The village elder handed the tribune the wedding bread and he broke it, sharply, like a man used to command.
The ceremony complete, the tribune touched her shoulder. “What next?”
His voice scarcely rose louder than the breeze that gusted in and out of the surrounding trees, but she startled. Next? Was there a next in this madness?
“A wedding feast?”
Yes, she’d prepared the feast, cooked all yesterday, but the village could enjoy that without her. “Let’s go.”
The tribune raised his dark eyebrows. “These are your people. Don’t you wish to celebrate with them before saying your goodbyes?”
Scarcely a goodbye, she’d live only a day’s journey away and visit often. If the village still welcomed her. A scratchy feeling rose inside her throat as the pounding of a thousand beehives swirled within her mind. She’d just married a Roman, a foreigner, to those villagers who clustered around the tables, an enemy. If Cedric thought her a fool, what did the others think?
The wind whipped at the tribune’s cloak, baring his arm that some Celtic sword had scarred for life. She knew precisely nothing about her new husband. A dizzy feeling started in her head and descended as the grass swayed uncomfortably under her feet.
“Ness.” Mother tugged at her arm. “Come, sit.”
Half the guests thronged the tables already, the Pict girl practically in Cedric’s lap on the rough-hewn bench they shared. Ness glanced toward the Roman horses tethered at the edge of the green. She just needed time to think. Once this pounding in her head dissipated, everything would work out.
Tentatively, she reached for the tribune’s hand. His calluses scraped against her as she touched her skin to his. “Please. Unless you want to stay?”
Mother, joined by Father now, took her arm to lead her to the long tables where the smoke of roast pig wafted up above the noise of revelers.
The tribune squeezed her hand back. “So be it.” The muscles of his arm brushed her shoulder as he tucked his hand in the curve of her waist. Glancing at her parents, he shook his head. “Celebrate without us.”
Father wrapped his fingers around his knife. “You’ll not deny my daughter her own wedding feast. You stay.” As chief of this village, he commanded obedience.
Except from Roman soldiers.
“No. We ride.” Her newly-wedded husband didn’t even raise his voice. Around them the noise of festive villagers continued, but here in this knot, all conversation halted.
“Farewell, Father.” Ness touched his stiff arm as he glared at the tribune.
Mother clung to her. Those gentle hands gripped her shoulders and she felt the heave of maternal tears.
She used her own sleeve to wipe away Mother’s tears as she extricated herself. “I’ll see you very soon.”
Reaching down, she grabbed her bag of seeds and slipped away.
Her mare, Kingcup, stood tethered by the tribune’s horses at the outskirts of the clearing. The tribune closed his hand over hers and they walked through the long tables. Every eye tracked their walk, many far from friendly. Ness gulped.
Mailmura sat to the left, surrounded by old Celtic warriors. Dropping a half-eaten rib, Mailmura grabbed for her hand. Voice overloud, Mailmura pulled herself to her feet. “You make sure he takes care of you, young’un, elsewise you’ll always have a nest back here.”
Thank heaven the tribune didn’t understand Celtic.
At the next table, Cedric and the Pict girl shared a bench and she had her hand in his food, trying to feed him like some sickly bairn. He looked at Ness.
She looked away and forced her weak knees to carry her on. Past the tables at last, she let her shoulders slump and released the breath she’d held.
The tribune stole his arm around her waist.
She jerked her gaze to his face. He already looked at her. Almost alone now, except for the handful of foreign soldiers clustered around the horses, his every feature seemed more distinct.
The sun shone down on skin that was no Celtic white, but brown like the earth, speaking tales of lands far away where olives grew and ships sailed into sunny harbors.
The strength of his arm, half covered in leather, pressed against her back. “I love you.”
Her boots smashed against the grass as she jerked to a halt. Love?
She stared at the foreign-made armor, the Mediterranean tan on his face, those dark eyes she couldn’t read. She touched her dry tongue to drier lips and flicked her gaze past the tables of festive people to the bench by the oak tree where they’d signed the marriage papers.
“I love you.” He touched her hair that tumbled free down her back.
She blinked. They’d danced once and spoken a few times more. He might feel passion, but certainly not love.
He wanted to feel it, though. That was something.
“Do you have land in Camulodunum? I brought corn and barley seeds for us.” She held up the sack. “Corn brings a good amount of denarii at market.”
He stared at her.
“Of course, I won’t till all the land. Pasture land is important too. Do you prefer sheep or pigs for grazing?” She held her breath. Please let him say sheep. Newborn lambs were so much more adorable than smelly piglets. Even if she only started off with half a dozen sheep, she could breed a respectable flock within a few years, make a tidy income contribution.
“Um,” puzzlement darkened his gaze, “never thought about it.” He looked toward the road and the horses that champed at their bits, then offered her his hand.
Gripping his hand, she let him help her up the stallion’s back, but she could have sprung to the saddle with just one leap. After all, she was a Celt, a horsewoman. Besides, she’d done it a thousand times before, a thousand times since Cedric had first shown her how.
Dust rose from the road ahead. A Roman soldier swung off a horse. “Sir.” The soldier saluted and extended a wax tablet. Her husband took it and scanned the words.
“What is it?” Ness looked down from the horse.
The tribune smiled. “New orders. To Rome by way of Germania. I thought I’d have to wait two years for this promotion.”
“Rome?” She gasped.
“Greatest city in the Empire. You’ll like my villa there.” He rested his hand on her mount, a fingerbreadth from her leg. His sturdy hand shifted the fabric of her dress.
“You own a villa?” She scanned his clothes. No finery, no gold, yet no commoner would own a villa.
He nodded.
Her heart sank. This tribune was no commoner, but a patrician, and they were headed for Rome.
Chapter 3
Noise. There was noise everywhere. A dirty man with hairy legs jostled Ness from the left. She jerked away. On the right, a cart full of turnips wobbled up over a jutting cobblestone. A full basket toppled over the side and turnips pummeled her from above. The purple globes splattered against the reeking filth that covered the street.
Just in front of her, a cutpurse unloaded a scrawny gentleman’s coins. Behind her, someone screamed. No, that was just the bleating of sheep mixed with the unearthly noises of unhappy pigs outside the pagan temple.
People milled everywhere, bumping against each other, sending up a stench, helping the Italian sun overheat the capital of the known world, Rome. Quickening her step, she slid her hand into Aquilus’.
He turned back and smiled at her.
Behind them, a man with sores covering his arms struck his fist against a youth. A woman stuck her head out from the second story of a shop and dumped excrement on the roadway.
Ness pressed close to Aquilus. Surely this place revolted him too. She glanced into his dark eyes, but he looked ahead to the marble buildings that spread out in the forum beyond. Certainly, he’d request a transfer back to Camulodunum soon.
Back in Britannia, spring would thrust new life from the ground, warming rolling fields so farmers could turn new soil. Beauty would fill the countryside, and serene landscapes surround Aquilus and her rather than
this cesspit of humanity.
“The Senate meets there.” Aquilus’ deep voice broke into her thoughts. She followed his finger with her gaze. White marble surrounded the forum in towers. A rose pattern embellished a temple on one side, clashing with a brick and cement building’s overly sharp angles at the courtyard’s other end.
She searched his face.
He spoke as if he admired this city, as if he’d choose to live in this place, and he awaited an answer.
She stared at the angled thing, so different from Britain’s wattle and daub structures. She gave him an uncertain glance. “It’s rather ugly.”
He laughed. “Austere. Stark. Not ugly.”
“I liked the Germanian capital better.” It hadn’t been home, but one could find quiet along the Danube. With her free hand, she touched his upper arm, just below the leather of his armor.
“Aggripinensium is one of my favorite cities.”
The street narrowed and the crowd pressed tighter around them. Strange words in foreign accents from the far reaches of the Empire assaulted her ears. Ness tightened her fingers around Aquilus’. “You left it often enough.” She bit her tongue, but she spoke truth. He had traveled incessantly and she’d known no one in all Germania. Her poor horse had died on the sea voyage too.
“I’m exploring the trade options.” He moved his hand with his words. “I’ll create a better plan so the Germanians cease revolting. Twenty years ago, Senator Aurelius regained the allegiance of all Gaul after they threatened to split off in the year of the four emperors. I want to do the same for Germania.”
“Who’s Aurelius?” She swerved around a pile of fly-covered horse dung.
His eyes widened. “You don’t know Aurelius?”
“No.” A mangy dog with a boy waving a stick in close pursuit ran between the legs of the crowd.
“He’s a modern day Cinncinatus, a Stoic too.” Releasing her hand, Aquilus gestured upward.
Ness stared at the cobblestone below. Stoicism might sound grand, but Celts took infinitely more pleasure in life, like when she carved that bow with Cedric and… never mind.
“Cinncinatus was the legendary Roman general who was given dictatorial power over Rome, but used it only for the good of the state.”
She twisted her mouth downward, gaze on the filth below. Who cared about the trade routes of empires? She’d much prefer to spend firelit evenings with him than think of such things. If only he preferred that too.
Aquilus laughed. He swept his hand beneath her hair, his gaze following hers as he moved closer. Tanned skin formed a wall blocking the sunlight, but his arms caught her attention, hard as those atrociously ugly bricks in the Senate, but as perfectly sculpted as the marble statues outside that temple. Even his lips were darker than the Celts. As he caressed the small of her waist, he moved his mouth toward her.
Heat like flames licked out across the distance. She touched the slippery metal of his shoulder plates and caught the smell of leather and iron, once alien, now familiar. She reached for his kiss.
From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a flash of purple edging. Expensive sandals made flapping noises against the marble above them as a stream of people emerged from the Senate.
Aquilus jerked away from her. “Forgot I was in the Forum.”
Ignoring the chubby man in a purple-edged toga who stared at them, or the hundreds of less pompous pedestrians who encircled them, she smiled. “So?”
“They’re senators. And look, see there, a consul.” He pointed the man out, his square hand as stiff as when he commanded legions. She’d seen that stiffness vanish each time he held her in his arms this last six-month.
She lifted her shoulders to match the corners of her mouth. “They’re just rich men with an obsession for politics.”
Putting his hand up, Aquilus tried to act as if his chest hadn’t shaken with laughter. “Quiet, they’ll hear you.”
His guilty half-smile didn’t match the armor that walled his chest, but she liked it.
She took a step forward and slid her hands up his scale armor, body indiscreetly close to his. “Would they faint from horror?”
This close to him, she could almost ignore the stench of rotting fish in the nearby cart and the reek of waste carried on the scorching air. His hair stuck to his forehead in the heat. Even after a six-month, she still marveled at its darkness. She reached out to touch it.
“Tribune Paterculi,” a voice called from behind him.
Aquilus half-rotated. A plump man separated from the sea of togas.
“Cassius.” Aquilus extended his hand and grasped the man’s hand at the wrist.
The man’s round face parted in a smile. “Have to catch the archives keeper, but welcome back to Rome.” He bustled off through the seething crowd.
She stepped closer to Aquilus. “Who was that?”
“Senator Cassius.” He watched the man disappear. More men in senatorial togas streamed out of the brick building, surrounding them, distracting Aquilus further. Here and there a senator waved his hand in acknowledgment of her husband. Still, the torrent of purple-edged robes continued.
Aquilus swung his gaze to her. He saw her frown and his lips twitched.
Mayhap the frown was petulant, but she was in a strange new land, home several weeks’ travel away, and she wished to kiss her husband.
He grabbed her hand and led her up the stairs of the senate building around to the edge of the forum. Away from the noise of bustling, new construction loomed in front of them.
Holding her hand, he ducked behind the pillar. Indented bronze slabs stood in front of them. Raised images rose above their heads, the dark metal hiding the senate building.
He tugged her in front of him, hands warm on her waist. “Still want that kiss?”
The dance came back to her heart. She leaned back against the engraving, resting her head between the raised bronze of a chariot wheel and a legionary’s shield where the word ‘Jerusalem’ etched the metal.
He paused.
Her gaze strayed to the chariot relief on the pillar. It had a covered front, unlike the Celtic chariots. Many a time Cedric had taken her in his chariot.
Moving into her space, Aquilus leaned up against the pillar. His hands spanned the chariot wheel engraving as he looked at her and smiled that smile that could melt bronze.
Sliding one leg up the engraved slab, she dug her heel into an indentation in the bronze work. Hands on his shoulders, she pushed herself up, a foot above him. The wind blew her hair back and she laughed.
He moved his hands behind her legs, pulling her off the bronze and spinning her around before he let her feet touch the ground.
With a laugh, she grazed her fingers across his face.
He pulled her tighter. One hand behind her, the other hand on bronze, Aquilus dipped her back, supporting her weight.
His hand felt like sunshine on her back, warming her, his arm surrounding her. She moved her gaze to his mouth. Then it wasn’t sunshine, it was a solar eclipse—for an instant the world changed and heaven’s stars appeared.
Clinging to his kiss, she twisted her arms around his neck and tried to make the feeling last. Just for a moment, she could forget that this noisy city was not Britain and that the hordes of milling people held not a single friend.
“The dissipation of youth these days,” a voice grunted.
Aquilus’ hand slipped. She turned toward the voice. A sinewy old man with an air of greatness stood a pace away.
A gasp escaped Aquilus. He pulled back against the monument.
The older man flared his nostrils. “That is Titus’ arch, a symbol of Rome’s victories abroad and the fortitude that made this empire great. Think before you dishonor it, soldier.” Then the man walked on, sandals hitting the dirt at a precise rate.
Aquilus watched the man leave. “That was Senator Aurelius.”
She looked from Aquilus to the senator and back to Aquilus again. Heat rushed to her cheeks as she pulled her shoulders in
.
“I shouldn’t have acted so impulsively.” Aquilus still looked at the senator.
She liked when he acted impulsively. Ness shifted her feet on the cobblestone walkway. She touched his arm. He didn’t respond.
“Aurelius was here.” Aquilus stared at the archway the senator had passed through.
With a sigh, she retracted her hand. “Will you show me your villa?” A villa would have fields. She could plant her seeds and start her sheep farm.
He took a deep breath and shook his head as if to clear it.
A half-hour walk took them through crowded streets, winding neighborhood roads, and finally in front of sprawling houses where stately landscaping replaced the churn of people. A bronze gate confronted them.
Aquilus rapped against the metal. A porter appeared. He gave her a puzzled stare, then, bowing his greetings, he showed them through the courtyard to the massive stone structure on the other side.
There, tall doors towered above, the wood decorated with inlaid designs. A massive metal lock held the doors in place.
Smiling at her, Aquilus held out an iron key ring. “Keys to my heart, Domina.”
She stared at the dangling keys. They looked heavy.
“Actually, just to my house.” He bent to clip them on her belt.
She gave him a quizzical look.
“Tradition,” he said. Letting the porter unlock the door, Aquilus swung her up in his arms and carried her across the threshold. Her cheeks heated as her body pressed against his in front of this curious porter. Arms still around his neck, she hopped down. Her smile vanished.
A house—that meant a dirt floor, wattle and daub, and a fireplace in the center. Her hand fell from the armor at Aquilus’ chest as she fixed her eyes on the interior of this mansion.
Cold tiles lined a great room in strange mosaic patterns. A shallow pool sat in the center, the roof open above to let water in, and too many rooms lined the interior. No rolling fields or towering forests surrounded this place. High walls and pronged gates enclosed the tiny garden behind the house, which backed up to another house, and another beyond that one. Not even a single sheep could graze in that garden, let alone a hundred.
For Life or Until (Love and Warfare Series Book 1) Page 4
