Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

"Nothing, Caius, but it has everything to do with your condition . . ." He waited, smiling more naturally now, waiting for my reaction. When he saw that my confusion had merely increased, he spoke again. "The child's mother, Julia, is the only woman in more than thirty years who has come close to making me regret my celibacy. Her mere existence disturbs me deeply. I lust for her, asleep and awake, and I am an old man." My mouth fell open but he spoke on, now giving me no opportunity to respond. "The mere sight or recollection of her fills me with terror and with thoughts and sensations I would have sworn were dead within me. Aware of that, the prospect of having a child of hers named after me would have been unbearable, a living reminder of my weakness. So you see, Caius, you are not unique, and no one, ever, is impervious to lust."

"Good God, Luke! And you told her this?"

"Not entirely, but she understood."

"And now what? How does she behave towards you?"

He shrugged. "Entirely as she always has, with kindness and consideration. Only with a more marked avoidance of approaching me too closely."

"She avoids you?"

"Not at all. She is merely gracious enough not to tempt me more than she must by her presence."

"You did tell her!"

We were interrupted at that point by the arrival of Dedalus who sought to drag me off to speak with Achmed Cato on a disciplinary matter. I held up my hand to stay Ded and indicate that I would come directly, but I kept my eyes on Lucanus. He smiled again and shrugged his shoulders. "Some of it. As in your case, I benefited thereby. Confession is good for the soul."

I heaved a great sigh of relief, feeling enormously better. "Thank you for this, Luke," I said, turning to where Ded stood frowning at both of us, curious as he always was. "I know how difficult it must have been, but I appreciate your candour."

Later that evening, in the family room, I watched Julia closely, marvelling over what Luke had told me. She was a comely, wholesome, healthy young woman, generously fleshed, aged somewhere short of thirty I suspected, with a pleasant, happy nature and an ever-ready smile. She doted visibly upon her husband and upon the son she now held easily within the cradle of one arm. But I could see no reason for Luke's lust. She was no Siren, bearing more resemblance to Juno, with her double chin and ample, milk-swelled breasts, than to Venus. Lucanus ignored both her and me that night, until the bishop Enos wandered in and settled by the fire and the talk changed to churchly things for once. Enos was saying that the Church maintained its methods of communicating from one land to another, so that the word could go from bishops in Britain to others far afield, like my old friend Bishop Germanus in Gaul. That captured all my attention, and when I asked him if he was saying a letter could be sent from one land and delivered safely in another he seemed surprised that I might doubt it for a moment. From that moment on, Germanus remained foremost in my thoughts, and that night I sat down to write to him.

Germanus Pontifex

From Caius Merlyn Britannicus

Greetings:

I write to you as bishop, though recalling you clearly as Legate, soldier and friend, in complete uncertainty that you will ever read my words.

My father's aunt, Luceiia Britannicus Varrus, of whom we spoke when first we met on the way to Verulamium, has recently died, as have some other, aged friends, and my grief is still fresh and new. She was old when I met you, as you may recall; too old to make the hundred- mile journey to hear your judgment on the teachings of my father's friend Pelagius. Seven years have passed since then, and she has finally expired.

Much has occurred in my life during those years, Master Germanus, and I had met no other bishop since that time until my aunt lay dying. She was devout, and faithful to the teachings of her gentle Christus, and she took pleasure all her life in the sustenance of His labourers, the bishops and the wandering men of God who keep this land of ours enlightened.

One of these men, calling himself Enos, was present at her bedside when she died, and consecrated bread and wine to her salvation. He has no home today, no Seat to oversee, now that the towns in this fair land of ours are fallen into ruin. You were correct in that, prophetic. Now Enos wanders, as he says, "wherever Heaven bids him," and he tells me that the Church is stronger here in Britain nowadays than it has ever been. When there were towns, the Christians held the towns, but the majority of rural folk were pagan pantheists. Now that has changed, he tells me, and the Word of God is everywhere throughout the land.

I asked about your schools. In Verulamium you had decreed that schools be founded to instruct the teachers in the ways of God. Where are they? He answered that they are within the hearts and minds and bodies of such as he; that their classrooms are the open glades and riverbanks and village pastures; that their students are the people, all the folk, including Saxons.

That disturbed me. It still does. Saxons are not "the folk." The folk of Britain are the native Celts and the descendants of four hundred years of Roman life and Roman occupation. Enos told me I am unchristian to deny God's wealth to any. I responded that God spread His wealth with even-handedness and that I grudge no man God's wealth, providing he enjoys it in his own homeland. So he it, I fear I may be damned.

I transmit this with Enos, who has hopes that it may reach you, somehow, in your home in Gaul. I hope it may, but were it lost forever, the writing of it has eased a troubled mind. Farewell

Merlyn Britannicus

Post Scriptum:

I rejoice to tell you that I have heard nothing in years from that new breed of Roman priests whom you called the monastics. You, for your part, may take pleasure in the knowledge that the name Pelagius has faded from our tongues . . . and hence from the minds of all save errant fools like me.

The advent of spring revived imperatives that could no longer be neglected or denied. Before the last of the snow had melted from the ground, our horsemen were manoeuvring again, the veteran cavalry once more forming the tight formations we had evolved through the years and sharpening the skills we had been unable to practice through the long months that had passed. New cavalry troops had been created, too, during the winter, and now rode in groups and squadrons, though without the tightly disciplined sharpness of the others. These men had learned to ride in theory only, walking or trotting their horses on the frozen drilling plain, learning the basic features of control. None of them, however, had ridden at the canter, and none had known the elemental freedom and power born of being astride a running horse at full gallop. Now they began to learn, and many a flying rump learned painfully that the frost had not yet loosed its hold on the earth.

This training all took place in an atmosphere of good-natured raillery, but there was serious intent beneath the laughter. The thousand men dispatched this spring from Camulod would all be horsed. Five hundred would be seasoned cavalry, the other five experienced infantry, mounted for speed. When the time came to fight, as come it would, the two would act in unison, the infantry dismounted, in their own element, and the cavalry free to range widely, driving the enemy onto the spears awaiting in the infantry's serried ranks.

I sat my horse beside Ambrose and Dedalus one afternoon close to the drilling ground, on the road, some way above the wide-stretched plain, where I could watch the parties wheel and regroup. Beside me, Dedalus cleared his throat and growled, "Now there's a likely rider."

I turned and glanced to see who had attracted his attention and failed to recognize the rider who was galloping towards us, crouched low over the neck of a big black like my own that was running strongly. Only when the rider sat back, reining the horse into a sliding halt and pulling off the helmet did I recognize Shelagh, and such was my shock that I could not react beyond staring open-mouthed. She shook out her long hair, appearing extremely pleased with herself, and kneed her horse towards us, up the hill, and as she did so I heard my companions explode into howls of hilarity. Shelagh was dressed as a man, armoured from head to toe in my own black and silver colours. Heavy, ring-mail leggings covered her legs and a tunic of the same material hung beneath her cuirass. She came straight up to where I sat, and bowed from the saddle as deeply as her armour would allow.