Ruth Downie - Semper Fidelis

“I’m Virana.”

“I can’t see you this evening, Virana.”

The girl was looking him up and down with undisguised admiration. “You are an officer!”

“Someone has to be.”

She shook her head. A loop of brown hair escaped from whatever was supposed to be holding it in place. “I am not here to see you. They said if I want to see your wife, I must come to the mansio.”

“Ah,” said Ruso. He turned to the manager, who was eyeing the girl as if he were planning to have her swept into the drain as soon as Ruso had gone. “Did my wife tell you that she might have visitors?”

“She did mention something, sir.”

“Well, this is one of them,” said Ruso, wishing Tilla had explained more clearly who those visitors might be. “Can she wait here while I fetch her?”

It was not really a question, and the manager knew it.

Virana was clearly delighted to be given more time to examine her surroundings. As Ruso left the hall in the company of one of the mansio slaves, he heard the manager snap, “Don’t touch those flowers!”

The walkway provided some shelter as the slave led him out around the courtyard and tapped on the fourth door. Beyond it he found a simple room, and in that room was just the sort of domestic scene a man wanted to come home to after a long day. A beautiful blond woman was presiding over a small table laden with a selection of salads and meats, a flagon of wine, a jug of water, and two cups.

“I did not know when you would be back, so I thought cold food would be easiest.”

“Ah.”

Tilla reached for his hand. “You look tired, husband. Is it true that a man jumped off a roof and killed himself?”

That was how it was in places like this: A man inside a fortress had only to sneeze and moments later half a dozen people on the far side of the wall were wishing him good health. He said, “It hasn’t been a good day.”

“It is over now. Sit and eat.”

“There’s someone waiting-”

“Let them wait.” She pulled the chair out for him, then handed him a cup. “Why did he do it?”

He took a sip of the wine and hoped they would not have the nerve to charge much for it. “I don’t know.”

“They said he was from the Atrebates.”

“Was he?” Nobody had mentioned Sulio’s tribal origins. Probably because only other Britons would be interested. “Tilla, I can’t stay. I’m sorry. I have to go and talk army business over dinner.”

“But I thought-”

“And there’s a patient waiting for you in the entrance hall.”

She sighed, looking at the food. “I suppose if I put a cloth over the top, it will do for breakfast. So you are going back to the fort?”

“I’ll be here, planning the move back to Deva with the tribune and the local centurions.”

“I do not like that tribune.”

“I didn’t know you’d spoken to him.”

“When you are not there, he looks at me.”

“Really?” He would keep an eye on Accius from now on.

“Not in that way,” she added quickly. “At least, I think not. More as if I am something strange and interesting.”

“What a perceptive man.”

“And, unlike you, he has never been rude to me.”

Ruso grinned, just to show he was not in the least bit perturbed by Accius being younger than he was, almost handsome, powerful, rich, and unable to keep his eyes off other people’s wives.

Tilla had moved on to a new subject. “I suppose Minna will be there, too, bossing the slaves around.” She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “Finish the wine at least. It will help you put up with all the boring soldiers.”

“I’ll be as boring as I can. Then perhaps we’ll finish early.”

She leaned across the table and kissed him. “I am sure you will be very good at it.”

It was not until he was sitting on a towel in the hot room of the mansio bathhouse, feeling the sweat begin to sting his eyes and trickle down the small of his back, that he realized he had forgotten to ask her to clean up his kit.

Later, perhaps while they were both polishing in a scene of domestic harmony he could not quite picture, he would see if she could shed any light on this business with the recruits. Despite a brief fling with the followers of Christos in Gaul, Tilla retained a firm belief in the power of cursing and blessing. She might have some insight into what the Britons thought was going on here. And then he could work out how to deal with it.

Ruso did not know a great deal about curses, but he did have a wide experience of army recruits. The impression he had formed at medical examination boards was that most of them were very young and poorly educated. Many were away from home for the first time, and even the best were trying not to show how nervous they were. His limited contact with them farther down the road suggested that Geminus’s men would now be exhausted by the rigors of training, feeling trapped inside the fort, struggling with a level of discipline they had not known at home, and no doubt wondering if they had made a terrible mistake. Isolated from their own tribes, fed on rumor and grieving for lost comrades, he could see how these young men had worked themselves up into a panic.

Accius, evidently well briefed, had done his best to settle them down before they went back to barracks for their evening meal. As befitted a young man with an expensive education, he knew how to give a speech. Better still, he knew when to stop. In a very short space of time he had said all the things they needed to hear. He had looked out over the men of the Twentieth assembled beneath the roof from which the recruit had jumped. He introduced himself with the clarity and authority of a man twice his age. He offered them his sincere condolences on the death of Sulio, whose mind had gone. He honored the bold rescue attempt of Centurion Geminus and the men who had supported him. He commended their example to the recruits, reminding them that soon they would be back at the Legion’s main base in Deva, where the discipline, bravery, and loyalty they had begun to develop here would bring them the advancement they deserved. They would be a credit to their centurion and their families back at home.

Finally, he announced a dawn parade at which he would personally preside over the sacrifice of a prize ram to Jupiter. Prayers would be said for the safety of the emperor and the spirits of the departed, and every man would be there in full dress uniform to witness it.

Accius was undeniably impressive, and it had seemed to Ruso that the young men whom Geminus marched out of the hall were less wild-eyed than before. Perhaps it was the presence of an officer of Accius’s standing. Perhaps it was the prospect of a long evening shining up such parade kit as recruits in basic training might manage to muster. Most likely it was the neat way the tribune had managed to respond to their fears without openly acknowledging them. He must have known what had been going on, and the people who had briefed him must be the centurions with whom Ruso was about to spend the evening. Perhaps he would find out what really had happened to young Tadius-and why Pera wanted it kept quiet.

Ruso wiped the sweat from his eyes and breathed in gently so as not to scald the lining of his nose. Deciding he had suffered enough, he got up from the bench and clacked across the hot floor on wooden sandals. A quick scrape of the dirt, a cold plunge, a rubdown, and he would be ready for a dinner which might turn out to be much more interesting than he had led Tilla to believe.

The black beads were cheap and the pink dress had been made for someone much slimmer. The first owner had probably abandoned it when efforts to scrub out a spatter of grease spots across the middle of the skirt had left them marooned in a faded patch.