Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

Titus shook his head. "I don't know, Caius. As far as I know, he's still unconscious. Lucanus is with him now." He set his jaw in determination and faced me squarely. "Nevertheless, at the risk of incurring your anger, I repeat that I must doubt the involvement of Ironhair in this." He held up his hand, palm towards me, to cut me off before I could respond. "I am not saying I believe the man incapable of such a thing, not at all. But I am saying that it defies credence that he could have planned the event when no one, including yourself, knew that you would go directly to the bath house after the funeral."

"But I didn't go directly to the bath house. I went back to my quarters and changed out of my armour. Had I remained there, he would have made the attempt there. As it was, he followed me to the baths. The only planning necessary was the decision to kill me today, while my mind was occupied with the funeral. The assassin is a stranger, unknown to me, but here in the safety of Camulod I would expect no threat, and even his strangeness ought not to have alerted me. I see many little-known faces around me nowadays. What saved my life, in fact the only thing that saved my life, was that I am aware of such lacunae in my knowledge of the folk here, and so turned around to try to place his face more firmly in my recollection. That's when I saw him lunge at me."

Flavius broke in here. "That's another thing I've found impossible to understand! How could anyone have got in there with a knife?"

I looked at him. "The bath house? He carried it in a towel. Do you examine all your friends while bathing to make sure they are unarmed? No one saw him armed because no one, including me, would ever have thought to look for such a thing there. Even after I had been stabbed, Flavius, no one noticed the blood until the other man screamed."

Neither man had any response to that.

I had tried to walk out of the bath house on my own, but it had been beyond me. Ambrose and Donuil had found me sprawled by the shallow tepid pool as I watched my own blood discolour the water. They had come at the run, bellowing for assistance, and soon the echoing chambers of the bath house were full of the clatter of running boots. I had pulled Ambrose down to me and whispered in his ear, sending both of them running to arrest the man called Ironhair, because I knew he had been behind this. I'd watched them go and felt my head fill with roaring emptiness, and then I lost all awareness.

Others had carried me here to the Infirmary, covered with blankets, and Luke had lost no time in coming to my assistance. Banishing everyone from the Infirmary save Ludmilla, Titus and Flavius, he had washed my wound with a painfully astringent solution that he told me would prevent sepsis of the cut. Then, when he was satisfied that the cut was clean, he had sewn it up—this almost painlessly, I was glad to discover—with seventeen small, carefully fashioned stitches, which he told me would have to remain in place for at least seven days. Only then had he gone to attend to my assailant, held under guard in a separate room. My wound had not been as serious as I had initially feared, and Lucanus's demeanour alone had reassured me as he worked. The incision was long but shallow, little more than skin deep in fact, so the muscles had not been damaged. The instinctual desperation with which I had sucked in my gut and arched my back had saved my life.

Now the door opened and Luke came into the room, looking directly at me.

"What did you hit him with, Cay?"

"My elbow, it was the hardest thing I had available But I hit him clean and well, right at the top of the spine."

"You certainly did. You killed him. Now we'll never know who he was."

I tried to sit up straighter and regretted it immediately. "But he can't be dead! He was alive earlier."

"So was Popilius. I wonder who'll be next? They say death comes in threes."

I winced at the pain in my belly. " That whoreson Peter Ironhair is number three, when I get my hands on him. What in blazes is taking Ambrose so long?"

As though in answer to my question, Donuil strode through the door.

"Donuil! Did you find him?"

He shook his head and gave a short, sharp sigh. "No, we missed him. You were right, obviously. He wasted no time. Must have had someone posted either in or just outside the bath house. As soon as he knew the attempt had failed, he was gone. The guards saw him leave by the main gate with three other men, moving quickly. That was before the news of what had happened even reached the gates. We arrived there much later. I had wasted time checking his known haunts first, the places you told us to search. Stupid of me. I should have sealed the gates immediately."

I waved that aside. "Don't blame yourself for that, my friend. By your own mouth you've just confirmed that he was gone before you could have caught him. At least you found out when he left. Did you send after him?"

"Aye. Ambrose took a full squadron of troopers, and two of his own trackers. His men are bloodhounds. They'll find them."

"Good man, I know they will." I lay back then, seeking respite from the band of fire that seared across my belly, and Luke was at my side immediately, a cup of some foul-tasting brew in his hand. I drank it unwillingly and fell into a deep sleep shortly thereafter.

Luke's soporific had been potent, because by the time I awoke night had fallen and the room in which I lay was lit by several lamps that threw a dim, yellow, comfortably warm light. I made a small movement, an attempt to change position slightly, and was rewarded with a searing blast of pain across my stomach, so that I lay still from then on and dwelt only on my thoughts. My eyes closed after a while, and I lay there dozing, not asleep but merely drifting in and out of awareness, and eventually I heard Ludmilla approach my cot, recognizing her by her quick, light footsteps. For some reason, and whence the impulse came I know not, I kept my eyes closed and feigned sleep. I felt her hand cool on my forehead, and then she moved away from the bed but remained in the room. I heard her sit down, and then the silence stretched, broken only by my own breathing. I opened my eyes after a time and looked at her without moving, but she remained unaware, staring into the light of one of the lamps, her thoughts evidently far away. She was always beautiful, as I had cause to know, but here in the lamplight she was ravishing and I allowed my thoughts to drift as I drank in the pleasure of watching her.

I realized with surprise that I felt neither rancour nor jealousy over the situation that had sprung into being between her and Ambrose. How could I have, I asked myself. What could be more natural than that this beautiful woman and my beloved brother should be attracted each to the other? But what of your dream? a small voice asked within my mind, and I smiled as the answer to that question came to me immediately, filling my chest with gladness and relief.

In the dream, Ludmilla had held up to me Aunt Luceiia's silver mirror, and I had seen myself reflected therein. But what I had seen was my mirror image—my alter ego—Ambrose my brother. I myself had been an eagle at the time, as witnessed by my talons striking the silver surface when I reached for it. Ludmilla had not shown me myself as reason for her happiness, but a semblance of me that she could love with ease, and I recalled the thrill of freedom as my beating wings bore me aloft again from the place where I had almost fallen to the ground in trying to touch her.

Now other footsteps approached the sick room and as they came, Ludmilla rose to her feet. I closed my eyes again before she could notice that I was awake, but kept them open the merest slit, so that I could see who came.

It was Ambrose, and he froze in the entrance as soon as his eyes lit upon her. They stood mute, staring at each other, each afraid to speak. Then Ambrose nodded, his face flushed with pleasure and constraint, and spoke in a low voice.