Marilyn Todd - Widow's Pique

Another honey cake disappeared without trace.

'I blame the parents, you know. Children today aren't disciplined enough, and we're starting to see the result of letting the little buggers run wild.'

Claudia glanced across to the courtyard, where Marek and Mir were tormenting a puppy by tossing it back and forth in the air between them, and mused upon pots calling the kettle black.

'That's a very attractive hairstyle,' she said, lining up a walnut on the table.

'Do you think so?' Rosmerta almost purred in delight. 'My wig maker tells me it's all the fashion in Rome.'

'Your wig maker's right.'

Unfortunately, it was a fashion adopted by far younger women.

'Only, I feel it's terribly important for a woman in my position to be stylish, don't you?'

Distracted by her own flounces and frills, Rosmerta missed the walnut pinging off into the courtyard. She caught only her son's yelp as something hit him hard on the ear, and didn't even notice the puppy drop from his hands and run like the wind for cover.

'Put an onion on it, darling,' she called. And get the men to check there isn't a nest nearby, one can never tell with a hornet.'

She turned back and sighed.

'Forgive me, Lady Claudia, but I'd better go. Make sure they get the sting out, and all that. Mustn't have it infecting my baby boy, must we?'

What irony, Claudia thought. The one person she could confide in on this godforsaken island was the last person she ever would…

'Godda margen.'

Apple cheeks flushed pink from working out in the gymnasium poked themselves round the door.

'Has the old trout gone?' Vani mouthed.

Claudia nodded. 'A hornet made an unprovoked attack on your husband — ' (brother-in-law?) — 'and Rosmerta's playing nursemaid.'

'Personally, I can't stand the old cow,' Vani said, perching on the edge of the table and swinging one long, muscular leg. 'But you have to hand it to old Fossil Face there, no one keeps a closer watch on her family. Trust me, cornered vixens couldn't be more protective, and I'm not just talking about her precious cubs.'

She selected a pear from the display on the table, then swapped it for a shiny green apple.

'The slightest sniffle and she's got Kazan wrapped up in bed, and I tell you, if I'd kept all the potions she'd given me to help me conceive, there'd be no room for the bloody bed in the room. Self-defeating or what?'

The sound of Vani's strong teeth crunching into the apple was the only sound in the dining hall and Claudia took advantage of the silence to study the exquisitely executed works of art on the walls, whose significance she was slowly beginning to understand.

Take the scene showing the High Priest hurling a sword into the lake. In this painting, he was surrounded by wailing women and mourners and that's because the spirit of every Histrian warrior is imbued in his weapon while it's being forged. It fell upon Drilo to consign this spirit to the gods after death. Another painting showed the God of the Fields arguing with the god who protects beasts of burden, reflecting the Histri's struggle to balance cruelty with output. But in each of the paintings little fat Varil scampered, either in the form of a goat or, more commonly, as himself. God of Lust and Fertility. In other words, whatever happened in the lives of these people, procreation was paramount.

'You've been trying for babies?' Claudia murmured.

Vani took careful aim before lobbing her apple core into the fountain with a perfect bullseye.

'For that, pumpkin, it takes two, and maybe if my husband spent more time in his wife's bed than with his bloody mastiffs, we'd have a better chance, though frankly, with his miserable performance, I rather doubt it. Mollycoddle them too much and everything goes soft.'

No wonder she found Kazan so attractive. A seasoned womanizer with that oh-so-essential ingredient, charm, he was that archetype of all lovers. The broad hunk with the slow hand. Claudia tried to think of a way to steer Kazan into the conversation.

'It was good of you to look in on me after my fall.'

'Don't be silly, it was the least I could do! I mean, honestly, fit as I am, even I don't take stairs twelve at a time. Dammit, woman, you put me to shame!' Vani shot her a sheepish grin. 'Mind, I thought you were asleep. I suppose you… well, I suppose you saw me kissing Kazan…?'

'Either that, or I dreamed about limpets.'

Vani eased herself off the table and bridged her back on the floor.

'It's only sex. '

Her back arched like a bow.

'The thing is, I signed up for this marriage and I've no intention of leaving my husband, but — well, Kazan's fun.'

She contorted into another gymnastic position.

And we do try to be discreet. Well, discreet-isA/ It's not easy when there are so few opportunities, so when that old battleaxe insisted Kazan remained in your room to keep watch-'

'Rosmerta did?'

'I told you.' Vani was in danger of tying herself in a knot. 'She doesn't look the motherly type, but tigresses could learn from that woman. As far as she's concerned, you're Histri now, pumpkin, and even though she's Illyrian born, she's Histri by marriage and that makes her one herself

'A dozen more stairs and I would have been history in every sense,' Claudia quipped.

Another performance like that, my girl, and I'm in danger of losing my crown for the Milk Race!'

'Milk Race?'

'Sorry, pumpkin, I'm forgetting you're a stranger to these shores.' Muscular legs performed the splits. 'See her?'

Vani pointed to a stone cat curled in the corner.

'That's Kikimora, Goddess of Plenty, and on the day of her festival, libations of milk are poured, rather than wine. Also, since Kikimora stands for contentment, her day is a public holiday with foot races, boxing competitions, wrestling, discus, you name it, hence the term Milk Race. Like the Greeks, though, our men compete naked, and the following day, of course, it's the marriage announcements.'

She straightened up and grinned impishly.

'That way, we girls know what we're getting.'

Although principally a fishing community that served every farm and village in the close proximity, the town of Rovin was still that: a town. A thriving, bustling town to be precise, where bankers set up stalls outside the temples, street sweepers kept the cobbles clean and masons hammered dawn till dusk, sculpting the island's bright, white stone. Since the Histri were self-sufficient in every sense, many trades were absent, such as weavers, barrel makers, basket makers, bone whittlers and dyers, and with no funds for luxury goods, there were no ivory carvers on the island, either, no perfume sellers, glassblowers or spice merchants, which would proliferate in the streets of Pula.

Barber shops were missing, too, the Histri having a strong attachment to their hair, whether on the head, on the face or on the body, a sentiment that sadly applied every bit to women as to men. It seemed odd, not having chariots trying to mow people down every ten seconds, for astrologers not to be touting their charts to read your fortune and viper tamers piping over their menacing charges. But Rovin still resounded to the clack of cobblers bent over their lasts, to the grinding of grain and the sawing of timber, and thirsts were still quenched in the many taverns whose stools spilled out into the shade.

Claudia was one such customer, the tavern keeper both flattered and flustered at such illustrious patronage, so that, having already plied her with a jug of his finest red wine at no cost, he was now in the process of inundating his guest with a selection of cheese pastries, ham rissoles and chunks of blood sausage deep fried with garlic. The tavern was nothing like the one she used to dance in, what seemed like a lifetime ago now. That had been smoke-filled and dirty, populated by sailors disembarking after too many long months at sea. She shuddered at the memory.