Kelli Stanley - Nox Dormienda

I looked down to find my hands clenched. I was getting too old for this. I started walking again. Bilicho fell in beside me, and the two soldiers, saying nothing, kept a distance all the way home. I had had enough of conversation for the night.

The two men saluted me when we finally arrived. I watched Arian, who kept his eyes down as he and the centurion faded into the gloom. I unlocked the door to find my bodyguard facing me in a battle position.

“Draco! I used a key!”

He shook his massive head. “When you went away with that man, I thought it best to prepare for anything. Especially with Dominus Bilicho not at home.”

He took his job seriously. Maybe too seriously. When we could breathe again, we walked into the triclinium and found a few lamps still lit.

“Build up the fire. Wake Brutius and tell him to watch for the rest of the night. And tell him to light the kitchen hearth, too.”

Draco tenderly sheathed his cast-off gladius and brought in enough logs for a blizzard. We shrugged off our muddy mantles, and I took out the dead man’s pouch and piece of parchment. By the time Bilicho brought some more lamps from the examination room, Draco was finished.

“Anything else, Master? Food? Drink?”

“Nothing. Go on to bed.”

The mention of sleep made his eyelids heavy. He lumbered through the door, and entered his own room down the hall, shutting it with a light clack.

I turned to Bilicho. “What the hell happened?”

He grinned. “Don’t you want to congratulate ourselves first?”

“You, you mean. Sorry about the story. You know soldiers-they don’t like freedmen.”

“No one does. Yet somehow we breed like rabbits.”

I leaned forward. “Listen-there’s a dead man on top of their altar. And he’s Vibius Maecenas.”

I described how the body was laid out, and told Bilicho what I had found, and what I knew-what there was of it.

“Jupiter’s Balls. So that’s where he went.”

“Who?”

“The Syrian. He must have slipped out when I was inside.”

“Inside what? What happened?”

Bilicho took a few seconds to get it in order. I knew it would be a long story-it always was, with Bilicho. But it was also always worth the wait.

“I caught up with the girl and followed her home. It’s a nice house, small, older style. Looks run down, though. Old door hinges, for one thing, and some of the wall beams are rotten. The roof probably leaks. So my guess is they need money.”

I nodded. That tallied with the market gossip.

“I decided to hole up in an empty market stall across the street. I waited about an hour, thinking nothing interesting was going to happen, and then a man in his early twenties sauntered up to the door. Black hair, well-built, definitely a native. And he was wearing good clothes-too good for that neighborhood. A slave answered when he knocked-a bearded man, red-haired, kind of wild-eyed. About fifty. Bad teeth, too. He probably stank-the younger one kept a distance.”

“Then what?”

“The slave wouldn’t let him in-kept shaking his head. I could tell the man was getting angry, and even from across the street I could hear raised voices. Then he reached for something inside his cloak, and the slave vanished and shut the door like a conjuring trick. The other one just folded his arms and waited.

“About a minute later, the door opened a crack, and he slipped inside. So then I figured I’d better find out more about him, and the corner bakery seemed like a good place to start.”

Bilicho paused for a moment, and picked at a tooth.

“I think that bastard baker adds rocks to the dough. Anyway, he was a typical nosy neighbor and told me Claudia’s family-just she, her father, an underage brother and a couple of servants-are down on their luck, and have been for a year or so. ‘I wouldn’t mind a piece a’ her’, he croaked at me. A real gent. Apparently the only piece he gets is her tongue, and not where it would feel good.”

Bilicho saw my face get red, and hurried a little.

“Ur … the young man. The baker said he’s been after Claudia since her husband died, about a year ago. That’s when their finances went to hell, too. His name is Rhodri. And he’s got a lot of money, for a Roman-hater.”

I looked up. Bilicho nodded.

“He’s made no secret about it. The baker hemmed and hawed a bit, but hinted around that this Rhodri is involved with the old religion. Well, of course he hates Agricola, because of Mona. He fought there, apparently, and he’s living proof the governor didn’t exactly succeed in killing off all the Druids. So naturally Rhodri hates him and everything the Romans do.”

I could understand why. I’d almost left Agricola over it. “Go on.”

“Well, I’d gotten this much out of the old man for the price of an as or two and a chipped tooth, and was on the point of trying to find something else to buy that wouldn’t kill me when out of the corner of my eye I saw the girl leaving the house.”

“How long afterward?”

“I’d been talking maybe half an hour. So I see her, wrapped up in something considerably less fine than she was when she came to you, and I thanked the baker with promises of drinks to come. Then I followed her up the street. Her head was covered, and she was in a plain brown mantle, worn at the edges, but I could tell it was her and not a slave woman from the walk and the shape. She knew where she was going-didn’t pause, didn’t look for markers, didn’t ask for directions. So I figured she’d been there before.”

“Go on.” I was getting nervous.

“I stayed behind her pretty close. Went through some nasty alleys-I don’t know if I’ll ever get the pig shit out of my boots. She was making for the center of town, right off the main market, and bold as a peacock marched straight into Lupo’s Place.

“So you were there this evening!”

Bilicho nodded, and allowed himself a pleased smile. “On business, not pleasure.”

“Why was she there? What possible reason could she have for going to a-” I stopped. I felt my face turn red again.

“She wasn’t … selling herself, was she?”

Bilicho looked at me with a modicum of pity. “No, Arcturus, she wasn’t. At least I don’t think so.”

“What do you mean, you don’t think so? Was she or wasn’t she?”

“I-don’t-know. Let me finish telling you what I do know, and you can figure it out.”

I glared at him until I felt better.

“I followed her in, and bought a drink and a semi-decent chicken leg and cheese. The cheese tasted more like beer than the beer did, but it was better than the bakery. She talked to the innkeeper for a few minutes, then walked upstairs-that’s the inn. The whores are kept on the ground floor, in back of the tavern. The barman saw me looking at her.

“ ‘Good-looking little squeeze, that one’, he said. ‘Too bad she’s marrying a fat, hairy foreigner. Persian or something. Rich as Croesus, but not as pretty-even now!’ He laughed at his own bad joke, and the stench that came out of his mouth was enough to make me wish I hadn’t bought the food.

“ ‘Why doesn’t she marry her own kind?’ I figured the native approach would keep him talking, and I made sure not to speak Latin.

“He scratched a wart on the side of his nose, then blew it. ‘Ah, there’s them that wants her but can’t afford her. Leastways, not yet. Young man, nice looking, British of course.’

“ ‘Of course.’ I leaned over the bar and placed my elbow next to his. ‘Is that where she’s going now? To meet her lover?’

“He leaned in close, and I held my breath so I wouldn’t get sick. Thinking about it still makes me want to light some incense.”