Maeloch knew what was in his mind. Scoti had learned from the disaster and from the later strengthening of the Ysan navy to confine their raids to Britannia—until this new generation reached manhood. Would the city and her she-druid Queens avenge attacks on the rest of Gaul, as they would any on Armorica? Eochaid must be headlong, and belike driven by a murderousness he could only take out on aliens, to have ventured past it. Now, with his men turning homesick, he was having second thoughts.
His words reminded him of that which brought heat into his tones: “Not that I can ever really go back—never to my father’s house. And this is the work of Niall. O man of Ys, in me you have no enemy. The foeman of my foeman is my friend. Might we someday, together, bring him low?”
A thrill rang through Maeloch. “Mayhap we do have things to say one to the other, my lord.”
The runner returned with the foreign skipper. Eochaid lifted a knee in courtesy to the latter and beckoned both to sit. The wench brought more wine while namings went around.
Gunnung son of Ivar was a huge blond man, young, comely in a coarse fashion. His tunic and breeks were wadmal, but gold gleamed on his arms and was inlaid in his sword haft. A certain slyness glittered in his eyes and smoothed his rumbling voice.
Talk went haltingly, for he knew just a few Celtic words, Eochaid and Maeloch no more Germanic. The runner, a sharp-faced wight called Fogartach, could interpret a little. Moreover, Gunnung had a rough knowledge of Latin, picked up when he went adventuring along the Germanic frontier and in Britannia, while Maeloch had gained about as much over the years—though their accents were so unlike as to make different dialects.
Regardless, Gunnung was happy to brag. Not many of his kin had yet reached the West. It was Juti who were beginning to swarm in, together with Angli, Frisii, and Saxons. Hailing from Scandia, outlawed for three years because of a manslaying, he had gathered a shipful of lusty lads and plundered his way down the coasts of the Tungri and Continental Belgae. Finally they settled for the winter among some Germanic laeti in eastern Britannia, but found the country dull. Defying the season, they embarked for Ys, of which they had heard so much. Piracy there was out of the question, but they did a bit of trading and saw many wonders. “Of course, ve said ve vere alvays peaceful shapmen, ho, ho!”
Eochaid had been watching Maeloch. “Gunnung tells of strife in Ys,” he said slowly.
The fisher scowled, searched for a way out—it was loathsome, opening family matters to strangers, let alone barbarians—and at length muttered, “The quarrel’s more ’twixt Gods than men. The King has his, the Queens have theirs. ’Tis nay for us to judge.”
“They’ve sent challengers against the King, I hear.”
“And he’s cut them down, each filthy hound o’ them!” Maeloch flared. “When he comes back—” He broke off.
“Ah, he is away?”
“On business with the Romans.” Maeloch swore at himself for letting this much slip out. “He may well ha’ returned since I left. He’ll set things right fast enough.”
Gunnung growled a demand which Fogartach relayed, to know what was being said. Eochaid nodded and the interpreter served him.
The Dane guffawed, slapped his knee, and cried, “luk-hai!” Looking at Maeloch, he went on in his crude Latin, “Vill the King then throw his datter off the ness?” He leered. “That douses a hot fire. Better he put her in a whorehouse. She make him rish, by Freyja!”
Maeloch’s belly muscles contracted. “What you mean?”
“You not hear? Vell, maybe nobody but they she got killed. For I think they also first yumped through her hoop.” Gunnung sighed elaborately. “Ah, almost I vish I stayed and fighted too like she vant. Never I have a gallop like on her. But I do not vant for only nine vomen till I die, haw-aw!”
“Who … she?” grated out of Maeloch’s throat.
“Aa, Dahut, who else? She vant I kill her father and make her Qveen. I am a man of honor, but a she-troll like that is right to fool, no?”
“Hold,” interrupted Eochaid. He laid a hand on Maeloch’s arm. “You’re white and atremble. Slack off, man. I’ll have no fighting under my roof,” as if that were the sky.
“He lies about—a lady he’s not fit to name,” the Ysan snarled.
Gunnung sensed rage and clapped hand to hilt. Eochaid gestured him to hold still. “He s told me how a princess lay with him, hoping he would challenge her father and win,” the Scotian said in Gallic. “Was it true, now?”
“It was nay, and I’ll stop his mouth for him.”
“Hold! I think the Gods were at work in this. You yourself said we must not judge. Dare you, then? If he lies, sure and They will be punishing him. If he does not lie—I know not what,” Eochaid finished grimly. “But to me he has the look of a man whose luck has run out. Yet today he is my guest; and I will never spend my men on a bootless quarrel that is none of ours. Heed.”
Maeloch stared around the circle of warriors. They too had winded wrath and drawn closer. Their spearheads sheened against the sun. Inch by inch, his fingers released the helve of the ax that lay beside him. “I hear,” he said. To Gunnung, in Latin: “I be surprised. Hurt. You understand? Grallon be my King. Bad, bad, to know his daughter be wicked.”
The Dane smiled more kindly than before. “Truth hurt. I tell truth.” Wariness reawoke. “You no fight, ha?”
Maeloch waved a hand at the men. “How? If I want to. No fight.”
“He’s gloated about it,” Eochaid said in Redonic. “That is ill done, and now here to your face. But you told me you have a task of your King’s. Save your blood for that.”
Maeloch nodded. He had gone impassive. “I will.” He pondered. “Mayhap he can even help. There’d be rich reward.”
“How?” asked Eochaid instantly.
Maeloch considered him. “Or mayhap ye can. Or both of ye. My oath binds me to say no more till I have yours. Whatever happens, whatever ye decide, ye must let my men and me go from this island.”
“If I refuse?”
Maeloch drew down the neck of his tunic. White hairs curled amidst the black on his breast. “Here be my heart,” he said. “My oath lies in it.”
That was enough. Barbarians understood what Romans no longer did, save Grallon: a true man will die sooner than break his word. After a pause, Eochaid answered, “I swear you will go freely, unless you harm me or mine.”
“Vat this?” Gunnung wanted uneasily to know.
“Scoti help me?” Maeloch replied. “You help me too? Gold. Scoti protect me.”
“You no fisher?”
“I travel for the King of Ys. You not fought King. Not his enemy. You like to help? Gold.”
“I listen.”
Maeloch passed it on Eochaid. The four sitting men rose. Solemnly, the Scotic chief called his Gods and the spirits of this island to witness that no unprovoked hindrance should come to the Ysans from him.
“Now I can say this much,” Maeloch told him. “We’re bound for Hivernia … Ériu. The errand’s about your enemy Niall and nay friendly to him. Our craft be just a fishing smack, damaged. We’ve nay yet got her rightly seaworthy, though we can sail in fair weather. This be a tricky season. We’d house at home were the business not pressing. An escort ’ud be a relief. We can pay well and … get ye past Ys without trouble.”
Fogartach explained to Gunnung. “Haa!” the Dane bellowed in Latin. “You pay, you got us.”
“It may be best that the men of Ériu guide you,” Eochaid said.
“Yours and his together?” Maeloch suggested. “Well, settle that ’twixt yourselves. First ye’ll want to see what we can offer ye.” He paused. “Wisest might be that none but ye twain have that sight. Too often gold’s drawn men to treachery.”
Eochaid took a certain umbrage at that. Gunnung, however, nodded when it was rendered for him; he must know what ruffians fared under his banner. “He be not afraid to go alone with me,” Maeloch stated in Gallic, leaving Eochaid no choice but to agree.
The Scot
ian did order a currach full of warriors rowed to the inlet to lie offshore—“in case we have a heavy burden to carry back,” he explained. “This eventide all our seafarers shall be my guests at a feast.”
He gave directions about preparing for that, sent word to the Dani, called for refilled wine goblets. When those had been drained to Lug, Lir, and Thor, the three captains set off.
Forest took them into itself. Beneath a rustling of breeze, noon brooded warm and still. Branches latticed the sky and wove shadows where brush crouched and boles lifted out of dimness. Sight reached farther on the ridges, but presently nothing was to be seen from them either except tree crowns and a glittery blue sweep of sea. Nobody spoke.
The trail dipped down into a glade surrounded by the wood. Folk said that one like that lay near the middle of the grove outside Ys and was where the sacred combat most often took place. Maeloch, in the lead, stopped, wheeled about, and brought his ax up slantwise. “Draw sword, Gunnung,” he said in Latin. “Here I kill you.”
The big bright-haired man hooted outraged astonishment. Eochaid sensed trouble. He poised the spear he carried. Maeloch glanced at him and said in Gallic, “This be no man of yours. He befouls my King. Ye swore I’d be safe of ye. Stand aside while I take back my honor.”
“It’s breaking the peace you are,” Eochaid declared.
Maeloch shook his head. “He and I swapped no oaths. Nor be there peace ’twixt Ys and Niall. Later I’ll tell ye more.”
Eochaid’s mouth tightened. He withdrew to the edge of the grass.
“You die now, Gunnung,” Maeloch said.
The Dane howled something. It might have meant that the other man would fall and his ghost be welcome to whimper its way back to the little slut he served. Sword hissed from the sheath.
The two stalked about, Gunnung in search of an opening, Maeloch turning in the smallest circle that would keep the confrontation. The Dane rushed. His blade blazed through air. Maeloch blocked it with his ax handle. Iron bit shallowly into seasoned wood. Maeloch twisted his weapon, forced the sword aside. Gunnung freed it. Before he could strike again, the heavy head clattered against it. He nearly lost his hold.
Maeloch pressed in, hewing right and left. His hands moved up and down the helve, well apart as he drew it back, closing together near the end as he swung. The sword sought to use its greater speed to get between those blows. A couple of times it drew blood, but only from scratches. Whenever it clashed on the ax, weight cast it aside. The next strike was weaker, slower.
Gunnung retreated. Maeloch advanced. The Dane got his back against a wall of brush. He saw another blow preparing and made ready to ward it off. As the ax began to move, Maeloch shifted grip. Suddenly he was smiting not from the right but the left. The edge smacked into a shoulder. Gunnung lurched. His blood welled forth around two ends of broken bone. The sword dropped from his hand. Maeloch gauged distances, swung once more, and split the skull of Gunnung.
A while he stood above the heap and the red puddle spreading around it. He breathed hard and wiped sweat off his face. Eochaid approached. Maeloch looked up and said, “Ye had right. His luck had run out.”
“This is an evil thing, I think,” Eochaid replied. “And unwise. Suppose he had slain you. What then of your task?”
“I have a trusty mate, and ye promised my crew should go free.” Maeloch spat on the body. “This thing misused the name of Dahut, daughter of Queen Dahilis—or misused her, which is worse yet. The Gods wanted him scrubbed off the earth.”
“That may be. But I must deal with his gang.”
“Yours outnumbers them. And ’twasn’t ye what killed him. Come with us to Ériu like ye said ye might.”
“What is your errand there, Maeloch?”
“What be your grudge against King Niall?”
“This.” As Eochaid spoke, it became like the hissing of an adder or a fire. “He entered my land, the Fifth of the Lagini, laid it waste, took from us the Bóruma tribute that is ruinous, made a hostage of me. And I was not kept in honor; he penned me like beast, year upon year. At last I escaped—with the help of a man from Ys—and took my revenge on that follower of his whose satire had so disfigured me that never can I be a king after my father. That man’s father cursed my whole country, laid famine on it for a year. Oh, the women and children who starved to death because of worthless Tigernach! But he was a poet, for which I am forever an exile. Do you wonder why I am the enemy of Niall?”
Maeloch whistled. “Nay. And I think he brews harm for us too.”
“How?” Eochaid laid a hand over Maeloch’s. “Speak without fear. I have not forgotten that man from Ys.”
Maeloch stared down at the corpse. He gnawed his lip. “It goes hard to tell. But Dahut—she guests a stranger who admits he’s from Niall’s kingdom. They go everywhere about together. The Queens be … horrified … but she mocks them, and meanwhile the king be away. Has yon outlander bewitched her? His name is likewise Niall. I’m bound for Ériu to try and find out more.”
Eochaid clutched his spear to him. “Another Niall?” he whispered. “Or else—It’s; always bold he was; and he has sworn vengeance on Ys. He lost his first-born son there, in that fleet which came to grief long ago.” Louder: “What does this Niall of yours look like?”
“A tall man, goodly to behold, yellow hair turning white.”
“Could it truly be—Go home!” Eochaid shouted. “Warn them. Seize and bind yonder Niall. Wring the truth out of him!”
Maeloch gusted a sigh. That be for her father the King. Besides, at worst he, whoever he be, he can only be a spy. Let me fare on to his homeland and try to learn what he plans, ere he himself can return. … What ye say, though, ids me make haste. I’d meant going to friendly Mumu and asking my way for’ard piece by piece. But best I make straight for … Mide, be that the realm? We need to stop in Britannia first and finish our work on the ship. I’ll send a man or two back to Ys from there—we’ll buy a boat—with word for King Grallon of what I’ve found out here.”
Eochaid had calmed. “Well spoken that is. And indeed you should not bear home at once. When the Dani learn you’ve killed their chief, they’ll scour the waters for you—along the coast, believing you’ve headed straight west. If you go north you’ll shake them.”
“Will ye come too? We could meet somewhere.”
Eochaid sighed and shook his head. “They remember in Mide. This face of mine would give your game away.” Bleakly: “We’ve thought we’ll seek folk like ourselves, Scoti, where we may be making a new home; but that cannot be in green Ériu, not ever again.”
Maeloch chopped his ax several times into the turf to clean the blood and brains off it. “I’ll be on my way, then.”
“I’ll come with you to your ship, and sign to my own men that they return. Heave anchor when they’re out of sight. I must let Gunnung’s men know what happened to him, though I need not tell them more than that.” Eochaid grinned. “Nor need I hurry along these trails. For it may be that in you is the beginning of my revenge.”
III
1
Rovinda, wife of Apuleius, slipped into the darkened room. She left the door ajar behind her. “How are you, Gratillonius?” she murmured. “Sleeping?”
The man in the bed hardly stirred. “No, I’ve been lying awake.” His words came flat.
She approached. “We shall eat shortly. Will you join us?”
“Thank you, but I’m not hungry.”
She looked downward. By light that seeped in from the hallway and past the heavy curtain across the window she saw how gaunt and sallow he had grown. “You should. You’ve scarcely tasted food these past—how many days since you came to us?”
Gratillonius didn’t answer. He couldn’t remember. Six, seven, eight? It made no difference.
The woman gathered courage. “You must not continue like this.”
“I am … worn out.”
Her tone sharpened. “You fought your way out of the flood, and afterward exhausted what strength
you had left for the sake of what people had survived. True. But that soldier’s body of yours should have recovered in a day or two. Gratillonius, they still need you. We all do.”
He stared up at her. Though no longer young, she was sightly: tall, brown-haired, blue-eyed, fine-featured, born to a well-off Osismiic family with ancient Roman connections. He recalled vaguely that she was even more quiet and mild than her husband, but even more apt to get her way in the end. He sighed. “I would if I could, Rovinda. Leave me in peace.”
“It’s no longer weariness that weighs you down. It’s sorrow.”
“No doubt. Leave me alone with it.”
“Others have suffered bereavement before you. It is the lot of mortals.” She said nothing about the children she had lost, year after year.
Two lived. Well, he thought, two of his did, Nemeta and Julia, together with little Korai, granddaughter of Bodilis. But the rest were gone. Dahut was gone, Dahilis’s daughter, swept from him with foundering Ys, off into Ocean. Would her bones find her mothers down there?
“You should be man enough to carry on,” Rovinda said. “Call on Christ. He will help you.”
Gratillonius turned his face to the wall.
Rovinda hesitated before she bent above him and whispered, “Or call on what God or Gods you will. Your Mithras you’ve been so faithful to? Sometimes I—please keep this secret; it would hurt Apuleius too much—I am a Christian, of course, but sometimes in hours of grief I’ve stolen away and opened my heart to one of the old Goddesses. Shall I tell you about Her? She’s small and kindly.”
Gratillonius shook his head on the pillow.
Rovinda straightened. “I’ll go, since you want me to. But I’ll send in a bowl of soup, at least. Promise me you’ll take that much.”
He kept silent. She went out.
Gratillonius looked back toward the ceiling. Sluggishly, he wondered what did ail him. He should indeed have been up and about. The ache had drained from muscles and marrow. But what remained was utter slackness. It was as if a sorcerer had turned him to lead, no, to a sack of meal. Where worms crawled. Most of his hours went in drowsing—never honest sleep, or so it seemed.
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