by Jack Whyte
After the funeral, as soon as I had stripped out of my armour and passed it into the care of my orderly, I made my way to the bath house to find it, as I had expected, jammed with people who, like me, had stood for hours beneath the chilling rain. I had never known the place so crowded in all the years since it had first been built, and my immediate reaction was to leave again and make my way down to the Villa Britannicus, where the baths were vastly superior. But that would have meant another journey through the icy rain, and it was too far and I was too lazy, so I accepted the jostling of the close-packed mass of bodies and resigned myself to merely absorbing the heat and thawing out my bones.
I made my way in the accepted fashion through the formalized pools of graded temperatures, dawdling little in any of them and elbowing my way almost surreptitiously and with many apologies through the throng, determined to arrive at the steam room ahead of the main crush. There was no rank in the bath house; first there, first served was the rule. The man directly ahead of me in the line for the calidarium, the hottest pool before the steam room, eventually gave up in disgust and quit the line. I glanced at him as he passed me and did not recognise him, and that surprised me. I had thought I knew everyone in Camulod by this time, having worked hard at the task since regaining my memory. Puzzled, and curious, I turned around to look at him again, only to find him close behind me; too close behind me, and moving towards me inimically, pale grey eyes wide with violent intent.
Reacting instinctively, I turned my side to him and sucked in my belly, rising to my toes, throwing up my arms and bowing my middle backwards. The knife in his hand sliced a straight line across the muscles of my stomach as my right hand slashed down to close over his wrist and I pulled him forward, smashing my left elbow into his nose. Before the man on my other side could even react—his back had been pierced by the point of the assassin's knife when I jerked it forward—I had spun again, to face my attacker, driving my right knee up into his naked groin. He bent forward, clutching at himself, and as his head came down I brought my other elbow crashing against the back of his neck, the full weight of my frame behind it. He fell to his knees and remained there, restrained from falling farther by the press of bodies around us. Now the man who had been stabbed, his wound a mere scratch, was turned towards us, his eyes staring and his mouth wide with terror as he tried to reach behind his back to staunch the blood that flowed from him. My own belly was covered with fast-flowing blood. Somebody shouted an alarm, and the first flush of panic began to spread, although the danger was over. While I had never seen the baths so crowded, neither had I seen them empty so quickly. I sagged at the knees then, staring at the open edges of the cut across my abdomen.
"Damnation, I won't accept any argument on this, Titus, it was Ironhair." I was almost hissing through teeth clenched against the pain. "It had to be him; there is no other conceivable explanation. He had just returned to Camulod after an absence of days—Ambrose and I met him just inside the gate yesterday—and I heard someone say later in the day that he had brought some strangers with him. Now he and the strangers have vanished, judging by the time Ambrose has been gone; all except the one we have. Have they found out who he is yet?"
Titus was looking at me in dismay, and behind him, against the wall of the sick bay in the Infirmary, Flavius stood close by as always, his brows knit in a furrow of concern. An attempted assassination within Camulod was unheard of, and that the intended victim should be me appalled them both.
"Answer me, damn it!"
Titus shook his head. "I don't know, Caius. As far as I know, he's still unconscious. Lucanus is with him now." He set his jaw in determination and faced me squarely. "Nevertheless, at the risk of incurring your anger, I repeat that I must doubt the involvement of Ironhair in this." He held up his hand, palm towards me, to cut me off before I could respond. "I am not saying I believe the man incapable of such a thing, not at all. But I am saying that it defies credence that he could have planned the event when no one, including yourself, knew that you would go directly to the bath house after the funeral."
"But I didn't go directly to the bath house. I went back to my quarters and changed out of my armour. Had I remained there, he would have made the attempt there. As it was, he followed me to the baths. The only planning necessary was the decision to kill me today, while my mind was occupied with the funeral. The assassin is a stranger, unknown to me, but here in the safety of Camulod I would expect no threat, and even his strangeness ought not to have alerted me. I see many little-known faces around me nowadays. What saved my life, in fact the only thing that saved my life, was that I am aware of such lacunae in my knowledge of the folk here, and so turned around to try to place his face more firmly in my recollection. That's when I saw him lunge at me."
Flavius broke in here. "That's another thing I've found impossible to understand! How could anyone have got in there with a knife?"
I looked at him. "The bath house? He carried it in a towel. Do you examine all your friends while bathing to make sure they are unarmed? No one saw him armed because no one, including me, would ever have thought to look for such a thing there. Even after I had been stabbed, Flavius, no one noticed the blood until the other man screamed."
Neither man had any response to that.
I had tried to walk out of the bath house on my own, but it had been beyond me. Ambrose and Donuil had found me sprawled by the shallow tepid pool as I watched my own blood discolour the water. They had come at the run, bellowing for assistance, and soon the echoing chambers of the bath house were full of the clatter of running boots. I had pulled Ambrose down to me and whispered in his ear, sending both of them running to arrest the man called Ironhair, because I knew he had been behind this. I'd watched them go and felt my head fill with roaring emptiness, and then I lost all awareness.
Others had carried me here to the Infirmary, covered with blankets, and Luke had lost no time in coming to my assistance. Banishing everyone from the Infirmary save Ludmilla, Titus and Flavius, he had washed my wound with a painfully astringent solution that he told me would prevent sepsis of the cut. Then, when he was satisfied that the cut was clean, he had sewn it up—this almost painlessly, I was glad to discover—with seventeen small, carefully fashioned stitches, which he told me would have to remain in place for at least seven days. Only then had he gone to attend to my assailant, held under guard in a separate room. My wound had not been as serious as I had initially feared, and Lucanus's demeanour alone had reassured me as he worked. The incision was long but shallow, little more than skin deep in fact, so the muscles had not been damaged. The instinctual desperation with which I had sucked in my gut and arched my back had saved my life.
Now the door opened and Luke came into the room, looking directly at me.
"What did you hit him with, Cay?"
"My elbow, it was the hardest thing I had available But I hit him clean and well, right at the top of the spine."
"You certainly did. You killed him. Now we'll never know who he was."
I tried to sit up straighter and regretted it immediately. "But he can't be dead! He was alive earlier."
"So was Popilius. I wonder who'll be next? They say death comes in threes."
I winced at the pain in my belly. " That whoreson Peter Ironhair is number three, when I get my hands on him. What in blazes is taking Ambrose so long?"
As though in answer to my question, Donuil strode through the door.
"Donuil! Did you find him?"
He shook his head and gave a short, sharp sigh. "No, we missed him. You were right, obviously. He wasted no time. Must have had someone posted either in or just outside the bath house. As soon as he knew the attempt had failed, he was gone. The guards saw him leave by the main gate with three other men, moving quickly. That was before the news of what had happened even reached the gates. We arrived there much later. I had wasted time checking his known haunts first, the places you told us to search. Stupid of me. I should have sealed the gates immediately."<
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I waved that aside. "Don't blame yourself for that, my friend. By your own mouth you've just confirmed that he was gone before you could have caught him. At least you found out when he left. Did you send after him?"
"Aye. Ambrose took a full squadron of troopers, and two of his own trackers. His men are bloodhounds. They'll find them."
"Good man, I know they will." I lay back then, seeking respite from the band of fire that seared across my belly, and Luke was at my side immediately, a cup of some foul-tasting brew in his hand. I drank it unwillingly and fell into a deep sleep shortly thereafter.
Luke's soporific had been potent, because by the time I awoke night had fallen and the room in which I lay was lit by several lamps that threw a dim, yellow, comfortably warm light. I made a small movement, an attempt to change position slightly, and was rewarded with a searing blast of pain across my stomach, so that I lay still from then on and dwelt only on my thoughts. My eyes closed after a while, and I lay there dozing, not asleep but merely drifting in and out of awareness, and eventually I heard Ludmilla approach my cot, recognizing her by her quick, light footsteps. For some reason, and whence the impulse came I know not, I kept my eyes closed and feigned sleep. I felt her hand cool on my forehead, and then she moved away from the bed but remained in the room. I heard her sit down, and then the silence stretched, broken only by my own breathing. I opened my eyes after a time and looked at her without moving, but she remained unaware, staring into the light of one of the lamps, her thoughts evidently far away. She was always beautiful, as I had cause to know, but here in the lamplight she was ravishing and I allowed my thoughts to drift as I drank in the pleasure of watching her.
I realized with surprise that I felt neither rancour nor jealousy over the situation that had sprung into being between her and Ambrose. How could I have, I asked myself. What could be more natural than that this beautiful woman and my beloved brother should be attracted each to the other? But what of your dream? a small voice asked within my mind, and I smiled as the answer to that question came to me immediately, filling my chest with gladness and relief.
In the dream, Ludmilla had held up to me Aunt Luceiia's silver mirror, and I had seen myself reflected therein. But what I had seen was my mirror image—my alter ego—Ambrose my brother. I myself had been an eagle at the time, as witnessed by my talons striking the silver surface when I reached for it. Ludmilla had not shown me myself as reason for her happiness, but a semblance of me that she could love with ease, and I recalled the thrill of freedom as my beating wings bore me aloft again from the place where I had almost fallen to the ground in trying to touch her.
Now other footsteps approached the sick room and as they came, Ludmilla rose to her feet. I closed my eyes again before she could notice that I was awake, but kept them open the merest slit, so that I could see who came.
It was Ambrose, and he froze in the entrance as soon as his eyes lit upon her. They stood mute, staring at each other, each afraid to speak. Then Ambrose nodded, his face flushed with pleasure and constraint, and spoke in a low voice.
"Lady. How is he?"
Ludmilla, too, spoke softly, her voice barely more than a whisper. "He is well. Asleep. Lucanus gave him a sleeping draught against the pain."
"Is his wound bad?"
"No, merely superficial. He was fortunate. Lucanus stitched him up and he should mend completely within the week. My name is Ludmilla."
I saw him nod. "Ludmilla . . . what?"
"Sir?"
"Ludmilla what? Have you no other name?"
"Oh, I see." I could tell she was smiling. "No Roman name in the style you would recognize. I am of the house of Pendragon, cousin to Uther. Ludmilla Pendragon, then, would be my Roman appellation."
"Ludmilla Pendragon . . . I am Ambrose Britannicus, half-brother to Caius Merlyn."
"No! Had I not heard you say so I should never have guessed." I heard pure raillery in her whispered tone, and so did Ambrose, but he mistook it for scorn. I opened my eyes fully and saw him flush even deeper.
"Forgive me, Lady," he said, appalled. "Have I offended you?"
Ludmilla was instantly contrite and moved towards him quickly, hand outstretched. "No, that was cruel of me. I did not mean to tease you, but did you honestly think I could be in any doubt of who you are? The resemblance between the two of you has been the major topic of conversation in Camulod since the first moment you were seen. Shall I wake Commander Merlyn? Do you wish to speak to him?"
"No! Not yet." He smiled, now, gaining confidence. "I would much rather speak to you first, before anyone else appears. How is it that I could be here for weeks and not have seen you?"
No raillery now. Ludmilla had evidently been asking herself the same question and her voice betrayed that. "I don't know," she whispered.
"Would you not at least have come, through curiosity, to see this marvel of comparison?"
"There is no comparison, but no, I would not."
"I do not understand. No comparison?"
"Please, Commander Ambrose, be seated." Her voice was gentle and Ambrose sat down obediently, his eyes never leaving her for an instant as she moved to stand closer to him. "I have many duties," she went on, "and in these last weeks they seemed to swarm upon me. I heard all about the marvel of your resemblance to Commander Merlyn, but I know Commander Merlyn well, by sight, and I find him amiable and admirable."
"But?" Ambrose leaned forward, an elbow on one knee. "You did not speak the word, but my ears heard a 'but' in there, somewhere."
Ludmilla giggled gently, something I could not remember having heard her do before.
"Your ears are keen . . . Let me see, then. How shall I put this? I cannot, without sounding improper and immodest, but I will in spite of that . . . Commander Merlyn is a wondrous man and everything a woman looks for in a man is there in him. For me, however, there is a blindness involved. I find him amiable and admirable; as I have said, but he holds no wonder for me. Do you understand that? I feel towards him as I would towards a brother. And therefore, when the talk was all of you and how much you two were alike, I found it no great sacrifice to dedicate what time I had to my duties. They were pressing and necessary, whereas the simple meeting of another amiable brother seemed to have no urgency. Does that make sense? I simply did not know . . ."
A pause of heartbeats, during which I decided it was time I sprang awake, but before I could do anything, Ambrose asked his next question. "Did not know what, Lady?"
"How different two identicals could be."
I coughed and spoke, "Ambrose," and in an instant they were both beside me, Ludmilla taking my right hand to feel my pulse, and Ambrose seizing the other to wring it heartily. Several moments of activity went by before I could ask the question that superseded all others in my mind.
"Did you catch Ironhair?"
"No, Brother. We caught his companions, three of them, but he was not with them."
"What do you mean? Where was he, then?"
He shook his head. "We don't know. The other three swore he left them as soon as they reached the bottom of the road down from the gates. He swung off to the north, they said, leaving them to make their own way south and east to Isca and thence to the coast and Gaul."
"Where are they now, these three? Did you bring them back with you?"
"No, they are on their way to their destination."
"What?" I attempted to sit up and merely managed to drive the breath from myself in a whoosh of pain.
Ambrose waited until I had recaptured my breathing, then resumed. "They told me they did not know him well, that they had met him only days earlier, him and one other, on the way to Camulod. They themselves had come to deliver a cargo of wine, ordered by our quartermasters this time last year. Ironhair rejoined them as they were preparing to leave, during the funeral or shortly after it, and rode with them from the fort. I believed their story, and did not interfere with them any further."
"What do you mean you believed them? Why should you
believe them? And why permit them to go on?"
He looked at me wide-eyed, his eyebrows high on his forehead. "I mean I believed them, Caius, nothing more than that. They had made no attempt to flee from us, or hide. When we approached them, they were prepared to fight, as anyone would be on meeting a force of strangers on the road, but once they saw who we were, they offered us no contest and were courteous and open with us. I believed them implicitly. They spoke the truth. I have met liars before, you know."
There was nothing I could say to that without sounding completely boorish. I let go my breath with a sigh. "Aye, you're right. I had no right to snap at you. I am angry Ironhair escaped, that is all."
"He will turn up again, sooner or later, Cay, and if he does, you'll have him. And even if he should never appear again, you will benefit by that; all of us will."
"Aye. What hour of night is it?"
He grinned at me. "Late. We returned some hours ago, but I met Luke and he told me you were a prisoner of Morpheus and would remain that way for hours, so I bathed and had some food."
"Good. I hope your bath was uninterrupted?"
"No one attacked me."
"Excellent." I sighed again, uncomfortable with my injuries. "Ludmilla, did Lucanus leave any more of that foul brew he fed me? I'll never get back to sleep without it."
She had moved away while Ambrose and I were speaking, but now she reappeared, holding a cup. "Yes, Commander, I have it here." She held it for me while I gagged it down, and then she and Ambrose returned to their fascination with each other. Neither of them was any more aware than I was of when I fell asleep again.
IX
We. had received no further news of Peter Ironhair by the time we eventually left Camulod nine days later. He had disappeared completely, swallowed up by the forests that stretched unbroken in every direction beyond our fields, and I was forced to come to terms with the fact that there was nothing I could do to remedy that, other than to keep searchers in the field in the increasingly forlorn hope they might stumble upon his hiding-place. I called them off after a wasted week. In the interim, however, I had mended quickly enough, although I bitterly resented the enforced idleness. Luke had estimated the healing time to the day.
