And maybe that’s why he failed on the field of battle, I thought. Maybe that’s why he was a weak king . . .
What if there truly was power—real power—to be found in the death of others? Or was it just the way small men made themselves feel larger? I thought about the Morrigan and the demands she made of her faithful, and I wondered. What if, one day, the goddess demanded that kind of sacrifice from me? The life of another for something as base as political gain?
She wouldn’t do that, I argued silently. Would she?
Not even here, in Rome? Not even if it meant gaining power over Romans and their gods? I honestly didn’t know. But the thought was enough to give me a chill on my skin that even the fire’s warmth couldn’t banish.
? ? ?
Word came the next morning—finally—that we had a ship. Cai gave me the news himself, and I noticed that his brooding mood had seemingly lifted overnight. My own foreboding vanished too, in a freshening wind of fierce anticipation. We would leave Arviragus’s prison house that very day, at dusk.
“I’d like to come with you.”
I jumped down from the back of the wagon Cai and I had been loading with gear and stood staring up into Arviragus’s bearded face, not knowing quite how to respond.
“That is, if you think you could use an old warrior,” he said.
“Uh . . .”
Until that moment, it hadn’t even occurred to me that he’d want to come with us. But there was a naked apprehension in his gaze—I think he was actually afraid we’d leave him behind—and I didn’t know what to say. True, since we’d descended on his prison home, I’d only seen him drunk once or twice—and not dead drunk or raving drunk or sick drunk—but he certainly wasn’t the warrior he had been all those years ago. Not close to it. And he didn’t exactly cut the most inconspicuous figure. It would be risky even getting all of us to the docks and aboard ship without the vigiles catching wind as it was.
“You are somewhat . . . recognizable, lord.” Cai delicately voiced at least that much of what I was thinking.
The look on Arviragus’s face broke my heart when he nodded and began to turn away, shoulders slumping. I reached out a hand, but Junius had heard the exchange and came over to us.
“I think I can help with that,” he said.
Arviragus peered at him suspiciously.
“I’ve my soldier’s shaving kit and a stash of civilian garb in my trunk,” he said. “The tunic’ll be a mite tight and the cloak a mite short, but if you stoop and keep your head down, you won’t look like the thundering great backwater barbarian you are. Come on.”
I watched them walk back into the cell where Arviragus had spent the last seven years of his life. Where he would spend who knows how many more until his great heart gave up beating and his soul escaped, finally, to the halls of the valorous dead in the Blessed Isles of the afterlife. If we left him there.
Cai was watching him too.
“You don’t think this is a good idea,” I said.
“His hands shake.”
I lifted my arm and held out my hand, fingers splayed wide. “So do mine.”
Cai took my hand in his. “Your strength will return.”
“So will his.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
Then it didn’t, I thought. And Arviragus the legend became Arviragus the liability. But I knew I’d already made my decision. “I’m not leaving him behind,” I said. “Like I left Tanis and the others . . .”
“You said it yourself, Fallon.” He smiled at me gently. “That was only a tactical retreat.”
“Right.” I nodded. “And Arviragus is a masterful tactician. His experience could come in handy.”
I knew I was concocting the thinnest of rationalizations for bringing him along, but I didn’t care. Arviragus had earned my faith in him. And if that faith was misplaced, then . . . what? Was I willing to risk the fates of many for the benefit of one who’d had his chance at glory a long time ago? Whose name was already, forever, a shining silver thread woven into every bard’s tapestry of songs? I wondered what Sorcha would do if our situations were reversed.
Would she risk my life to save his?
I already knew the answer before I even asked the question: Yes.
And the Morrigan alone could judge the rightness of it.
Right or wrong, Arviragus was a sight to see when he reappeared, shorn of his tangled mane and beard, and dressed in a plain tunic and cloak. Even Cai looked twice, a hint of a smile tugging at his mouth. Arviragus could have almost passed for any merchant or a farmer from the provinces come to Rome to trade. Nothing could completely hide his warrior’s carriage, but I hoped that it would simply make men avoid eye contact, thinking him an ex-soldier or mercenary.
Mostly, I just hoped he would keep his hood up, and his drink down.
“Will you come with us, Junius?” he asked his longtime jailer. Seeing as how there would be nothing left to guard after he was gone.
“I’ve been hovering over you for the better part of the last seven years,” Junius snorted. “You’d think you’d be glad to see the back of me. No, I’ll stay here. My relief isn’t scheduled to take over for another week. That’ll give me time to think of something to tell him. Probably that you drank yourself to death and I had to bury you in the yard.”
“He’ll believe that.”
“Oh, aye. And keep it a secret, because he wants his legion pension.”
The two men clasped each other by the wrists.
“Goodbye, old friend,” Junius said.
“Farewell, old enemy,” Arviragus growled.
My heart swelled a bit at the straightness of his spine and the flickering fire I could see kindled to life somewhere deep behind his eyes.
X
THE CLOAK LEANDER had found for me was a shapeless, featureless thing with a deep hood—useful for conveying anonymity, which I desperately needed. As Caesar’s vaunted Victrix, I’d been seen by at least half of the citizens of Rome on more than one occasion, and there was a good chance someone would recognize me if I went about in the streets bareheaded.
And not just me.
We had to tie Elka’s long blonde braids up and hide them beneath a drab shawl she wore over her head. We hid Ajani’s distinctive features beneath a veil. The other girls were likewise disguised, and Cai and Quint both had to stow their legion gear in a trunk and dress in garb befitting merchants, hoping no one would scrutinize their military-short haircuts.