David Drake: To Bring the Light

He turned his face toward her and added, “It’s because you can read that you know about these things?”

“I suppose so,” Herosilla said. “I know a lot of things that aren’t true as well. Since I came here last month I’ve had a hard time deciding which things belong in which category.”

Remus laughed, then sobered slowly. “It’ll be good having our own grainfields with the new colony,” he said after a time. “I’m not sure that I’m going to like living in a city of six hundred people, though. It’ll take some getting used to. At least we’ll be able to get the drainage right.”

“You’ll have more power,” Herosilla said, watching her companion to see how he would react. “Real power. The ford here is the best route across the river for many miles. You can grow wealthier than Numitor ever thought of being.”

“I’m not my brother,” Remus said; an observation rather than a gibe. “Living as a free man among free men is…”

He looked directly at her again. That he desired Herosilla was as clear as the fact he had no intention of acting on that desire unbidden. “I was going to say ‘enough’. But I honestly can’t imagine anything better.”

Herosilla didn’t speak for a moment. She’d met very few people whom she really liked, and there were fewer still natural gentlemen. To find both rarities combined in a shepherd from a barbarous village was as remarkable as the lightning bolt that had transported her here.

A very handsome shepherd, besides.

“Remus,” she said briskly. “Do you ever worry about dying? Of being killed?”

“No,” he said with a dismissive shrug. “Oh, I expect it’ll happen. I’m not one to start trouble, but often enough somebody else will and I’m not going to stand back, either. A man can’t worry about that, though. Not and live like a free man.”

“Much as I thought,” Herosilla said. She patted his arm. “Help me up,” she directed. “We’ll go back to the village now.”

As they rose, as graceful as a pair of panthers, Herosilla added, “And since you’re not going to worry about keeping yourself alive, I’ll take care of that too. Along with the drainage.”

The colony celebrated its first night on the Palatine with mutton and vast quantities of beer. It seemed to Herosilla that at least half the settlers ate and drank more like mourners at a funeral feast than in joyous anticipation of the future.

The moon was full again. Flavia Herosilla had lived in this age almost exactly one month. The location was nearly the same as well: the brothers had decided to place the settlers’ temporary shelters on the broad pasture at the north side of the hill rather than clustering them around the existing houses of Palatium.

Herosilla thought of looking for the oak that lightning blasted when she arrived; she decided the sight would depress her even more. Besides, several families were probably using the stump to support one end of their lean-tos.

She’d been alone during most of her former life. Now she was lonely: there was no one in this age with whom she shared more than a month’s worth of memories.

“Mistress Herosilla?” Romulus said, coming out of the shadows. Dozens of small cookfires burned among the warren of shelters, but at any distance the vagrant light they threw was more distorting than an aid to vision.

“Leader?” called a burly man coming from the other direction. He wore a cape with a patterned border, marking him as a person of wealth. “Can I speak to you? I’m Gaius Helvius and I’ve got a pottery workshop.”

“Co-leader,” Herosilla said.

“Co-leader,” Romulus agreed with a nod. He looked over the other man and added with a slight frown. “Are you a member of the colony, Helvius?”

“We’d like to be,” Helvius said nervously. He was wringing his hands beneath his cape. “I wasn’t going to come, you know, not and live in a field for, well, the gods know how long. But the wife and I talked this morning and with Numitor king… well, can you take another household, us and my slaves?”

“Always glad to have another citizen, Gaius,” Romulus said. “We’ll be making the allotments at the assembly tomorrow, so you’re not even late.”

He turned his back on the potter to end the conversation. Helvius babbled thanks anyway, then scurried into the darkness.

“There’s a hut on the knoll,” Romulus said to Herosilla, nodding toward the drystone building she remembered from the evening she arrived. “Will you walk up there with me where we can talk without people interrupting?”

“Yes, all right,” Herosilla said after a moment’s consideration. The beehive structure was slightly above the camp, but it was well within the distance she could shout if there was trouble. “But we’ll stay outside.”

“Whatever you want,” Romulus said curtly. He led the way up the track worn by generations of sheep. Herosilla followed, stumbling occasionally but better able to stay with him than she would have been a month before.

Sheep rubbing themselves on the shelter’s lower layers had worn the stones smooth. Tufts of wool fluttered from crevices and the air breathed the warm, slightly sweetish odor of lanolin. Herosilla could see and hear more of the encampment’s sad bustle than she had when she stood on a level with it.

“You don’t like me, do you, lady?” Romulus said bluntly.

She sniffed. “No, of course not,” she said. “Why should I like you? You’re a boor, a braggart, and you tried to rape me. Nonetheless, I want the same thing you do: a city here that will become the greatest the world will ever see. You—your presence, your vision—is necessary for that dream to succeed.”

Romulus nodded. He didn’t appear to be offended by her equal frankness. Though pride got in the way of his thinking on occasion, Herosilla knew Romulus was far more than a stupid shepherd.

“And you do like my brother,” Romulus said. “That’s true too, isn’t it?”

“As a person?” Herosilla said. “Yes, I rather do. He has just as much will and intelligence as you do, though he directs it differently. Do you know, he says he wants to learn to read?”

She smiled ruefully. “Not that there’s a great deal to read in this age.”

She heard the rustle behind her. Thick cloth covered her head before she could turn. She tried to strike backward but Romulus snatched her feet into the air.

Herosilla hit the ground hard. The impact knocked the air from her lungs; the cloth was smothering her. She stabbed with her fingers and tore flesh.

“Death take you, Celer!” Romulus snarled. “Get her arms!”

Callused hands twisted Herosilla’s wrists together. She tried to shake the bag away from her head. A fist hard enough to drive tent pegs slammed the pit of her stomach.

For a moment Herosilla’s consciousness was a red glow hovering close to black. She felt herself being moved; the movement stopped. Hands stuffed a wad of raw wool in her mouth, then tied a strip of cloth at the back of her neck to keep the gag in place.

A figure knelt over her, silhouetted against the low door arch. She was in the herdsman’s shelter; hints of moonlight came through chinks in the stones.

“Listen to me, lady,” Romulus said. He paused to control his breathing. “I can’t trust you not to turn the crowd against me at the assembly in the morning. You’ll wait here until it’s decided who rules the colony. If you’ve been quiet, you’ll be released with no harm done… but if you try to raise a fuss, well, Celer’s going to be right outside. He’ll hear you before anybody else does, and he’ll cut your throat.”

Herosilla’s ankles were bound; her wrists were tied behind her to a peg hammered into the hard dirt floor. She tried to kick Romulus. He chuckled and backed out of the hut.