Memento Mori

by Ruth Downie

Neena was already on her feet by the time Tilla arrived to snatch up her wrap from the end of the bed. “I am trusting you to look after Mara and the old centurion,” said Tilla, flinging the wrap around her shoulders. “While I am gone, pray very hard for your master. Pray for us both!”

  64

  Stay braced: feet on one wall, back rammed against the other. Fight it. Don’t let it drag you down there. Don’t think about the air dying in your lungs.

  Air. The inspection hatches. That square opening in the roof—how far back? The force of the water … not so strong now. Stay braced: Edge your way along the tunnel. Keep hold of the pole. Force your arm upward against the flow.

  Weak as a kitten.

  Prod at the roof.

  Solid. No way out.

  This is how it ends. With no chance to say good-bye as your treacherous lungs betray you, sucking in warm black water in desperation.

  Wait—yes! Nothing up above. The inspection hatch! The rope. There was a rope. Find the rope—yes! Hold on. Push against the floor with the pole now … pull up …

  His head banged against the roof of the tunnel and he only just stopped himself gasping in a lungful of warm black water. So near—but the flow was too strong. One more try, then he would let himself go. He longed to go now. Death was a welcome— Pay attention! Feet down; brace against the sides of the tunnel; pray; haul up—

  Dizzy. No strength left.

  This was it.

  Open mouth—draw in—

  Air! Thick, steamy, precious—

  Trembling, Ruso clung onto the slimy rope, straining to keep his face above the surface.

  Gulping in the heavy atmosphere of the shaft while the water below still tugged at his body. Opening one eye: nothing. Opening the other one, blinking to make sure they really were open. Nothing. Just—

  Nothing.

  Only one thing to do now.

  Hold on.

  His sore arm ached. He could feel his pulse throbbing in the wound on his scalp.

  Hold on. The water will go down.

  How long would that take, with him trapped in this suffocating black hole? How long would the air last?

  Don’t think about that. For this moment:

  Hold on.

  His muscles were rivers of pain. His injured arm, pressed against the hard brick of the shaft, felt as though it was being torn apart.

  Hold on.

  No! He had so nearly succumbed to the temptation for a quick rest.

  Hold on.

  For this moment.

  And the next moment.

  And the next.

  Hold on.

  The warmth splashed over his face and into his mouth. He hauled himself higher, trying to spit out the disgusting taste, clamping his stiff hands one by one into new positions and hooking the rope around one leg. He should have done this before; the current was not pulling as strongly at his legs up here.

  But his face was no clearer. It didn’t make sense.

  Yes it did. But not a sense he wanted. The water was rising to fill the shaft, and the shaft was not very high.

  What was it Catus had told Tilla about the river flooding back up the drain and into the bath? Here, under the ground, how far below the bath level was he trapped? How far below ground?

  “Help!”

  It sounded feeble even to him. He peered upward, praying for some chink of light to appear, but there was nothing. He hauled himself up again. Even if he could float up, what would happen if the water rose to the top? There must be something substantial covering the opening. He could bang the pole on the— No, the pole had gone. He had no idea when. And now his head brushed against whatever was covering the top of the shaft. One hand to push against it: nothing. The stone slab was unyielding. He was only succeeding in pushing himself back down.

  “Help me!”

  No reply. Only the gentle sound of water lapping against brick.

  Ruso rested his head against the rope and whispered, “Sulis Minerva, have mercy on me.”

  65

  Tilla raced across the terrace and down the steps in the moonlight. She fumbled with the latch on the tall gate and slammed it behind her, hearing the clatter as it bounced back instead of closing.

  There were people on the road, making their way back to their beds after the celebrations. She could only make out one traveler going in the direction of the temple: a small figure who gave a hasty glance back over his shoulder when he heard her behind him, and broke into a run. Her cry of “Stop!” only seemed to frighten him more. Realizing her mistake, she picked up her skirts and sprinted after him, calling, “I know where Catus is!”

  “Whoa there, girlie!” shouted a drunken fool from a group ahead of her. He staggered sideways into the middle of the road as she approached, holding his arms wide as if he were trying to halt a runaway horse.

  There was no time to avoid him, but he had left himself wide-open to the punch, and stepping around his toppling form wasted almost no time at all. The messenger boy, who had paused to hear her news about Catus, now joined her in fleeing before the drunk could get up.

  They did not stop until they reached the busier streets. For a moment they both stood panting in the middle of the road, hearing the music waft out over the courtyard wall as chattering partygoers wandered past them.

  “Catus went to the baths,” Tilla told him. “With my husband. About an hour ago. They were going to—” She bit back the words, look for something. “They had to check something in the drainage tunnel.”

  The boy frowned in puzzlement. “But he’s not at the baths now, miss. They sent me to fetch him.”

  “You have checked in the tunnel?”

  The dark eyes widened. “Miss, there’s a full-moon tide and it’s been raining.”

  “I know that!” she snapped. Then, because it was not the boy’s fault, she said more gently, “Something went wrong, and they were going in together to sort it out. It’s very important that we find them.”

  The boy looked relieved. “So Master Catus is already sorting everything out?”

  “What is this business about sluices?”

  The boy shook his head. “I don’t know, miss. If Master Catus is there, he will—”

  “But he’s not there, is he? You just said you don’t know where he is!”

  He began to back away.

  “Don’t—” Tilla lunged for him, but he ducked out of her grasp and barged through a group of people in the courtyard entrance. She followed him, ignoring the shouts of protest, only to find herself back in amongst the musicians and a few late-night revelers gathered beneath the sputtering torches. Where was the boy?

  Several knots of people had formed by the sacred spring and were peering down and pointing. Dreading what she might find, she ran across to join them. The boy was there, standing beside a slave in a bathhouse tunic. They were both leaning over the railings on the far side of the pool, but there was nothing terrible to see. Instead, the pool was almost empty. A tall opening had been revealed in the far wall, and the people gathered around were watching the water drain out of it.

  She said, “What is happening?”

  “It’s all right,” someone farther along the railing assured her. “The slave says they do this from time to time. It washes the silt out.”

  But surely not in the middle of a party? She hurried across to where the boy was standing with the bathhouse slave. “Engineer Catus left his house an hour ago to come here,” she said. “He was with my husband. They said they were going to check something down in the tunnel.”

  The man glanced at the boy and then straightened up. “Not tonight, miss. It’s a—”

  “I know, a full-moon tide and it has been raining. But that is what they said.”

  He shook his head. “We have a rule here, miss. When somebody goes down, we leave another man at the top for safety. There’s nobody at the top.”

  Tilla said, “This was urgent. Perhaps they did not bother. Someone needs to go down there and look
for them.”

  The boy shrank closer to the man and said, “Is that why the entrance hatch …?”

  “Course not,” the older man told him. “That was the same jokers as opened the spring sluice—”

  Tilla said, “What sluice?”

  “—and pulled the plug on the main bath,” continued the man. “We’ve had a right fine time here this evening, miss. We’ve been looking for the boss to tell us whether to let it all drain and get the silt out now it’s open, or close it back up. We don’t do nothing without orders, see, and the manager’s off having dinner with the governor and can’t be interrupted. But it’s a bit late now anyway.”

  Tilla stared at the center of the empty pool, where steaming water still bubbled up through the mud and flowed out through the opening. Vaguely aware of a familiar voice calling her name, she said, “All the water from this pool has gone down into the tunnel?”

  “And half the bath, miss. Don’t worry, he won’t be down there.”

  “Then where is he?” she shrieked, finally losing her patience. She turned to the boy. “Show me how to get in there. I am going to find them.”

  That familiar voice again, calling her name. She turned, still impatient, to see Albanus elbowing his way past a group of partygoers to reach them. He was saying something about a centurion. “Did your husband find him?”

  For a moment Tilla could not think what he was talking about. Then she remembered Pertinax’s illness. “The centurion is feeling better,” she assured Albanus. “But my husband and Serena’s uncle went into the drainage tunnel and nobody has seen them since.”

  Albanus turned to the bath slaves. “Is this true?”

  The man said, “Sir, there’s nothing that would have sent the boss down there on a night like this.”

  “It was important,” Tilla said.

  The slave gave her the sort of look he might give a woman who expected him to risk his life for a lost earring.

  The boy was wide-eyed. “What would happen,” he said, “if Master Catus was in the tunnel with all that water?”

  His companion stepped away from the railing. “Find Celer and Docilis,” he said to the boy. “Tell them I want them by the first hatch right now. I’ll fetch a rope and a hook.”

  Tilla said, “I will come!”

  The slave turned back to address Albanus. “Keep the lady out of the way, will you please, sir?”

  Both slaves hurried away into the bathhouse. Now, without the anger to cling to, Tilla began to tremble. What would happen if somebody was in the tunnel with all that water? She made to follow the slaves, but Albanus’s grip on her arm was surprisingly strong. “We must leave them to do it,” he insisted. “The doctor would never forgive me if I let anything happen to you.”

  “Then what are we going to do?”

  “We are going to wait,” he told her.

  The sight of the black river water slapping at the wall below her made Tilla shudder. It was so close, it seemed to be reaching out for her. Albanus said this was where the tunnel came out, beyond the vegetable plots, but there was no sign of a tunnel now. The river had risen over the outlet. There was no escape here except by swimming.

  But it was a big tunnel, Albanus had insisted. Such things were built high enough for slaves to walk down and clear them. So it must surely be possible to be swept out with the flow of the water and to swim to safety.

  She raised her head and peered out at the shifting surface of the river in the moonlight. “Husband! Husband, can you hear me? Where are you? Blessed spirit of the river, bring him back to us!”

  The river flowed on, silent and indifferent.

  “Why does nobody fetch a boat?”

  Albanus, also staring out into night, said, “He is a better swimmer than he is a sailor.”

  The words were kindly meant, but not a great comfort.

  “He might have climbed out further downstream. He might be on his way back.”

  An owl hooted from the woods across the water as if it were mocking them.

  “Husband!” Tilla cried. “Speak to us: Where are you?”

  The owl’s cry went unanswered. The wall was cold and damp under her hands. She leaned back and whispered a prayer to the moon goddess, who gazed back with her wide, bright, beautiful face. Perhaps she too was searching.

  Perhaps she had already seen him. Lying pale and drowned out there on the riverbank.

  “I think we should go back to the baths,” Albanus said. “The staff might be looking for us.”

  It was kinder than saying, He is not here.

  They picked their way along the mud paths between the vegetable patches, now slippery with the rain. Tilla remembered how she had taken fright out here on her own, even though in the end there were only two angry women to be afraid of. Perhaps that fear had been an omen: a warning that none of them had understood or heeded.

  As they trudged back up the lane, the kitchen smells from the Mercury wafted toward them. Ahead, torches were blazing outside the door, picking out the angles of the armor on the guards stationed beneath and glinting on the puddles in the street. From somewhere inside there was a too-hearty gust of laughter: the sound of people determined to be jolly. Perhaps the governor had just told a joke.

  “Mistress, is that you?”

  The voice was so close it made her jump.

  “It is me!” it said. “Esico!”

  Earlier today she would have been pleased to see him. Now she barely managed to reply as he fell into step alongside her. She could smell the beer on him as he chattered in his native tongue about begging the master to take him back and making a new start.

  “Not now, Esico.”

  “I will learn to speak Latin!” He stepped in front of them, walking backward as he pleaded. “I will work hard.”

  Tilla stopped in the middle of the lane. She had no energy to force her way past him. Ahead of them, a helmet moved under the torchlight as a guard outside the Mercury turned to watch. She said, “Your master is missing.”

  “I will never wander off again, I swear. Please, mistress—”

  It was Albanus who stepped forward to put him in his place. Glaring up at the youth, who was a head taller than himself, he announced that the doctor had gone missing and was feared drowned, and if Esico had any respect he would not be pestering the mistress on this of all nights.

  Esico said, “Eh?” and Albanus cried, “Oh, gods above!” in exasperation. “After all your master has done for you, and you never even bothered to learn Latin! He should have sold you months ago, you foolish boy!”

  Tilla placed a hand on Albanus’s arm. “It does us no good to argue.”

  “Well, I’m sorry,” Albanus spluttered, “but really …”

  “I know.” So Tilla made the lad stand in the middle of the lane and listen while she explained, watching his eager face crumple as he understood, and then he said, “I fear he is gone, mistress.”

  Albanus, who had no idea what Esico had just said, muttered, “We should go,” but nobody took any notice.

  “We may be wrong,” Tilla told Esico, feeling sorry for him now. Perhaps the gods had sent him as a gangling and annoying mercy: someone to lift her mind for a moment from her own fears. “He might be safe somewhere else.”

  “No, mistress. I heard his ghost.”

  “He might be quite safe and—what?”

  “I was lying down to sleep in the stable because I had nowhere else to go, and I heard him, mistress. Calling from a long way away. ‘Help me.’ I got up and looked out but there was only the guards standing there and I thought it was a dream, or the beer, so I—”

  “Did you go to the river?”

  He looked stricken. “I never thought—”

  “There you are, my boy!” The voice was not sober, and neither was it welcome.

  Esico turned to face the figure shambling toward them. “You can piss off,” he told his father. “You’re no use.”

  “Wait!” Tilla turned to the old man. “My husband
has gone missing. Have you seen him?”

  But the old man had not. “Nothing but stuck-up guards and fancy types in daft clothes down here tonight.”

  “Esico thought he heard someone calling.”

  The man paused and scratched his head. “Hm.”

  Tilla stepped closer and stared up into the creased and whiskery face. “Did you hear something? Where did it come from? Did it come from the river?”

  The old man frowned. “Nah.” He stared back up the street and scratched his head again. “He can’t be down in that cellar thing. I’d have seen him climb in.”

  “ ‘Cellar thing’?”

  He waved a hand toward the middle of the paved area outside the Mercury. “Over there. I reckon it’s a bit damp. Well, it’s a daft place to put—” But Tilla was already there, hauling at the ring set into the stone and screaming at the guards to come across and help her, and when they got a spear through the ring and heaved the stone aside there was water, and something was floating in it.

  66

  Tilla was not dressed for a smart dinner and Pertinax had only made it down there because some of his men had loaded him onto a borrowed mule, but still the sight of him, and his gruff “She’s with me,” worked like a magic spell to get her past the governor’s guards.

  The conversation on the dining room couches died as they entered. The pipe players faltered into silence. The big bald man on the central couch raised his eyebrows and looked at the chief priest lounging next to him as if waiting for an explanation. Everyone else stared at the sight before them: an old man dressed in full centurion’s regalia, his breastplate glittering with awards for bravery. Below the metal-tipped straps that hung from his belt, he had one leg made of human flesh and one of wood. He limped forward, a crested helmet under one arm and Tilla on the other.

  Gleva was the first to move. She leapt up from her wicker chair, dodging between the musicians and a lampstand. Taking the helmet and handing it to a servant, she seized his arm and whispered, “What are you doing here?”

  “Pertinax?” said the governor. “I was told you were ill.”