Praetorian Series [3] A Hunter and His Legion

by Edward Crichton

  He smiled at me but I glared at him, and he got the message. Gathering his things he rose to his feet and started for the exit, but turned back to Helena for one last bit of advice.

  “Remember to keep your liquids up, Helena,” he advised, “and don’t exert yourself but stay active if you can. I’m sorry to say it, but it’s going to get harder before it gets easier.”

  “Thanks, Doctor,” she said.

  He nodded and left, leaving the two of us alone. Slowly, I looked at her and she looked at me, and we simply stared at one another for a while before she dropped her chin and looked at her shoulder, clearly only one thing on her mind.

  “Jacob, how did you find the orb?”

  I too dropped my eyes to her shoulder. “How long have you known?”

  “Only after leaving Camulodunum, remember? I found it in your footlocker.”

  I didn’t remember.

  “I didn’t go looking for it, Helena!” I said hastily, perhaps defensively. “I didn’t. It found me. It was just there one morning on our way to Alexandria, and when it was, I… I kept it. I didn’t even realize what I was doing, but it was with me this whole time. That I remember now. It was in my footlocker, it…”

  “Shh…” Helena breathed, reaching out to pull my head against her shoulder. “I believe you.”

  “There’s so much I can’t remember about the last few months, Helena,” I said, resting my head against her shoulder and squeezing my eyes shut as though that would help force the memories to return. “I can see images, things like fire and people tied up and Penelope…”

  “Don’t think about it, Jacob,” Helena soothed as she held me.

  I reached up and grabbed her shirt near her other shoulder, and clung to it desperately. “I’m so sorry, Helena. I can’t believe I let it happen. It all felt so right and it made me feel so good. I couldn’t help it. I…”

  She interrupted me by lifting my chin up with a finger. “No more apologies, Jacob. I don’t need them. I don’t want them. I’m the one who should be apologizing to you. I should have…”

  “No!” I nearly yelled as I pulled away from her embrace to stare at her intently. “Promise me if I ever fall under the orb’s influence again that you’ll stay away from me. As far away as possible! Don’t confront me! Don’t even come near me! It make me… makes me dangerous! You can’t possibly understand, but I’m not sure I wouldn’t have hurt you had you tried to intervene before.”

  “But, Jacob…”

  “No, Helena! If it happens again, stay away. You have to! Do it for me.”

  Reluctantly, she nodded. “I’m still sorry.”

  “I understand. Completely. But you had the little guy to think about, and you did the right thing. My mom always told me that parenthood is all about sacrifice, doing what’s best for the baby, even if it hurts you. You protected him, and I am so happy that you did.” I paused and smiled. “I always knew you’d be a good mom.”

  She cocked her head to the side and reached up to stroke my hair. “Thanks you, Jacob. That means a lot. And I have to admit, such parental insightfulness is kind of a turn on…”

  I smiled. “Oh, yeah? So where would you like me to start?”

  I placed my hand against her bare thigh and stroked it lightly, but she laughed and pushed it away. “I’m hardly in the mood for that, Lieutenant Hunter! Look at me! I’m hideous!”

  “You’re beautiful.”

  She looked genuinely happy at my comment, and reached out to cup my cheek with a hand. “I suppose there’s hope for you yet, Jacob Hunter, but if you really want to impress me, you can start by getting me another pillow. My back is killing me!”

  I chuckled. “Well that I can do. Always was good at finding things.”

  She offered me a sly smile. “Oh, you certainly were, but there will be time enough to see if you’ve still got it later.”

  I smirked and found the pillow she needed, and placed it behind her head, noticing her short, disheveled hair again and found myself staring.

  Helena noticed my attention. “Problem?”

  “It’s just that your hair is…”

  “I didn’t necessarily want to do it, Jacob.”

  I sighed. No, she probably hadn’t.

  “It’s just that it…” she gave me a look as I started, so I rethought my words. “No, it looks good. Really. Like an 80s pop star or something. It’s very sexy.”

  She chuckled. “Hope indeed.”

  I pumped a fist in the air lightly in triumph, but couldn’t think of anything else to say, although I was content not to say anything at all so that I could simply enjoy the moment. But then a sudden and urgent thought entered my brain, one so dire I nearly shouted at Helena as I spoke.

  “Wait! We need to pick a name!”

  She belted out a quick laugh, probably surprised by the randomness of my comment. “I did have a few in…”

  “Augustus!”

  “Uh… no.”

  “Julius!”

  “No…”

  “Galba?”

  “Really, Jacob?”

  “What about Jacob?”

  “Well, it was on my list…”

  “Oh… I got it! What about Romulus Remus van Strauss Hunter! It’s got a ring to it…”

  “Jacob…”

  “How about…”

  ***

  “Well you look as pleased as peaches this morning, Mister,” Santino said from beside me.

  I glanced to my right and over at my friend as the two of us rode side by side, unsurprised to notice that there was a smile on his face. I felt like returning it, but didn’t want to give him the acknowledgment that he was in fact quite right.

  I was as pleased as peaches this morning.

  Emotions still whirled within me, anger, guilt, and shame all still there and many more, but I no longer felt alienated and lonely, nor did I feel unwanted or hated by those who called me their friend or from those who loved me. I felt my old, self-deprecating, bearing-the-world-on-my-shoulders self again, but that was okay, because that’s who I was, and that also meant I had the love and friendship that defined me as well. Everyone carried negativity around with them, perhaps me more than many others, but that was a burden all of humanity shared. It was only by the ways we dealt with those emotions that gave us our own unique individuality – that is, unless under the influence of the orb.

  I’d had a lot of time to think about it last night, and I was certain I understood it now.

  It was a simple drug, one that seemed to work by taking all of a person’s pain, his anger, his darkness, and all of his unrealized negative intentions for use as fuel to power the body’s impulses. Personal values were rendered moot, replaced with a sense of confidence and superiority, but at a grave risk. With the loss of inhibitions came the loss of good judgment, and the orb only magnified that loss, replacing clear headed thinking with something much worse.

  No one had yet told me what I’d done while under the orb’s influence, but I knew it hadn’t been good. In fact, I knew I’d done horrible things, but the entire experience had given me perspective. Carrying around all my negativity was a part of who I was. It defined me as equally as my positive attributes did, but it was through the help of friends and loved ones that those issues could be dealt with and contained, something made all the more clear to me after spending the entire night with Helena, to whom I felt closer than any other person throughout my entire life, a bond made all the more inseparable by her inability to abandon me even after everything I had done. No person really deserved that kind of love, but I would take it and hold onto it for as long as I possibly could.

  That still did not explain the orb’s other apparent ability to drive men insane, but I figure such a stage would have only been just around the corner had I not been parted from it.

  “Don’t give him a hard time, John,” Artie said from my other side. “He’s been through a lot.”

  “He’s been through a lot?” Santino demanded. “He’s
been through a lot?? I was the one who had to deal with a best friend who’d gone crazy! Me! Not him!”

  “And I’m just so sorry to have let that happen,” I said, happier than I could possibly describe just by being here with them.

  “You’d damn well better be,” Santino responded, but then he sighed and seemed to grow sad.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Oh, it’s nothing,” he answered, clearly not in a mood to talk about it until a half second later when he was clearly in the mood to do just that. “It’s just that you weren’t any fun when you were crazy and Helena’s pregnancy has taken all the fun out of my jokes.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “There’s just no fun in the sexual innuendoes anymore, man! Kinda gross actually, but that was my thing!”

  “Yeah,” I said gratingly. “I remember.”

  “It’s just not funny anymore when I say something that references Helena and…”

  “Shut it, John!” Artie scolded. “You shouldn’t be thinking about those things anyway. Ever! You should be thinking about m…”

  Artie’s voice trailed off and I snapped my head to the left to see what it was that had kept her from finishing. She seemed fine but her eyes were looking past me and toward Santino. I snapped my head around but found my friend staring off into the distance, not paying either one of us any mind. I eyed him suspiciously before turning back to Artie.

  “Mind finishing that thought?” I asked.

  She flushed red. “Um, no, not really.”

  “Uh-huh…” I said, giving her an equally uncertain look. “That’s what I thought.”

  She smiled at me awkwardly but didn’t turn to face me, settling instead with simply glancing at me out of the corner of her eyes. I sighed but realized that if the two of them were messing around there was little I could do about it. At least they had the common decency to try and keep it from me.

  “I can’t believe I’m actually saying this,” I said, “but I think I’d rather go ride with Agrippina for a while.”

  “Oh, Agrippina,” Santino said lustfully. “How I cherish those memor…”

  He too cut himself off midsentence, but instead of wasting time glancing at him first, I looked to Artie instead, but she didn’t seem even the least bit curious about what he’d said. Slowly, I turned back to Santino, who was also looking away, inspecting a dead branch from a tree as he rode by.

  I looked away from them both, frowned, and noticed Boudicca riding silently in front of us beside Archer. She hadn’t understood a word of our conversation, but she didn’t seem to mind either. She simply rode in silent contemplation, content with simply being here, but not needing to get involved. She was my stalwart protector it seemed, and while I didn’t think I needed her, I appreciated the gesture.

  Besides, Wang wasn’t here, so she was her usual dour self when he wasn’t around.

  I shook my head and pressed Felix to surge past them all. He picked up speed and I found myself approaching Agrippina’s position near the head of our tiny marching formation. Only thirty individuals had set forth from the camp an hour ago, two hours after dawn, including Archer, Vincent, Santino, Artie, Boudicca, myself, Agrippina, and the rest of our party consisted of her Praetorians. Agrippina hadn’t indicated where we were going, only that it wasn’t far and that it was of vital importance. In fact, she’d been rather cryptic about the whole thing, but I supposed I couldn’t blame her for being just as distrusting of us as we were of her. Our temporary partnership was of mutual interest to both parties, although I wasn’t sure what exactly she hoped to get out of it yet.

  As I rode up to her position, I thought of a dozen different questions to ask her, but foremost in my mine was the notion that finally, after months of growing fuzziness, I could suddenly think clearly again. As we left the orb behind us, I could feel its presence less and less, and while I still felt a pang of longing for it, I wasn’t nearly as overwhelmed by it as I once was. Its presence persisted within me, a distant reminder of its power and potential, but for now it was, literally, out of sight and out of mind.

  Felix snorted obnoxiously, causing a thick cloud of mist to dissipate around me as I passed through it, but also serving to alert Agrippina of our approach. She twisted her head just slightly, and while I knew she couldn’t yet see us, the slim smile tugging at her lips suggested she knew exactly who was approaching.

  “Come for questions, Jacob?”

  I grunted silently under the noise of Felix’s stomping feet as I came up alongside Agrippina. She rode a startlingly white mare of ample size, its blank coat blending in with the snow so well that Agrippina seemed to float in midair. She wore heavy robes that cascaded down her body in numerous, thick layers, but I could see that she had chosen to wear trousers as well.

  “If you don’t mind,” I answered.

  She lowered her chin. “I suppose you deserve them.”

  “Do I?”

  “You do,” she said, lifting her head. “You may be the source of a great many negative things, but I am willing to accept that they were done inadvertently and out of your control, but that is why I have an inkling that your presence is essential to the task ahead.”

  “What task?” I asked, almost pleading for answers. “Where exactly are we? And how did you even end up here? How is it that I’m on the most aimless, directionless journey of my life, and yet I end up bumping into you of all people?”

  She smiled. “It seems pertinent to answer your third question first.”

  I jerked my head at her impatiently, prompting her to continue.

  She looked away, almost distractedly. “Quite simply, Britain was always where I intended to go.”

  I looked at her suspiciously. “Why?”

  “I will get to that,” she replied, “but first, after the incident between us in Syria, I led my Praetorians north to deal with the Parthian insurrection. Our reports indicated they were quite ready to invade Anatolia and push through Byzantium and into the West, but such claims were rather farfetched. One particular upstart princeling had decided that Rome was in a more vulnerable state than reality reflected, and raised a rather sizable force against us, but when facing my Praetorians on the field of battle, with Vespasian having arrived to lead them, most turned and ran. The rest held their ground, but I was able to… personally convince their general to head back to Parthia and never raise arms against Rome again.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered. “Convinced?”

  She shrugged. “I can be quite convincing at times, can I not, Jacob?”

  I gulped and didn’t answering, knowing she certainly could be.

  “What happened to Vespasian?” I asked, curious about the man.

  “He returned to Germany where I left a sizable portion of my Praetorian force to help with hostilities.”

  “He didn’t want to come here? With you?”

  “No. What cause would he have?”

  “No cause, I guess,” I said quickly to cover my suspicious tone. “But that doesn’t answer why you came to Britain.”

  “Most astute of you, Jacob,” she said and I forced myself not to roll my eyes. “As I was saying, the Parthian threat was dealt with quickly, so I took my Praetorians west almost immediately. There were still the Germans to deal with, and Gaul and Iberia were acting recalcitrant as well, but as we arrived in Dalmatia, one of my spies returned from Alexandria.”

  I grimaced at the memory and immediately rubbed my leg where the arrow had hit me when chasing Agrippina’s ninjas to the coast. She noticed my action and pointed at my leg.

  “They reported wounding one of you.”

  “They sure did,” I said, the memory of my warped vision surfacing. “I’ve had worse, but it still hurts sometimes.”

  Agrippina continued to look at my leg for a moment before she settled back on her horse and jerked herself forward in a manner that suggested she was exceptionally frustrated with something.

  “By the gods, Jacob, I do not wish for this feud
between us to continue! There has already been too much death and pain. My feelings, as I explained them to you last night, still ring true, but I have thought long on you and those with you for many months, and I truthfully do wish to end hostilities between us.”

  “For just how many months have you been thinking about it?” I asked. “Because you seemed quite content to torture and murder me the last time we met.”

  She looked angry for a moment but then seemed to push it away, but not easily. “I am not without my faults; I more than anyone understand this character deficit. I am quick to anger and I am not averse to violence with permanent ramifications, but such actions have begun to haunt even me in recent…”

  “Does Varus’ death haunt you?” I snapped. “Because it haunts the hell out of me!”

  “It does,” she admitted quickly, “but I was not without reason in killing him. He had committed treason and was an enemy of the state. That, and I’d learned he had been able to manipulate the orb and was unwilling to use it in a way that aided me. Again, treason alone may have not been reason enough to have him killed, but…”

  She trailed off and I understood.

  It wasn’t that I understood her reasoning, but that I understood that she’d simply had him killed because she was an angry, venomous bitch. But as our conversation moved to revolve around the orb, I couldn’t understand why it hadn’t affected her when she’d had two of them? It had affected both Claudius and Caligula, and was apparently affecting me, so why not her?

  I cleared my head, hoping that I might find an answer to that question soon.

  I turned back to her. “Treason?”

  She didn’t immediately answer, but when she turned to meet my eye, her face almost looked apologetic. “My Praetorians found the note he’d left telling you to come to Britain.”

  “So that’s how you knew,” I surmised stupidly, as if the answer hadn’t been obvious all along.

  “Yes.”

  “But how did you end up here?” I asked, gesturing out to the bare trees we rode between. It wasn’t a thick forest, but it was still the densest one we’d encountered in days.