“Oh.”
They took the high road and the path climbed upward. She started to feel the cold again and hugged the warm robe tighter around her. The houses thinned, the path spread out and open space started to appear once more on both sides. She could already see the beginnings of flowers in the large grass field to her right.
“Gardens,” Licinius said, answering her unspoken question.
“For growing food?” she asked.
“No, to look beautiful,” Licinius said.
“Wouldn’t it be easier to take a walk to where the flowers grow rather than force them to grow here?”
Licinius grinned. “Rome does not go to flowers. Flowers come to Rome.”
“Many of the flowers are not native to Manhatos,” Dinah added. “There are times Tabor likes reminders of his boyhood home.”
A house loomed above them, but it was like none she’d seen in the town below. This place was solid stone.
The entrance was flanked by what she first thought were massive tree trunks cut and modeled for the villa. As she grew closer, she realized they were made of the gray stone that could be found all over Mannahatta. Grooves had been cut into the mighty stone.
The stone columns were easily three times as tall as she was. Long, flat steps of the same material led up to the massive front door that was a wide as five men. She was thankful that the door was, at least, wood. It was nice to see something remotely familiar.
The door was guarded by two Romans with swords at their waists, metal armor on their chests, and wearing helmets with a plumed fringe.
The guards struck their chests as Dinah and Gerhard approached. Warriors? They must be. Part of what the Romans called their legion, if she remembered right.
Dinah spoke to one of the guards. All Sky could understand was the name “Gaius.”
Both Dinah and Gerhard asked the soldiers more questions. One of the men cleared his throat, apprehensive. But Dinah had clearly expected a warm, easy welcome. What was wrong?
“Licinius, what is the matter?” Sky asked. Could Tabor be refusing her entry for some reason? Did he know her people had agreed to keep the location of Legate Makki’s ships secret?
“There is trouble with recent arrivals from Rome,” Licinius said. “Commander Tabor is talking to an armed delegation from the Emperor. Dinah does not like it.” He paused. “I doubt Tabor likes it either. In any case, it’s what has delayed Gaius. He went in, as Dinah asked, but he has not come back out to welcome us.”
Sky swallowed. Legate Makki’s people were here. The knowledge of the fleet’s secret felt like a great stone sitting in her stomach.
Sky remembered that Makki had said the Romans in Manhatos were in rebellion against their Emperor. What was at the root of this conflict? “Why do representatives from the Emperor come armed? What do they want so desperately?”
Licinius shook his head. “To be obeyed, I think.” He frowned. “The Lenape and the Mahicans are essentially the same people yet there is still sometimes war between you. It is the same with Romans. Manhatos and Seneca thrive only because those here sacrificed and worked for its survival. Tabor feels the Empire has lost the right to give orders to any of us.”
“Us? Do you call yourself Roman them?”
Licinius shook his head. “No, but I’m of Seneca and so is Tabor. That makes him one of us. A threat to him is a threat to all.”
Dinah finished talking with the guards. They opened the door for her and the entire party walked into a great hall. The floor was polished, marbled stone of white and black.
Painted life-size images decorated the walls.
Goddess, what have I stepped into?
Her father sometimes played different parts of a long tale to keep the audience’s attention, sometimes using costumes to make the story come to life.
Here, it was as if someone had painted a tale on the wall, with images so well-crafted and so vivid that it seemed they could walk out from the walls.
Where had the Romans gotten such colors into their paint?
Sky walked to the closest painting and reached out a hand, but stopped short of touching the wall. This section portrayed a battle and she stepped back to view it as a whole. She finally recognized the Battle of the Thunder, where the Romans had made the ground explode under the Mahican warriors’ feet.
The fire erupting from the ground was particularly vivid, as were the faces of the fallen Mahicans.
But the most striking section of the painting featured a bare-headed Roman high on a hill, brandishing a sword, surrounded by two Viking warriors. With a start, she recognized the blond Viking as Gerhard. The other was a giant of a man with long, dark hair who stood at the Roman’s right hand.
The last section depicted the Mahicanituck River that ran past Seneca, the same river than ran past the southern tip of this island and then down to the sea. On the river was a long boat, with a dark-haired woman standing at the prow, smiling.
Dinah.
If Licinius thought her eyes wide in wonder before, it was just as well he could not see the amazement that filled them now.
All these people had been at that battle. And they had killed many of her distant kin.
Have I walked straight into the arms of the enemy?
Thankfully, the other two paintings were more pastoral, though just as well-crafted. In the sky was an eagle, soaring above what must be the community of Seneca. A fort stood high on a hill. Below it, a thriving town edged all the way to the river. Another community, built into the mountain, was just below and to the left of the fort.
The third and last painting on the right wall showcased a grove of trees bearing fruit that almost seemed real enough to pluck from its branches.
“Apple trees,” Licinius said in answer to her unspoken question. “That’s where the cider came from.”
She nodded because words didn’t seem accurate. No threat there, only nature. Still, though, nature that the Romans had brought to her land.
Dinah put a hand on Sky’s forearm. “Your emotions are an open book, Sky,” she said.
“And?”
“And you will not be completely among friends here. Be careful. People don’t like change.” Dinah pointed to their party. “They are safe. They’re mine. But others are not safe.”
“Including your Commander Tabor?”
Dinah smiled. “Tabor has never been safe. But he is no threat to you or any of our people, unless you are a threat to him.”
Gaius appeared at the entrance to an arched hallway. He strode toward them, though he glanced behind with apprehension. Keeping Dinah’s advice in mind, Sky tried to keep her face blank, even as her mind churned with worry and questions. What would they do to her if they knew she knew that her people were hiding the location of Legate Makki’s fleet?
Licinius stepped closer to her. That helped. She would have felt immeasurably better if Ceti were here as well, preferably wrapped under a cloak with her.
Gaius reached them, said something to Gerhard and Dinah, and pointed to a small hallway to their left. But before anyone could reply, a whole crowd spilled into the main hall.
Sky counted twelve men, all armed, though only about half wore uniforms. Instantly, everyone in her party from the Viking long boat surrounded her, hiding her from the view of the new arrivals.
One Roman among the soldiers was doing all the talking.
It was Legate Makki el-Andulasia, looking even more impressive than he had on the beach, all gleaming armor and weapons decorating his beautiful dark skin. He had a hand on his sword. So did the rest of his men, which included Ahala, the man who spoke her language. He was the only one who didn’t wear armor.
Ahala turned his head and stared directly at her.
Sky stepped behind Gerhard, using the Viking to hide, praying that Ahala had not recognized her. The Imperials might attack her village if they believed that her tribe had broken their word to keep the fleet secret from Manhatos.
A man strode into the cha
mber followed by a group of soldiers, redirecting Ahala’s attention.
The newcomer was a gray-haired man—no, a warrior. That was clear in the way he held himself and the set of his shoulders, though he wore no weapon and was dressed in a simple red tunic and tan leggings. He was a head shorter than Makki but it did not make any difference. The gray-haired warrior exuded power, in a way that reminded Sky of her mother or Deep Water.
Or Legate Makki.
The Roman warrior glared at Makki and stepped within arm’s length of the legate. Sky was reminded of a wolf, just before it struck its prey. She glanced to the painting of the Roman victory at the Battle of Seneca and realized that this man was the painting come to life: Tabor, the Roman leader of Seneca and Manhatos.
Dinah had called him dangerous. Dinah was absolutely right.
Legate Makki gestured, angry, at Tabor. Tabor grabbed the other’s hand, tight. Everyone put hands on the hilts of their swords, ready to draw, including Gerhard and Licinius.
Tabor and Makki stared at each other for what seemed like forever. The tension was so strong that Sky imagined she could see it physically entangling the men in its tendrils.
Tabor stepped forward, still holding onto Makki’s wrist, and whispered something in a low tone to his enemy.
Makki growled.
Air was silently displaced by the mass drawing of swords.
Chapter Twelve
Ceti rushed to his workshop, but his haste was slowed by the effort required to carry the aquila up the long, steep steps to his home. Even with the help of the Vikings from the ship, it was no easy task.
He directed his help in loading the aquila onto the catapult and thanked them. They left as quickly as they’d come. Ceti suspected they would go right back to their ship. They still didn’t feel completely comfortable in Manhatos. Too many unfamiliar Romans, probably.
Ceti examined the damage to his masterpiece. For now, this offered the most secure place to conduct repairs, but he double-checked the catapult to make sure it could not be accidentally triggered. The broken wing needed new bamboo and he would have to sew a patch on the cloth. At least a day’s work, maybe more, was needed before it would fly again.
Time Ceti could not spare, not now.
He must discover how the construction of the onagers and ballistas was progressing. While his engineer corps had plenty of experience in modern cannons, the corps had little knowledge of torsion siege machines. Ceti didn’t know of anyone who’d built them on this scale in his lifetime. Likely because there hadn’t been anyone desperate enough to match wood siege machines against more powerful metal cannons.
Sky would be fascinated by them.
Fool, he thought. Sky had more important matters than ancient technology.
He stripped off his dirty, wet clothes and changed into his formal uniform, a dark brown wool tunic embossed with a silver eagle. The tunic had the advantage of being warm and dry, but it also reminded Ceti that he was a soldier, under orders. He held a tribune’s rank, one of only four in this legion, but he served completely at Tabor’s pleasure. His life was not his own.
Sky was a princess, a domina of her people. She didn’t take orders, she gave them. From what he knew of the Mahican tribal structure, if Ceti were member of Sky’s clan, he’d rank far below her, among the anonymous warriors and hunters.
Sky had thought him special because of the aquila. Would she feel the same once she realized his own place in the Roman hierarchy was not equal to hers among the Lenape? Roman patricians were notoriously focused on rank. He had no idea if that was the same among Sky’s clan.
Though she had cuddled nicely under the cloak with him. And she had seemed genuinely unhappy he’d left her at the beach with the others.
And she had kissed him. There was that.
He completed his return to duty by buckling on his chest plate and his sword. With the imperial ship at anchor, he must be ready in case of attack.
He took a last look at the aquila before he left and realized he could do something for Sky that no one else in the world could do.
He could teach her to fly.
****
Ceti strode purposely to the engineer’s station at the east wall for a report from his corps centurion, Godwin. A solid man, Godwin, from a long line of builders in Britain, but he sometimes lacked imagination.
The station was an inelegant stone structure with no windows, only slats, deliberately built to be as impervious as possible to enemy cannon fire. Interior light was provided by oil lanterns permanently attached to the walls.
The lanterns were burning bright when Ceti entered. Books and older scroll parchments lined the wall shelves. There was barely room for Ceti to walk between tables that were covered with plans for the new siege machines.
Godwin was in the midst of the mess, deep in conversation with two of his deputies. The light gleamed off his bald head. Ceti stayed silent. They could be sorting out a design problem and he didn’t want to make them lose hold of their idea.
Godwin raised his head.
“Ceti! Welcome back. You’re exactly who we need,” he said, pointing at something on the plans. “Look at this.”
“What’s the problem?”
“We need a way to get the projectiles from the onager to go higher. We’ve got a nice range from them, but they start out too low to go over the wall. It’ll do us no good to bring down our own barricades.”
“That was my main concern when I explained the idea to Commander Tabor,” Ceti said. He traced the drawing of the onager with his fingertips and briefly wondered who the original Grecian designer had been. For all he knew, Odysseus himself had built the first one. But surely a Roman had perfected it, inventing a weapon out of desperation or necessity.
“You need to lengthen the vertical arm,” Ceti said.
“Are you sure?” Godwin frowned and rubbed his short gray beard.
“Yes. I had the same problem with the catapult for the aquila. It’s counterintuitive, I know, but it works.”
Godwin nodded. “Good. Now we don’t have to waste time on trial and error.”
Ceti sketched the new dimensions onto Godwin’s design. Godwin rolled it up and handed it to one of the deputies. “Get this in the field, now. Batiatus will know how to make the changes. And, quickly, we’re chasing time’s tail here.”
The deputies hustled off.
“How much time do we have, Godwin? Have the imperials left their ships yet?” Ceti asked. “And is there any sign of the rest of the fleet?”
“No sign of the rest of the ships, but the legate himself and his personal guards came ashore this morning and were escorted up the hill to meet with Commander Tabor at his villa.”
“The imperial legate is at the villa now?” Sky was up there. Alone.
Well, not alone. Tabor surely had guards and Dinah and Gerhard were there and her cousin Licinius and...
But Sky had just stepped into the middle of all this and he wasn’t there for her.
“Do you have a written list of the progress since…” Ceti cleared his throat. “Since I’ve last been here?”
“Since you decided to turn into a bird you mean? Good to see, by the way, that the landing wasn’t fatal.” Godwin smiled and held up an official legionary engineering journal. “All the reports are in here.”
Ceti took the small green journal from Godwin. “Thank you. I’m going to report to Commander Tabor now and be back to inspect the progress visually when I’m done.”
Godwin rubbed his beard, a sign Ceti knew signaled nervousness. “It’d be easier to conduct an inspection in the light of day.”
“The commander needs this information now,” Ceti snapped. “That’s all, Centurion.”
Godwin raised his eyebrows. Ceti rarely pulled rank on his men. He didn’t need to, they all knew their jobs. But if Godwin was discomforted he didn’t show it. The centurion saluted and left without another word.
Ceti slid the book inside his belt pouch and headed
as fast as he could to Tabor’s villa, wishing he had a horse. He cut through the center of town, a path that angled steeply uphill. It would be less crowded the edges of Manhatos, but it would also take far longer to get where he was going.
Ceti barely noticed people on the street. He chided himself that his concern for Sky was unfounded—there were plenty of protectors with her—but that didn’t make his irrational fear disappear.
The guards at the vast wooden door to the villa waved him past without a word.
Ceti stepped into the great entranceway and immediately saw Tabor, backed by his private guards, confronting an imperial legate.
Tabor had his fingers wrapped tight around the legate’s wrist. The two commanders stared each other down, almost as if they expected their eyes to strike a fatal blow.
Tabor’s guards and the legate’s escort had all drawn their gladius, the short sword carried by every legionary soldier.
Tabor released his hold on the legate.
The legate cursed him through clenched teeth.
“Traitor,” the legate said. “You bring destruction on you and yours, Tabor.”
“It’s the Empire that’s betrayed us, leaving the citizens here without resources. It lost any claim on the loyalty of me and mine years ago,” Tabor said. “The last emperor exiled me here when his murder plot failed. I see absolutely no reason to give my pledge to the new one, especially when he’s shown himself ready to kill all rivals.”
“Are you threatening to attack the emperor himself, Tabor? You think you can kill and then replace him?”
Tabor snorted, as if the accusation amused him. “I have all I need here.” He tilted his head. “But you might want to reconsider your own loyalty. How soon before your new leader sees you as a threat, Makki el-Andulasia?”
Makki brandished his gladius. Light streaming down from the glass roof caught the metal and reflected it off the marble floor.
Tabor crossed his arms over his chest. “If you strike me down, Makki, then you and your men will not leave this villa alive.”
“And if you strike me down, Tabor, then my fleet will attack immediately,” Makki said with a sneer. “You know that. Just as I know you only received me to stall my actions and delay our battle.”
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