. The tent was completely dark, the camp outside tomb-
quiet. Finally accepting that he could not fall back asleep, Connor stood to his feet. He took a draught from a water skin and then dressed in his breeches and boots. He slung his baldric over his shoulder and took one more look at
Lucia
before stepping out into the night.

             
The harsh heat of day had given way to an oppressively muggy night. The odor of the swampland just to the north blended with the sweating humans and horses, burned out campfires, excrement, trash, and other unidentifiable smells of the massive camp. Far to the west Connor could see some rain clouds in the sky, and he hoped that they might come give them some relief. He urinated on the ground as he looked at the towers of Ravenna and the lights that still burned within the city. Finishing, he began to walk away from Valia’s encampment, towards the open field that lay between them and the larger host.  There was a rise just on the other side of the main camp that provided a good view of the Adriatic. It was about a fifteen minute walk away. Without really thinking about it, Connor set out in that direction.

             
Connor knew well why his thoughts were churning and why he could find no rest tonight. It was
not just the usual fears and hardships. Around the time of the evening meal, Ataulf had arrived as expected. Valia and the other warlords had gathered around as their general gave out the good news. After so many days or weeks, a treaty had finally been drafted to the liking of b
oth the Visigoths and Honorius’
delegates. It remained only to be ratified by Honorius himself, which could happen as early as tomorrow. It would be hard to imagine that the petulant emperor would not ratify it, despite his vow never to make peace with Alaric, as it was drafted under delegates that he had selected and continuously instructed. As Ataulf told the terms of the treaty, Connor had trouble
imagining how the E
mperor could not ratify it, as it was objectively almost solely in his favor. The Visigoths cheered, men and women alike, as they heard the terms – so long had they been embroiled in this struggle, so long had they wandered without an end in sight, that they were ready to take what was offered provided that it held at least the shade of what they desired. And it did – the Visigoths and their allies were to receive ample land in Noricum as a client kingdom in exchange for military service as
foederati
against Rome’s innumerable enemies. The Goths received their long-sought-after
place to call home; but would almost immediately – presumably next year – cross the Alps to go to war against Constantine, the Franks, Bu
rgundians, Sueves, Alans, and Alamanni
. After that who knew? Maybe they would go on to fight the Saxons, the Vandals, and of course the Huns; maybe the new rebels they were hearing rumors of, such as Constantine’s former general Gerontius, or the evil Heraclian who seemed to be rising fast in Africa? Then there were always the Persians. Honorius had finally bought himself a military force willing and possibly ready to take on his multitude of enemies; and all for the price of swallowing his pride and granting them a barely fertile, mountainous region that was on the crossroads of any advancing barbarian horde, northern or eastern.

             
Yet this news was very well received. Though the Visigoths had been disappointed enough times to know by now not to celebrate until all the ink was dry, this did not stop them from cheering at the news. This was followed by laughing or crying and embracing each other; with flowing wine and eating double rations; with singing and even some dancing; and talking deep into the night of the good hearths they would build and the grand war they would fight, now that they were the
sword of the
Imperium
, now that they were the hope of Rome. 

             
Connor sighed as he paced the grass of the open field between the Ataulf’s cavalry encampment and Alaric’s much larger camp. He was happy for them – though the arrangement did not appeal to his more detached sense of justice. What was bothering him was where all this left him. Over these last months it had been easy to get lost in the day to day. He had his
manda
tae
– fight for Valia and his new friends, protect
Lucia
and take her to Asisium, recover Dania and take her home – but it had been very easy to get lost in this. He followed Valia and the others wherever they might go, earning his food and shelter with his valor, steadfastness, and skill. He would have already taken
Lucia
to her kinsfolk – but she had made no appeal to go since they had become intimate. She seemed happy with him, and she was his greatest treasure – at times, seemingly, the onl
y thing he had
. They were not ready to lose each other.
But what of Dania?
Connor cursed himself. He never should have let other
mandatae
get in the way. He had vowed to find her and rescue her. Perhaps there may be market records that would lead him to her; or perhaps he could watch long enough for
Andopaxtes to return, as the trader certainly would, and force the information from him. Connor grinned in the darkness at the thought of making the slave trader talk; but quickly abandoned the fantasy in the face of reality.  It may be possible to discover who had bought Dania – but that was last year. What if she had been sold again? Or what if she had died? Meanwhile, every day for her must be a living hell – if she had any soul left to burn. He should have left the Goths the first morning, gone to Massilia, and sold Merridius’s fine horse for the money to buy her. As his mind turned over and over this, he thought of lots of things he could have done differently, if only he had not allowed himself to become mesmerized by the task of everyday survival. How many days in the nameless town where they had wintered, how many nights on the road, how many weeks here camped before these walls had he gone without even thinking of his mission and purpose? Had he not even faced Constantine’s army in the foothills of Liguria back in the spring, before they realized that Alaric had outmaneuvered them politically as well as militarily and had to retreat? The showdown between the Gothic cavalry under Ataulf and the seasoned Roman army of Britons and Gauls under Constantine
had amounted to mere skirmishes, but still – might he not have been killed there and then. How would he fulfill any of his obligations if his corpse lay rotting in a field?

             
“Password,” the sentry demanded as Connor approached the camp, jolting him out of his reverie. The big man looked more annoyed than vigilant as he leaned on the head of his axe, unhappy to be awake while everyone else was sleeping off their celebratory ale.

             
Connor had to think about it for a moment before he remembered it.

“
Wenjan
,” Connor said
–
hope
in Gothic. The warrior moved to let him by. 

Connor’s mind quickly returned to the same thoughts as he picked his way through the maze of tents, striking a course east towards the sea. He turned over the same litany of problems, foregone conclusions, and phantom solutions several times before he realized that even this line of thinking was a distraction. What he had to decide was what he was going to do when the treaty was signed. He would have to take
Lucia
somewhere. He was not going to spend the next twenty-five years enlisted in the Roman cavalry, fighting against all comers. Or was he? Would
Lucia
be content to be a warrior’s wife in cold, distant Noricum? If the war took them first to Gaul, could he not secure Dania while he was there? Should he leave his dreams of returning home behind, in favor of what was being offered him now?

             
Had the taller man’s stare not been so cold, Connor might not have noticed them. He looked up and returned the gaze, but even as he did so both men looked away and continued to walk north through the camp. Connor’s eyes followed them – it was hours before dawn but already in the last watch of the night. In a camp this size there was never a time every person slept. Connor would not have thought it strange that two men might be strolling past the tents, as he did, well after hours. But the second man’s stare had aroused Connor’s suspicion, and what made that suspicion now impossible to abate was that the men were both wearing cloaks. Connor was ove
r-warm walking shirtless. He
looked hard at the men, now several paces away from him. They moved purposefully, but almost like they were trying not to
move too quickly. He could see their scabbards swing under their cloaks as they walked, though here in this camp that was evidence of nothing. He tried to picture the taller man’s face – the squinting eyes and patchy blonde beard and mustache. It seemed familiar to him, but he could not place it. The man turned his head as if he felt Connor’s eyes on him, but he did not dare turn and look full on again.

Suddenly Connor saw that the men were not alone. Well past them, two other cloaked men made their way through the crowd of tents. Connor saw three more to his left, and then turning his head cautiously to his right he saw several more. They were all far enough apart to seem to the inattentive as isolated pairs or very small groups, like one might encounter here on any given night. But Connor realized that they were far from innocuous. Slowly, trying to appear casual, Connor turned around and began to walk back in the direction he had come. Aside from the first pair, he did not know if any of the others had noticed him yet. He began walking as naturally as he could manage, his heart again racing.

Connor felt eyes on him once more. Before he could master himself he turned his head, seeing the taller man watching him. Recognition flashed –
the squinty eyes, the patchy blonde beard
. It was
the man who pulled
Lucia
from her bedroom in the villa, who had put a knife to her throat, who had held her down in the courtyard that autumn day so long ago – Arastan’s man. But that was impossible – Arastan was with Sarus, who had returned to his master Honorius.

Then it was all clear.

Connor
started walking faster. Though he could not run and attract the attention of all these men, it
no longer mattered if the taller
man knew that he had been recognized or not. Nor could Connor just scream havoc – if he alerted everyone the wrong way it would have the same effect as shouting “fire
” in a crowded basilica. Sarus’
men could fade away while the other Goths slew each other in their panic. No – he had to get back and tell Valia; because after all, he knew exactly where they were going.