Return to Exile

by Lynne Gentry

  “Me? I’m not the traitor. I can’t believe you have the guts to look Cyprian in the eye after what you did.” She jerked her hand away and took a step back. “Let alone come to his church and then his wife’s funeral and pretend to be his friend.”

  “Weren’t you doing the same?”

  “I … uh … no!”

  “That wasn’t you weeping in the shadows while Cyprian’s second wife burned in the flames?”

  She started toward the path. “I don’t have to listen to—”

  He snagged her arm. “There’s obviously been a little misunderstanding between us. I want to clear it up before someone gets hurt.”

  “So you decided to assault me?”

  “Assault is an ugly word. Persuade fits my purposes far better.”

  “Persuade me to do what? Forget what a snake in the grass you are? Good luck.”

  “I’m sure we can come to a workable agreement.”

  “Agreement?” Anger pent up for the past six years spewed forth. She hadn’t liked him from the beginning. Cyprian had tried to convince her otherwise, but she should have followed her gut. “It was you who told Aspasius when and where Ruth and I would be that day the soldiers captured us in the market, wasn’t it.” Lisbeth poked his shoulder. “We were the bait to draw Caecilianus and Cyprian out, weren’t we.”

  “Speculation at its worst.” Felicissimus chuckled. “Difficult theory to prove at best.”

  “I saw you leave Aspasius’s palace.” Lisbeth felt her voice go up a notch.

  “You saw a loyal Christian doing his part to bridge the gap between his Lord and his sovereign,” Felicissimus countered.

  “Don’t think you can claim you were there trying to end persecution. Do you think I’m an idiot? You bragged about becoming the rightful bishop of Carthage!”

  “Could it be possible that what you thought you heard was distorted by your overwrought emotions of the day? You have no idea what I’ve done to save Cyprian’s life.”

  “No one would believe you.”

  “Oh, I think the church will.”

  “I don’t know what you’re up to or what you possibly hope to gain by taking over the church, but I know what I saw. And I plan to tell Cyprian.”

  “Well, now, that’s the very reason I called our little meeting. I find your presence in Cyprian’s home as surprising as you find mine.” He leaned in. “I think there are those who would find it equally as disturbing to know you are not where you belong.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Merely reminding you.”

  “Of what? How despicable you are?”

  The gloating smile in his voice made her cringe. “You’re still officially the property of Aspasius Paternus.” He had her there. He knew it. And the fact that she could tell he intended to use this piece of information drew her up short.

  “So?”

  He rubbed his palms together. “Since you have the most to lose, I think it’ll make this situation simple.”

  “What do you want?”

  “You forget what you saw in the palace of the proconsul, and I’ll forget who I’ve seen in this house. Cyprian, you, your bewitching mother, and, most important of all, your beautiful little daughter.”

  Terror prickled Lisbeth’s skin. “What do you know about Maggie?”

  “I inquired around after your little search party set out. Word is how closely your little jewel resembles the exiled patrician evading justice … Christian to the core, dense as a gravestone, and yellow as a chicken egg.”

  She lunged for his throat. “Leave Maggie out of this!”

  He pried her hands loose with a chuckle. “So can I assume we have a deal?”

  “What about Cyprian?” Her entire body was shaking. “How do I know you won’t turn him over to Aspasius just to get him out of your way?”

  “You don’t.” Felicissimus laughed. “What you do know is that I obviously lack your sentimentality. Therefore, the best thing for you to do is tread very carefully and pray your husband never suspects a thing.”

  37

  IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM, unchecked herds can multiply and overwhelm their habitat. Disease is nature’s way of eliminating the weak and less desirable. If plagues were meant to winnow the chaff from humanity, how did snakes like Felicissimus continue to thrive?

  Lisbeth watched the slave trader slither into the shadows. How could someone who called himself a Christian act with such malice? She swiped angry tears from her cheeks. What was she going to do? Protecting Maggie meant she could say nothing. Saving Cyprian required she tell him everything. How could she do both at the same time and not get someone killed?

  Still shaking from her unexpected encounter, Lisbeth prayed for wisdom as she stepped into the warmth of the barn. In the dim light her heightened senses worked to place the low, mournful sounds of someone wrestling with a huge sorrow. Once her eyes adjusted she spotted her husband standing before the stall of one of his father’s prize Arabians. His face was buried in its mane, and his shoulders were shaking as he emptied his grief.

  Of course, he’d loved Ruth and their child. He was a man capable of generosity beyond comprehension, a generosity that she prayed could somehow still include her once she told him what she knew.

  She let out a slow, nervous breath. “I thought I’d find you here.”

  Startled, Cyprian jerked around. Moonlight silhouetted the lean lines of his body. “Then you’ve spoken with Pontius?”

  “No. Why?”

  “I sent him to look for you. He’s going to help you take our daughter far from this trouble.” His dull-edged pain sliced through her.

  “Maggie and I aren’t going anywhere until we talk.” This conversation would have been so much easier before her encounter with Felicissimus robbed her of the luxury of transparency. “You deserve to know everything.” She prayed her secret agreement with the slave trader hadn’t tainted her voice.

  “So if I let you finally speak your mind, you’ll take Maggie to safety?” Cyprian’s eyes held hers.

  Lisbeth felt a constriction in her chest. “If that is what you want.” Her hand went to her pocket, where she’d stuffed the carefully folded paragraph describing the separation of Cyprian’s head from his shoulders. Was her job here double in purpose? Save Cyprian from those wishing him dead, and save him from throwing away a chance for their family to be together?

  “This could take a while.” She nodded toward the empty hay cart. “Mind if we sit?”

  Cyprian’s gaze danced between her and the wagon. He’d been through so much in the past twenty-four hours, and the strain of it all showed in his tightened jaw. How she wanted to touch him. To take some of his burden on herself. Instead she waited, keeping her quickened breaths shallow and the skirmish she’d just had with ­Felicissimus buried deeply.

  Cyprian let out a reluctant breath, placed his hands on her waist, and lifted her onto the cart. Heat spread from beneath the span of his touch and ignited a fire in her belly. For what seemed like ages they stared into each other’s eyes. His face, serious and determined, was inches from hers. So close she could have kissed the tear-streaked smudge above his right dimple.

  Memories of him carrying her across the threshold on their wedding night rose from the ghostly traces of smoke lingering on his skin. Much like Ruth and Cyprian’s marriage, theirs had also been a marriage of convenience neither of them had wanted. But both had agreed the arrangement was necessary to accomplish the greater good. The plan had been simple. Defeat Aspasius. In doing so, Cyprian would save Carthage and the church, and she would save Mama and Laurentius. Once each got what they wanted, they would shake hands, part company, and go their separate ways. Except things hadn’t worked out quite that way. They had not defeated Aspasius. Neither had gotten what they wanted. And parting company wasn’t an option for two people who’d unexpectedly fallen in love.

  Lisbeth remembered standing in the middle of their honeymoon suite simultaneously searching for a way out an
d desperately clinging to this man. Similar conflicting messages plagued her now. She wanted to fall into Cyprian’s arms and tell him about Felicissimus and his treachery. To be totally honest for the first time since her arrival. But for Maggie’s sake, she had to stick to the facts in the history books.

  “What is it that you must tell me?” Cyprian pulled back and stared directly at her.

  She tore her gaze from his and forced her mind to concentrate on the controlled and methodical chewing of the midnight-­colored horse emptying the feeding trough.

  He seated himself beside her. “The time is short.” His leg lightly brushed hers.

  Lisbeth felt tiny hairs rise beneath the friction of his close proximity. Sparks, hot and jagged, swept through the dry tinder of her body. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean it’s best if you and Maggie travel to the cisterns in the dark.”

  Something about the way he hesitated didn’t feel right. Maybe he was having second thoughts on sending her home.

  She took a hopeful breath. “A few weeks ago, while I was still back in my time, a college girl from Dallas went to Africa on a mission trip with her church. She came home feeling like she had a cold. What she didn’t know was that she had contracted measles. The girl, full of the invincibility of youth, blew off her mother’s suggestion to spend a little time in bed. Instead she went to a church picnic. In less than an hour, this one carrier managed to infect every susceptible person there, including a young mother who unknowingly then took her family and the measles to Disney World.”

  “Disney World?”

  “Uh, a big carnival.” From the puzzled look on Cyprian’s face, he was out of the habit of trying to comprehend her strange vernacular and the unbelievable things of her world, but he wasn’t totally opposed to dusting off his rusty curiosity. “You know … silly shows, rides, lots of junk food?”

  “Like the Festival of Lupercalia?” His sincerity elicited her first genuine laughter since her return. His brows crinkled, but his lips smiled at her. “Why is my question funny?”

  “Modern theme parks don’t usually have naked priests running around waving strips of goatskin, but I’ve heard that during spring break the crowds can be as crazy as a Roman holiday. Not to mention, places like Disney are always crazy expensive. I was saving up to take Maggie, but we came here instead.”

  “Maggie,” he said softly. “You’ve done a fine job raising our daughter.”

  Lisbeth choked back tears. “If Maggie grows up to be half the person her father is, I will count my work as a parental success.” She wanted to throw her arms around his neck but reined in the urge and quickly returned her hands to her lap.

  “What does a carnival have to do with me?”

  “Right. Like I was saying, measles have the remarkable ability to find the susceptible. Without vaccinations, herd immunity drops. When the moat around the castle dries up, the infection can spread unchecked, leaping from host to host like a forest fire. There have been numerous outbreaks throughout the centuries. Some have even caused significant loss of human life. If we could stop measles now, think of all the lives we’d save in the future.”

  “So let me see if I have this straight.” Sarcasm sharpened ­Cyprian’s voice. “You not only know the past, but now you are claiming you can also predict your own future?” His eyes narrowed. “So you came back for the measles?”

  “No.” Lisbeth reached for his hand. “I came back for you.”

  He did not pull away, as she half expected him to do. “Maggie told me.”

  “She did? When?”

  “One night while I tucked her in … before Ruth died.” The sadness in his voice hung between them like a black curtain. They sat in silence, staring straight ahead, neither of them willing to pull back the veil and expose the depths of the other’s grief.

  After a few minutes, Lisbeth let out a slow breath and asked, “Do you want to come back with us?”

  Cyprian lifted his eyes to hers. “I don’t want to be separated from you ever again, but I can’t go to your world and you can’t stay here.”

  “Why not?”

  He placed his straightened index finger over her lips. “For the second time in my life I have buried a wife.” His feather-light touch burned with the intensity of the funeral pyre. “First you. And now Ruth.” He removed his finger and moved in so close his breath became hers. “I cannot bear the thought of burying you again. And if you stay, that very well could happen.”

  She stared straight into his eyes, unwilling to let him see how frightened it made her to think she might have lost him forever.

  When he finally spoke, it was with a surprising calm. “I know with absolute certainty that there is a spear, a sword, and an executioner waiting for me.”

  Lisbeth gasped. “How do you know about … that?”

  “Dreams.” He raked his hands through his hair and stood, pacing. “The same one. Every night since my exile to Curubis. I will not allow you or Maggie to suffer my fate.”

  “God warned you that everything was going to go south here, and still you came back?”

  He cocked one dark brow inquisitively. “Go south?”

  “Turn ugly. Fall apart. End in tragedy.”

  The corner of his lip rose in a half smile. He took a step toward her. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “To keep everything from going south, as you say.” He stepped so close his waist brushed her knees. His hand tilted her chin to his. “You went home and poked through your father’s history books, didn’t you?”

  She was trapped between his solid chest and her flimsy plan. “Maybe.”

  “I don’t know what you found, but I’m betting you discovered something so horrible in my future that you could not stay away.”

  Lisbeth’s insides quivered, and tears gathered behind the curtain of her lashes. She needed his strength. His comfort. Hers was all used up. Did he want her as badly as she wanted to tell him everything and fall into his arms? Or was he too hurt and angry to feel the undeniable arch of her body, the magnetic draw pulling her toward him? She swallowed, unable to speak.

  His breath, no more than a whisper, warmed her cheek. “And even though the historical accounts warned that things would end badly for me, you came back anyway?”

  Lisbeth’s chin trembled. Hot tears spilled onto her cheeks. “How did you know?”

  He cupped her face with his hands. “I know you.” He slowly dragged the pads of his thumbs over the wet streaks on her cheeks. He hovered over her, so close she could smell the musky scent of him, the intoxicating combination of strength and leather sealed deep within her sensory memory of their first meeting. “And I can think of no other reason you would risk our daughter’s life.”

  A shiver rippled over her body. Her gaze dove into the desire swimming in his, and she felt herself being sucked into a vortex of tingling emotions. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  His thumb moved from her cheek and gently caressed the outline of her mouth. “Lisbeth …” Before she could answer, he lifted her chin and brought his lips to hers. Lightly at first, as if searching for familiar ground. Then again. The stubble around his mouth grazed her nose and sent her already heightened senses pulsing through her body. He tasted of tears and funeral smoke. He hauled her up against him. His lips pressed harder. Lisbeth could feel his heart beating beneath his tunic.

  He pulled back but did not raise his gaze to hers. Instead he focused on his fingers gently tracing the curve of her collarbone before running along the slope of her neck and nudging her face up. When their eyes met, he smiled at her, and Lisbeth caught a glimpse of the man she remembered. A man capable of sweeping her into a time and place of their own making, a world where only their love existed.

  Lisbeth twined her arms around his neck and drew him close. He growled low in his throat, and they fell back on the flatbed of the cart, his mouth fiery on hers. Cyprian’s weight bore down ha
rd on her. She could barely breathe, and she didn’t care. She was his wife, and she was in his arms.

  Suddenly, Cyprian let her go and broke away. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have …” He quickly pushed himself off of her and stood.

  Lisbeth sat up. “Why?”

  His breaths were coming in short, rapid spurts. He straightened his shoulders and brushed the straw from his tunic. “I can no longer think only of my own needs.”

  “What?” She could feel her gown sliding down her chest, exposing her heart. “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t you see, Lisbeth? There is no one else who can do what the Lord needs done. He’s called me for such a time as this.”

  He was choosing the path that would make him a martyr. How could she compete with such a noble undertaking?

  Lisbeth felt as if she were coming apart inside. Bricks of control, ones she thought solidly cemented into place, crumbled. “What are you planning?”

  “To do everything I can before Aspasius stops me.”

  “Let me help.”

  He shook his head. “Go home, Lisbeth.”

  38

  THE MOON FADED FROM the sky while Barek waited for the embers to lose their red-hot glow. In the chilly, blue-gray of dawn, he approached his mother’s burned-out funeral pyre. The sea air was heavy with the acrid scent of smoldering wood and incinerated flesh and bones. Cyprian had counted the chore complete and taken his leave after the wooden altar crumbled.

  For Barek, the task of properly laying his mother to rest was just beginning. Twice he had failed to protect his mother in this life. He would not fail to keep her safe in the next.

  Barek had prepared the bottom of an empty crock with a splash of goat’s milk, half a chalice of Cyprian’s finest wine, and the entire bottle of his mother’s favorite perfume. Fighting nausea, he crouched before the mound of debris and set the crock beside his feet. He gently began to shovel bits of ash and bone fragments into the urn. The first shovelful hit the liquid mixture with a thunk. Each blackened scoop added thereafter was more than a painful reminder of his family’s destruction; it was the end of life as he knew it. No longer was he bound to the one God of his parents or their needy little band of believers. He would honor their religious choices by placing his mother’s remains beside those of his father, but then he would be done with their God. What would become of him after he completed this last chore for his mother was an itch he couldn’t seem to scratch.