"That gives us time to appreciate some excellent wine ... an exploratory sip or two. I don't suppose you'd have any objections to that?"
I grinned and bowed to him, "None worth mentioning," I said, "and I speak as a new man — clean, pampered and perfumed. A draught of good wine would be the final touch."
He laughed and led me through two massive, magnificent doors of polished oak into the triclinium, the formal dining room of the villa, where two stone jugs of wine from Gaul — the one a deep, purple red from the south and the other a pale, golden yellow nectar from the central lands — awaited our attention. The red had been slightly cooled and the yellow deeply chilled. I chose the latter and it was wondrous — smooth and very slightly sweet. Veronica joined us within minutes and drank some wine with us, sharing our enjoyment of the late afternoon sunlight. The household servants were evidently working smoothly, since there was neither sound nor sight of the children.
The declining sun threw long beams of golden light from the open shutters across the spacious room to spill in rectangles on the polished wooden floor and the solid, comfortable-looking furnishings, and I was conscious of a deep-seated feeling of well-being. I saw, without thinking about it, that four places had been set at the large, high table, and as I accepted a second cup of the delightful wine from Veronica, I ran my hands absently but admiringly over the carved, lustrous surface of one of the high-backed, cushioned chairs that flanked the table.
Quintus noticed my gesture and smiled. "You like those?" There was no mistaking the inflection of pride in his voice.
I nodded in response, looking more closely at the carving of the chair's frame. "Yes," I said. "They're magnificent. The man who carved these was a genius."
Veronica's laugh was like the sound of a harp. "No," she cried, "the man who carved those is a man of his time, who could never have endured lying supine to eat his meals as people did in the old days. He is a man who likes to sit up when he eats, believing it aids digestion when he keeps his back straight and his head erect. And you have made a lifelong friend of him with that remark. My husband made those and carved them himself."
I was astonished and made no attempt to hide it. "Really? You made these, Quintus?"
He nodded, his grin widening. "I did. I love working with wood. It's my favourite way of passing time. Most of my friends think I'm strange."
I toasted him with my upraised cup. "Here's one who doesn't. I know exactly what you mean, because my mind works the same way. My passion's for metal. Mainly iron, but over the past few years I've started to work with silver, too. It demands a whole different set of skills, but it rewards one's efforts in a way iron seldom does. Silver has a beauty that is unique."
We spent the next several minutes discussing craftsmanship. I learned that Quintus had literally made the entire room, from floors to doors, with his own hands. The doors were spectacular, each made from two massive, tongued and grooved planks of solid oak. On this side, facing into the room, they had been meticulously carved into panels, six to a door, depicting the labours of Hercules. The other side was plain, polished oak, ornamented only by handles. I had no need to pretend to be awed by the workmanship here as I pushed the doors open and closed, delighting in the ease with which the mighty weight of them was hinged.
I declined a third cup of wine before dinner and excused myself in order to go to my room and change. It had been a long time since I had met anyone with whom I felt so much at ease as these two, and I found myself whistling as I changed into my best clothes. I checked my chin for stubble, ran my fingertips through my short-cropped hair to make sure that it was dry and behaving as it should, and then, still whistling under my breath, made my way back directly to rejoin my host and hostess.
I had barely begun to make my way down the stairway from the bedchambers on the second floor when I became aware of what I can only describe now as a blueness. There are moments in everyone's life, usually spontaneous, seldom planned, that are seminal. In a brief flash of time, events occur that change the status quo, immediately and drastically, forever. One of those moments had overtaken me and overwhelmed me before I had time even to realize that anything untoward was happening.
I have tried for years to remember the exact sequence of events, actions and reactions that happened to me in the few moments that followed there on that stairway, but have never been able to reconstruct my own thoughts clearly, or my reactions to what I thought I saw.
I remember sensing a blueness; it seemed to me that the entire wall below me and ahead of me had taken on a bluish tinge, almost as though a blue light were flickering nearby. I believe I had even turned my head slightly, looking for the source of the effect, before I became aware of the woman who was walking along the hallway below. Her back was towards me and she was within three or four steps of the open doors to the triclinium. I had an instantaneous and overpowering impression of eerie, almost frightening familiarity. I saw long, straight black hair, a tall, graceful form in a blue robe and a gliding style of walk that seemed to owe nothing to feet or legs.
I heard a roaring sound in my head, and I know I clutched at the handrail of the stairs for support as her name resounded first in my mind and then in the stillness of the hallway.
'"Cassie?"
She stopped immediately, tilting her head forward slightly, as though listening, before turning back to face me, looking up to where I stood transfixed at the top of the stairs.
"Cassie?" I said again, my voice emerging this time as a croak. She did not speak, made no move. With a conscious effort of will, I began to move down the stairs towards her.
I remember thinking she looked far younger than she ought to, and not at all matronly. And then, as I approached her, I realized that she was not. Cassie. She was a complete stranger with only a slight resemblance to the girl I had known so many years before. She had the same black hair and large blue eyes, and she wore the same colour that Cassie had worn. But this woman was not Cassie. I stopped at the foot of the stairs and looked at her, and I knew that Cassie had always stayed a young girl in my mind and in my heart. This entrancing creature who faced me in silence was a woman in every sense of the word, and her beauty brought my heart up into my throat. I shook my head, whether to dismiss the last, lingering thoughts of poor Cassie or to begin an apology for having mistaken her, I do not know, but as I did so she began to walk towards me.
As she moved, I was aware again of multiple, simultaneous impressions of height, dignity, effortless motion, breath-taking beauty and blueness. I saw her as a vision, tall and slim, self-possessed and lovely. She walked with her head high and erect, her back held straight so that the fullness and thrust of her breasts were apparent even beneath the dark blue stola she wore over the long, paler-blue draperies of her gown. Her clothes brought out the brilliant blue of her eyes, even in the shadowed gloom of the passageway, so that they seemed to blaze at me above the swellings of wide, high cheekbones. Long, dark hair, innocent of curl or artificial trickery, fell in straight cascades to frame her face and then swept back over her shoulders to hang behind her.
I had no idea who she was, but I knew that she was the woman I wanted above all others. My thoughts raced so that by the time she had moved two paces closer to me I had decided that she must be one of Veronica's personal servants, although I had never seen or heard of a serving woman so beautiful. It didn't matter, anyway. Mistress or servant, she was magnificent. Her beauty, mobility and dignity deserved my homage. I clenched my hand involuntarily over my breast in a military salute and bowed to her, moving backwards and away from her, my eyes cast down as she approached me. I saw the tips of her sandalled feet come up and then stop directly in front of me. In an agonized silence that seemed to stretch forever, I decided that I had to straighten up and look her in the eyes.
When I did so, I found her to be far more lovely than I had thought from a distance. The blue of her eyes was painfully deep and the kindness and welcoming warmth of her smile dried up my mouth. Sh
e spoke my name, and I marvelled, not at her knowledge of my name but at the texture and the timbre of her voice, warm and soft and mellow and deeper than I would have expected. She reached out and took both of my wrists in her hands, and the only things in my world were her face and the warmth and softness of her hands.
"Luceiia, you're here! What took you so long?" Veronica's voice seemed to come from a great distance, and her words completed my confusion. I could see her standing in the open doorway of the dining room, and she was obviously speaking to the woman who was holding my wrists. But she had called her Luceiia! Could this be Luceiia Britannicus? The woman Quintus Varo had described as unwomanly? Unfeminine?
She ignored Veronica's comment and kept her eyes and her smile directed full upon me. "Welcome," she said. "We thought you might never come to our western land.
I was debating with myself as to whether or not I should have you abducted and brought here, just to have you nearby when Caius comes home."
I swallowed hard and worked my tongue to moisten my mouth. I know I said something banal and stupid, but I have no memory of the words. They must have been appropriate, however, because she released my wrists and walked with me into the dining room, where she embraced Veronica and Quintus. In the ensuing babble of conversation, I had time to collect myself and recover from the astonishing impact she had had on me. Nevertheless, although the memory of that first sight of her is an undying but hectic one, the passage of the next hour or so is a blank in my memory, a blue-tinctured haze of warmth and pleasure.
I know now, from subsequent conversations with both Quintus and Veronica, that my condition was obvious and afforded them great hilarity during dinner, which they graciously concealed. Quintus admitted afterwards that he had been warned by Veronica not to talk of Luceiia's beauty. They had wanted to observe the effect she would have on me if I encountered her with no advance warning.
After dinner, the major-domo of the Varo household broke the spell I was under with an announcement that the fire had been lit in the outer courtyard, and that if we would care to be seated, the entertainment was about to commence.
Quintus thanked him and led the way to a built-in courtyard at the rear of the house. A huge fire was blazing in a pit there, throwing leaping shadows on the walls all around, and about a dozen people, whom I took to be the servants of the household, were sitting quietly in a loose group on one side of the fire-pit, listening to a young man seated on a log in the corner of the courtyard who was tuning some kind of a lyre. We made ourselves comfortable by the fireside and he sang to us for more than an hour, accompanying himself on his instrument. His voice was strong and clean and his songs were all of the beauty of this country we lived in. He could not have chosen a better theme, and he could never have had a more appreciative audience. Quintus Varo surprised me by remaining rapt from start to finish and offering lavish applause and encouragement at the end of every song.
As the lad's voice rose and fell, weaving a spell of beauty around us all, I sat and drank in the flame-washed beauty of the woman who sat across the fire from me. The emotion that was writhing in my breast here was a marvel beyond my experience. No woman, not the Cassie of my youth, not even Phoebe in my hour of greatest need, had ever affected me like this. I had never seen anything to compare with the sweep of those cheekbones, or the perfection of that mouth, or with the mysticism of that face, dappled as it was with firelight.
Eventually, the young man exhausted his fund of songs and was permitted to leave, rewarded with a coin from Quintus and another from me. His departure was the signal for all the other servants to leave, and soon there were only the four of us — Quintus, Veronica, Luceiia and myself— left in the courtyard.
For a few minutes after they had all gone, there was a warm silence broken only by the guttering of the fire. I raised. my eyes to look again at Luceiia, only to find her looking at me. Abashed, I returned my gaze immediately to the fire. When I dared look up again, her eyes were still on me, and she smiled a small, secret smile.
Quintus cleared his throat. "Publius, I cannot remember having spent such an enjoyable evening in many years, but now I am tired and must sleep. You will be leaving in the morning, and before that I want to have my day's work allocated and well in hand. Good night, my friend. Come, Veronica."
I started to rise, but he waved me back to my seat. "No, no! There's no need for you to leave. Stay here and enjoy the fire with Luceiia. Luceiia, you know well enough by this time where your room is. Good night to both of you. Sleep well. We'll see you in the morning, before you leave."
After they had gone, I sat tongue-tied, not daring to look across at Luceiia. It was she who broke the silence.
"Poor Quintus is not very subtle, is he?"
I looked at her then, drinking enough beauty in one look to sustain me until I dared look again. "Subtle? What do you mean?"
"What do I mean?" Her laughter was like the sound of the boy's lyre. "I mean he's being outrageous in his matchmaking."
"Matchmaking?" I heard stridency in my voice and dropped it to a whisper instantly, so that I sounded merely foolish. "Oh. Is he?"
"Well, isn't he? I cannot imagine him leaving me alone with any other man at night under any circumstances."
I swallowed, feeling highly uncomfortable. "I see. Would you rather go to sleep now? I mean, rather than stay here? With me, I mean?" I cursed myself for being a fool, providing her with opportunities to flee.
"No, thank you. I am quite comfortable. This has been a lovely evening. I have no wish to end it yet."
That made me feel better, but the silence fell again, leaden and unbreakable by any effort of mine.
"My name is Luceiia."
I blinked in surprise. "I know." She was smiling strangely. I felt I had missed something. "Why would you say that?"
"What? That my name is Luceiia? Because it is, and I like it, and you have not said it once since we met. Although it seems to me that you called me at first by another name. What was it?"
I cleared my throat nervously. "Cassie," I croaked, then I cleared my throat again. The name sounded strange on my tongue, like one from an ancient tale. Cassie might have been a figure from some dream, a ghostly presage of the woman I saw before me now. "When I first saw you, there in the atrium with your back to me, you reminded me of her. She was someone I knew a very long time ago, when I was just a boy."
"She must have been important to you."
"Yes, and no. I only met her once, one afternoon."
"But you remember her still."
I was growing more confident, coming to terms with the long-held memories of a boy, and gauging them beside the current evaluations of a man. I shook my head, dismissing Luceiia's comment.
"Not really. I recall the feelings she stirred in me, the mood she created. But in my mind she is still fifteen. She's a memory, no more. She had your kind of beauty, dark hair like yours, and she wore blue."
"Were you sorry when you saw I was not she?" This time her eyes were not lifted to meet mine, and I smiled at the top of her head.
"No. Not at all. How could I be? Cassie was a child, and so was I."
There was silence for the space of a few heartbeats, then she said, "It's an unusual name. Cassie."
"Short for Cassiopeiia. I don't even know if that was her real name."
"Cassiopeiia.... It's a beautiful name."
"No more than Luceiia. That is a beautiful name."
She looked up and smiled. "Say it again."
"Luceiia."
She was grinning now. "That's much better. Twice better. Now I feel as if we have been properly introduced." I found myself grinning back at her. "You are a fascinating man, Publius Varrus," she continued. "I feel as if I have known you all my life, and now that we have really met, the feeling has not changed. The only thing I did not know was what you really look like."
"And?"
"And what?"
" Do I look anything like the person you had imagined?"
&
nbsp; She smiled, and there was a teasing mischief there. "Well, now. How should I answer that?" I waited. "I could tell you that I had imagined you to be so handsome that the reality was bound to fall short of my expectations...."
I was not used to playing games of words with women, and my face must have shown some of the insecurity I was feeling, because suddenly the mockery was gone from her smile and her expression was one of total sincerity as she continued.
"Caius talked incessantly of you. It was 'Varrus this' and 'Varrus that' and 'Varrus would have... ' from morning to night, and my brother talks that way of no one else. It is not his way. Naturally, being curious about this paragon of military virtue and solid, straight-thinking values, I used to ask him things about you that might give me some idea of what you looked like. The picture I finally formed of you was almost perfect. I knew that you were tall, broad-shouldered and immensely strong in the arms and body. I knew that your hair was dark brown and cut short in the army style, and that you wore a short beard and moustache. I knew that there was enough grey in your beard and on your head to give you a silvery look from a distance. I knew that you had all of your teeth and that you laughed easily and often. And I knew that you had received a terrible wound in my brother's service that left you crippled, or at least with a permanent limp."
I felt a head-splitting rush of mortification at her casual reference to my crippled state, and then it was replaced by a growing wonder that she was not embarrassed in any way to mention it. She did not even find it worthy of further comment. She accepted it as being part of me and kept right on talking.
"The only thing I did not know, could not know, was the balance of your features, the shape of them, the expressions you would have. So your face was always a blank to me. Until today. Until now."
I got up and placed another log on the dwindling fire, not wishing to lose the sight of her face to the gathering darkness that was crowding in on the dying flames. I had not felt so foolishly juvenile since I had stopped being foolishly juvenile, and I did not want her to stop talking. Her voice was low and pleasantly husky in a way that I had never heard before in a woman. A fountain of sparks jetted up from the fire-pit and I felt several burning pinpricks on my hand. I sat down again across from her, waiting for her to resume speaking, but she was waiting for me. I wanted very badly to ask her if she was pleased with the filled-in blanks, but I would have sat there all night before the courage came to me to voice the words.
[A Dream of Eagles 01] - The Skystone Page 25
