“Fort’s up ahead, sir.”
Varro desperately tried to remember where he was before he opened his eyes. The pain medication Scortius had given him must be potent stuff. A lot of hours must have passed since he’d taken the damn powder and his brain still felt as though his was trying to think through a linen sheet.
Rumbling.
Yes, he was on a cart. On the engineering wagon, with the bearded giant. Oh yes, and he was wounded.
“Ow!”
The captain sat up with a sharp motion, causing his head to swim slightly. The field medic, who had joined the wagon shortly after Varro and had stayed aboard ever since, gave him the despairing look that doctors reserve for a difficult patient, and pulled a dressing tighter round his middle.
“Captain, you really have to sit still.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Varro asked.
The medic sighed and directed a level glare at the captain.
“You gave me so much trouble last time I changed the dressing, I thought I’d try again while you were asleep. You wouldn’t have needed all these changes, sir, if you’d not tried riding your horse until the wound was fully sealed.”
With a last tug, he tied off the dressing.
“I’ll not bother making a neat job of it, captain. You’ll be in the camp in five minutes and then you’ll need to go and clean up properly. Be very careful and I need you to go and see doctor Scortius at some point before sunset tonight.”
Varro grumbled something that could have been an agreement and prodded at his side.
As the medic clambered down from the wagon and hurried alongside the column, stuffing his kit back into the medical bag, Varro leaned to one side and saw through the dusty haze the familiar and welcome sight of the great, heavy grey stone walls of the Crow Hill fort and the large oak gates standing wide open to admit the column. The vanguard were already inside and dispersing. Corda and the Second would be inside in a few minutes, but despite what the medic had said, it would be at least fifteen minutes before the slow, lumbering carts and wagons of the engineers crossed the threshold. With a sigh, he leaned back and drifted away into comfortable sleep once more.
“Sir.”
Again Varro stirred with difficulty and took a moment to focus his gaze on the great, bearded young engineer sitting beside him.
“Mmmph?” The captain wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist and pulled himself a little further upright.
“We’re here sir. Thought you might wanna get down ‘fore I head to the compound?” the engineer said quietly. “You sure you’re alright sir? You’ve slept most of the day away.”
Varro nodded wearily.
“Just the medication. Thanks for the lift lad. And thank your sergeant for me.”
The big man smiled. “I’ll do that, sir.”
As the captain climbed down and unhooked his horse’s reins from the wagon, the engineer sat patiently and, as soon as Varro and his mount were free, he saluted, shook his own reins and trundled slowly off toward the engineers’ section. The captain stood for a moment, getting his bearings, and then realised the soldier had brought the wagon round half the camp and deposited him about thirty paces from his house.
“That’s what a little courtesy gets you” he muttered smugly to himself as he led his colt to the one-horse stable that formed the rear entrance to his abode. Every fort, Empire-wide, followed the same rough plan as Crow Hill, but in these days of relative stability, the four great armies rarely moved from their base for any length of time, preferring to send out small sub-units on six month tours to man smaller forts on the frontiers. The centre of the fortress held the great headquarters building with its fine arcade, the prefect’s house with its peristyle garden and three wings, and also those small, yet still impressive, abodes of his adjutant and staff officers. Behind them stood the temple to the Imperial Gods in white marble, the shrine to the Emperor Darius with its gilt statue and the many facilities the fort required, from the enormous vaulted bathing complex to the contained rows of shops staffed and run by civilians from the local area. Then, fanning out from the centre like the rays of the Sun God depicted on Pelasian temples, the rows of barrack blocks, each with a sergeant’s small house at the end. And at the near terminus of each street of barracks, the houses of the departmental sergeants for each cohort. Finally, between them and the central area: the houses of the six cohort captains and the other two mid-ranking officers in charge of the camp and the stores.
These houses, eight identical buildings standing facing one another along the near end of the four streets that cut the fort into quarters, were well-appointed as befitted a cohort’s commanding officer. Essentially a two-storey town house with a garden and stable at rear, they towered above the barracks and were, in turn, towered above by the headquarters and command area.
Fastening his horse in the compact stable he noted that Martis had run on ahead and filled the feed rack with hay. With a weary smile, he closed up and headed through the interior door into his house, already glowing with the light of small oil lanterns and slowly beginning to warm through with the crackle of fire from the hearth on the main room.
“Martis?”
The stocky manservant came sauntering slowly from the kitchen, a large knife in one hand and a fresh half-plucked game bird hanging from the other. “Sir?”
He shook his head.
“Never mind, Martis. You keep preparing dinner. Best prepare a good amount too. I’ll likely have Corda round for the evening. If anyone calls for me, I’ll be in the bathhouse for the next forty five minutes or so.”
Martis nodded. “I anticipated a larger gathering, sir. I’ve also placed another waterproof pad on the table by the door, along with your dress uniform. It will save time if you dress fully before returning from the baths.”
Varro laughed loud. “Martis, I need to give you an extra corona a week. Are you content with that?”
“Most assuredly, sir.” The servant bowed slightly and then spun and returned to the kitchen with his goods.
Varro, still smiling, collected the neat pile of green tunic and breeches, his cloak and other accoutrements, along with the waxed and treated leather pad, and made his way out of the house and along the busy street in the rapidly diminishing daylight. Even after a day of relative rest, twice on the short journey he had to stop at the side of the street and lean on the wall, clutching his painful side while he regained his breath and each time, concerned soldiers would ask him if he needed help. As he once more pushed himself away from the wall in the direction of the baths, waving aside offers of assistance, he made a mental note to ask Scortius later about the possibility of different medicine. Something that lasted longer but allowed him to think a little straighter. This felt like the time as a newly-commissioned captain he’d caught some Gods-awful fever in the swamps near the northwest coast.
Finally arriving at the baths some minutes later, he passed beneath the great arch and made his way to the changing room. Leaving his clothes in one of the alcoves under the watchful eye of the civilian attendant, he carefully removed the temporary dressing the field medic had applied on the cart. Wincing as the last of the pad came away where it had stuck to the blood, he slipped a robe over his shoulders, carefully pressed the treated leather patch to his side, and entered the central area of the bathhouse. Within minutes he had been oiled, scraped and rubbed down and was sinking gratefully into a small, private, warm bath. Fortunately, while most of the army would be desperate to get to the baths after the day’s travel, the majority of them would have innumerable tasks to perform before they had the chance; even the non-wounded officers, who would be required to settle their units and report in before going off-duty.
Leaning his head back on the tiled edge of the semi-circular bath, he allowed himself to doze lightly for a while.
A half hour later, cleaner if not refreshed, the captain walked out of the baths and into the dark street, the dying embers of the day casting an orange glow on the dark cerulean horizon and lending the shadowy street a strange glow. His head still hazy and his sight slightly blurred, presumably from the mixture of the dull pain, the after effects of the drug and the steam heat within the baths, he walked directly into the soldier before he saw him.
“You alright, captain?” the soldier asked with concern, grasping him by the upper arm and holding him.
Varro shook his head slightly, startled. The lower ranks didn’t treat their seniors like this. He squinted in the low light and the figure swam slowly into focus. The neat uniform and shiny armour, the black crest and cloak and the white baldric bearing the raven and the wolf; the uniform of the marshal’s personal guard. Even the lowest member of that honoured unit might argue seniority over a cohort captain. Varro steadied himself and nodded, as though to an equal.
“Just suffering a little after effect from the battle. Apologies.”
“No apology necessary, captain, as long as you’re alright”, the man replied sincerely.
Varro stepped back and straightened a little. The cooler night air was beginning to clear his head a little and his focus was sharpening. The man was not alone, but indeed part of a squad of six guards, all in the marshal’s guard dress uniform, and betwixt them stood a slighter, shorter figure wrapped tightly in a lustrous dark blue robe against the chill of the night air. Varro frowned as he caught sight of the pale, slender hand holding the robe closed, and the two white gold and amethyst rings on the hand.
“Catilina?”
The captain stepped back and straightened, a dozen emotions fighting for control of his face. He suddenly felt quite ill.
“Catilina…”
The lady let the hood of the robe fall back to reveal her delicate porcelain features. Her prefect brow and the tresses and curls of her ebony hair gave her an austere and otherworldly appearance in the strange, waning sunlight. Catilina had been renowned as a beauty from a very young age and many a courtier had been deceived by her looks into believing her to be flighty, weak or even vapid. Nothing could be farther from the truth and, given her parentage, there was no surprise in that. marshal Sabian had built the modern Imperial army back up from scratch, and the Lady Cassida had survived twenty years of civil war as mistress of her own estate, purely through nerve and insight, while many a powerful lord had fallen.
“Captain Varro, you should address me as Lady Sabianus.” The primness of her words caught Varro off guard and he stood dumb, weighing her words and trying to decide whether she was truly serious or playing some game with him. This was not a simple woman, even in simple conversation.
She waited a moment, watching the uncertainty on Varro’s face. “Has the constant drudgery of battle finally driven your Gods-born manners from you?” she enquired in a flat tone.
The captain remained still. When he opened his mouth to reply, all that came out was a choking, stuttering noise. He felt a slight flush rise in his cheeks and damned himself to more than one hell for showing such childish weakness in front of professional soldiers. He was a longstanding and decorated veteran and yet, faced with a dozen words from Catilina he fell apart like a fresh faced boy. A low growl of irritation or anger began to well up deep in his throat.
“Varro,” the woman laughed lightly, her eyes suddenly sparkling in the moonlight, matching the amethysts on her fingers almost perfectly. “I do believe you are blushing!”
Before he could react, for which he was truly grateful, Catilina’s smile warmed and she tilted her head slightly to one side.
“But I see you’ve been wounded again, my dear captain.”
Varro’s hand went to his aching side in an involuntary movement.
“Yes.”
The lady locked his eyes with her own for a moment and a look of concern passed briefly across her face before being replaced once more with a visage of good natured elegance. Her eyes bored into his.
“You’re not yourself, Varro” she stated as a matter of fact.
He shook his head and gave a weak smile, but Catilina tapped her cheek with a slender finger, her gaze never leaving his face.
“You’ve no banter and no quick wit. Most unlike you. Your eyes seem hazy and they wander while I speak.” To emphasise her point, she held up her index finger and moved it slowly from side to side while her eyes remained locked on his face.
Varro found with great irritation, that he was watching her finger and shaking his head like an idiot. He growled and waved a hand at her irritably, dismissing the conversation, but her look hardened.
“You’ve been on mare’s mead,” she said with a note of accusation. “Or something stronger, possibly. Whatever it is, you don’t look well.”
Finally Varro found his voice. It wasn’t as strong as he’d like, but still clear enough in the cool evening air.
“I’m fine, Lady Sabianus.” He stressed the title a little too much. “A little battered, but I’m fine. I’m due to see Scortius sometime today…” He looked around the street, now almost dark with the sun fully set. “Tonight, I suppose.”
Catilina glared at him.
“You need to see him now, Varro. Not later. I’ll have two of the guard escort you.”
Varro waved his hands at her in a way he hoped looked pleasantly admonishing and shook his head, which threatened to send his brain spinning once more. The queasiness came again in a sudden blast but was, fortunately, gone in a flash.
“I’m going to see him later,” he replied flatly. “Right now, I’m going home for a while. I haven’t eaten for a year or so, my stomach tells me.”
For a long moment the two held each others’ gaze, locked in a battle of wills, until Catilina looked away, folding her arms indignantly to indicate to all present that she had decided the captain’s decision was wrong but was willing to watch him fail to prove her point.
Varro ground his teeth in frustration. No matter how he dealt with Catilina, in every argument, every conversation and even every minor exchange of greetings, he had always left feeling that he had lost the debate and she had let him go.
“I’ll no doubt see you shortly, Lady Sabianus. I expect your father and the prefect will want to see me tomorrow.”
Catilina regarded him with an unreadable expression.
“In this world, Varro, all things are possible.”
She gestured at the man Varro had bumped into.
“Crinus, take two others and make sure the captain gets back to his house safely.”
She looked at him and smiled mischievously.
“If, that is, he can remember where he lives.”
Varro continued to grind his teeth, unable to form a suitable reply. His mind was feeling surprisingly clouded, even here in the late evening breeze.
“Come!” Catilina waved to her retinue and swept away past the captain toward the grand headquarters building at the centre of the fort.
The captain watched her go with a curious mixture of desire and relief. The three remaining guards exchanged a look that Varro recognised in irritation: soldiers that had been assigned a duty they felt was beneath them. Baby-sitting. He grinned a wicked grin.
“So, lads. Who’s for a jug of good wine?”
The senior of the soldiers regarded Varro with something akin to disdain, as though he were some sort of carrion, and returned the captain’s smile with no warmth.
“Home, Captain.”
The other two guards reached for Varro’s elbows as if to support him, and he pulled away indignantly with as much pride as he could muster.
“I’m quite capable of walking, even if the Lady feels I need an escort,” he narrowed his eyes at their leader. “So let’s just go.”
The group of four walked purposefully along the street toward the officers’ quarters as the arteries of the fortress gradually filled with off-duty soldiers on their way to the baths, taverns, gambling pits, or to the other dens of pleasure that were to be found in the civilian settlement just beyond the fort’s massive walls. As he walked, Varro found he had to concentrate with every step to prevent himself staggering.
As they rounded a corner, sergeant Corda strode into view, still in his armour and coated in the grime of travel. Varro nodded a professional greeting as he came to as steady a halt as he could manage.
“Corda. Would you care to join me this evening? Martis is making something fowl.”
The sergeant smiled a rare smile at the pun and nodded.
“I’d be glad to, sir, but I must settle in and bathe first. I’ll join you shortly.”
With a salute, he strode off toward his quarters while Varro made for the welcoming lights of his house. At the door, he thanked the marshal’s guards with mock extravagance and entered, closing the door behind him. He leaned on the door jamb for support for a moment, breathing heavily, and then turned and walked into his main room.
“Good evening, captain Varro,” the marshal said from his seat beside the fire.
Varro stopped in his tracks and swayed for a moment before recovering himself as best he could and coming to a surprisingly smart salute. The sudden movement certainly made his head swim a little, but he snapped his arm back down by his side and stood as straight and as still as he could, a gentle sweat beginning to glisten on his brow.
Marshal Sabian, tall and imposing with his iron grey hair and his handsome, yet lined and careworn face, sat with his legs crossed and his black-plumed helmet on his lap. The fact that the marshal already held a crystal glass of what was clearly Varro’s best wine and a small platter or cold meats lay on the table beside him made it plain that Martis had been as diligent and efficient as ever in dealing with the man who was, after all, the second most powerful man in the Empire.
The captain smiled weakly.
“Marshal, you honour my house.”
Sabian waved his hand, brushing aside the compliment.
“Gods, Varro, I have more than enough obsequious sycophants hanging around me at Vengen; I don’t need the same here. Sit down before you fall down. I sent your servant out for a short while. I don’t want us to be disturbed.” He reached and took a neat slice of chicken from the plate, rolling it and dipping it in the accompanying pickle before popping it into his mouth. His eyes swept the room, taking in its austere appearance, almost entirely lacking in decoration, and that which could be seen was clearly of military origin: a worn pennon here, a scabbard with a telling dent there. Clearly the home of a career soldier.
Without a word, and quietly grateful, the captain made his way to a seat close by; close enough for low conversation, but not close enough to seem discourteous.
“It’s been a long time, marshal,” he replied, being careful to keep his tone slightly familiar and yet thoroughly respectful.
“Long indeed,” Sabian replied quietly, his gaze slowly wandering down to rest on his boots. “Always knew you’d be commissioned, Varro. Even in the old days, I mean. I suspect if I hadn’t given command of the Fourth to Cristus, it would have wound up with you, sooner or later.”
Varro blinked a few times, gently shaking his head. Likely it was the fault of the drugs and the drowsiness, but his mind seemed to be refusing to work correctly. He was suddenly entirely unsure of the situation around him and the scene felt increasingly unreal to him.
Here was the second most powerful man in the Empire, a close friend of the Emperor himself, speaking to him as though they were campfire companions on campaign in the wilderness; suggesting that he could be a staff officer in the right circumstances. Oh, not that he hadn’t considered that himself from time to time, but had never thought to hear it from above. And perhaps he hadn’t done. It wouldn’t entirely surprise him to find his mind was playing tricks on him. He focused once more on Sabian, aware that the marshal had continued to talk, long after he’d stopped listening.
“…and so you might still get that chance, Varro; probably will in fact.”
The marshal raised those insightful eyes, ‘a window onto genius’ as some poet had once written of him, and rested them on Varro.
“But for that to happen,” he said with surprising force, ”I need you to do something.”
Varro blinked in alarm. He’d missed something. Trying not to sound panicked, he settled slightly in the seat and gave a reassuring smile.
“Can you just repeat that, sir?”
Sabian gave him an odd look; disturbingly reminiscent of the one Catilina had given him in the street outside the bathhouse.
“Prefect Cristus will, tomorrow, be formally announcing his decision to step down from command.”
Again Varro blinked and Sabian’s eyes narrowed.
“You are taking all this in, aren’t you Varro? If I didn’t know better I’d say you were topped up on Mare’s Mead.” His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward in his seat.
The captain shook his head.
“Sorry sir. Strong medicine our cohort doctor put me on. Took a stab wound in the side yesterday and it pinches a bit.”
Sabian smiled.
“I expect it does, Varro; I expect it does. Still, it’ll be towards the end of the year before Cristus can actually fully step down. He’s plenty to do before then, but he’ll be looking at a position on the Imperial Council in Velutio. And that’s where I need to strike a bargain with you, Varro.”
“Sir?” The captain’s brow furrowed. Taking this in at face value was hard enough. Digesting the details and trying to read between the lines was positively crippling in his current state, though with the marshal it was always worth checking.
Sabian sighed and leaned forward over the plume of his helmet, resting his elbows on the knees of his black breeches and steepling his fingers.
“Catilina.”
“Catilina, sir?” replied Varro, thoughts rushing around his head and refusing to settle. For certain Sabian had known of their dalliance; Varro would never have been foolish enough to tangle with the marshal’s daughter in secret. But that had been over for years now, hadn’t it? And yet the marshal had come to his house; the house of a lowly captain, to speak of her?
“Yes Varro,” Sabian continued, his voice clear and suddenly much less familiar, “Catilina. I know the two of you had something together; a few years ago, back in Vengen. I might have been busy, but I couldn’t miss my daughter fawning and swooning over a scarred captain on a furlough. Besides,” he continued, “my son knew well enough. And he and I talk.”
A momentary panic seized Varro but faded into disbelief. Catilina was not a woman to whom anyone would apply words like ‘fawn’ and ‘swoon’.
“It was truly nothing sir. We never…”
Sabian stopped him with a hard look.
“She was sixteen and headstrong,” the marshal interrupted. “She’s always known exactly what she’s doing and I trusted her judgement even then; even with you.”
His look softened once more.
“But the problem is this: Cristus has asked me for permission to court her.”
Varro leaned back heavily in the chair. He tried to find his voice, but nothing seemed to be coming out, no matter how hard he tried.
Sabian continued to stare directly at him.
“Cristus will be one of the most powerful politicians in the Empire. Very suitable as a match for Catilina. But the problem is: I am very much afraid she still carries a torch for you. A worryingly bright torch. I almost had you broken when you went back the next month. You left her a mess, though she would have no one tell you of it. A father knows, though.”
Again Varro’s mouth moved with hardly any sound emerging.
“I won’t have her marry a soldier, Varro. It’s a dangerous profession, no matter how good at it one is. I love my daughter and I won’t have her destroyed because the man she loves is lying face down in a mountain pass with a spear in his back. Do you understand me?”
Varro nodded and managed an affirmative sound. He really was having trouble now. It was one thing to be feeling light headed and woolly, but he was now having real difficulty forming words in his head, let alone voicing them.
Shaking his head again in a vain attempt to clear it a little, he squinted and focused on his commander.
“I understand that sir. Catilina’s n’extraordinary woman sir, but I never expected her to…”
Again he fumbled with his words.
“I wouldn’t…”
He was saved any further attempt as Sabian nodded.
“Calm yourself, Varro. I’m not here to rake over the past with you. My visit here concerns the future. All I’m asking you to do is keep my daughter at arm’s length and, if she insists on being near you, to try and put her off; to dissuade her from pursuing this. She doesn’t know about Cristus’ troth yet, but she will do so before we return to Vengen at the end of the week.”
Varro nodded uncertainly.
“This may sound a little unfair to you, Varro,” the marshal continued. “But I’ve watched both you and Cristus. He’s moderately ambitious on a personal level and actively seeks a lifestyle that I’d like him to be able to provide for Catilina. You are an outstanding field officer. I’ve said as much many times. You may even be a truly great officer. But one thing I’m also certain of is that you will live and die a soldier. I’ve known your sort many times. Many of my closest friends fit that very mould.” He sat back once more.
“But that’s just not for my daughter.”
Varro shook his head again. Nothing he tried was clearing the fog that continued to settle on his mind. He smiled weakly at the marshal.
“So,” Sabian went on, “the fact remains that when Cristus steps down at the end of the year, the fourth will need a new prefect. By general right of seniority, I should give the position to the captain of the first cohort, but you know Parestes as well as I do.”
Varro nodded and cleared his throat.
“He’s ‘by th’ book’ sir. Good enough, but no ‘magination.” Why the hell wouldn’t his tongue work properly. Surely the drugs must be wearing off by now.
“He hasn’t an imaginative bone in his body, Varro. Moreover, though he’s commanding the senior cohort, you actually have more years’ active service than he. You were just held back by that incident at Fallowford. My doing, I know, and probably unfair, but necessary at the time.” The marshal smiled.
“So I’m going to name you. It’s my prerogative, and I really don’t think Parestes will be put out over the matter. He knows you have more ‘time-in’ than him.”
Varro nodded again, and then shook his head.
“Thank you sir.”
Sabian flexed his shoulders and pulled himself upright.
“Very well, Varro. I’ll see you at the headquarters tomorrow morning. Get some rest. That wound’s clearly taken a lot out of you.”
“I will, sir” the captain replied and hauled himself out of the chair, wobbling slightly as he came upright.
“Goodbye, captain.” The marshal inclined his head slightly and, turning, left the room.
Varro saluted as his superior departed, and then staggered slightly.
He turned to find the chair he’d been in, and as he spun, noted with fascination the way the light from the oil lamps in the recessed alcoves streaked along, like a greasy stain on a pane of glass. He smiled at that, or at least he thought he smiled. His mind didn’t seem to be functioning properly at that moment. He spotted what could well have been the expensive, carved oak chair with the leather padding and reached out to grasp the handle and sit while the feeling passed.
Varro pitched forward with all his weight, unconscious even before he fell through the oak chair with a crash, splintering the finely carved legs and coming, after a brief roll, to a halt amid the wreckage, viscera leaking from his reopened wound and fresh blood seeping from half a dozen new cuts.
When Varro awoke it felt as though his body were pierced through in a dozen places with jagged knives. His head felt heavy and thick and he had a headache that threatened to break through his skull, but the uncertain fluffiness of before seemed to have retreated. His eyes flickered open. The light immediately made his head thump all the louder, but he was grateful to note that after mere moments a dark wooden beamed ceiling swum into view. At least he could see.
With a groan he began to rise to a seated position and suddenly hands were on him, gently pushing him back down. In a minor panic, he turned his head, sending fresh thumping beats and waves of nausea through him. Two medical orderlies were performing some menial task over by the side bench.
The hospital then. He’d been here before often enough.
Very slowly and carefully rolling his head the other way, two more figures came into view.
Corda, clad in his dress tunic and cloak, stood beside the table, a look of great concern on his pale features. With a start, Varro realised his second in command was covered in dried rivulets and pools of blood. Varro’s blood, plainly.
Standing behind Corda was another figure in white. Even with his back to Varro, the captain recognised the low rumble of disapproval that was a trademark of Scortius, the chief doctor of the second cohort. The man was hunched over something on a table. Varro looked weakly up at Corda.
“Am I…”
The sergeant reached out a hand and clasped Varro’s in a time-honoured fashion.
“I found you on your floor. Don’t know how long you’d been out, but there was quite a pool of blood. You’re looking quite pale and Scortius had to take a chunk of chair out of your back. Another wound, sir, I’m afraid.”
Varro tried to lift his head from the table, failing drastically. There was so little strength in his body and the muscles refused to obey. Breathing deeply and collapsing back he closed his eyes. Corda cleared his throat.
“Your other wound opened right up again too. Scortius has been having a good look inside you.”
“Has he,” gurgled Varro with an edge of resentment. “And did he find anything he liked?”
Slowly the doctor turned and approached the table.
“Varro,” he said quietly, “lie still. You’re putting too much strain on what’s left of your body.”
“Nice.” The captain rolled his eyes. “At least I feel better.”
The doctor cleared his throat and leaned closer.
“You only feel better because I’ve filled you so full of pain-killing remedies that you probably couldn’t stand straight even if you were in full health.” He sighed. “I’ve got to tell you something; something you’re not going to like.”
Varro merely nodded as best he could.
“I’d a feeling something was wrong. I’ve been wounded many times, but it’s never hit me like this. Even worse-looking wounds I’ve suffered. But surely I can’t die from this? I mean; it’s not that bad a wound, surely?”
Resting the heels of his hands on the side of the surgical table, Scortius leaned over the captain and Varro felt his heart skip a beat when he saw the look in the doctor’s eyes; the same look that crossed them every time the man thought of his long-gone son, Terentius; a look that carried loss, and despair and utter hollowness. A look that frightened Varro to his very core.
“What…?” The captain’s voice came out little more than a croak, or a whisper.
“There’s nothing I can do, Varro.”
The captain’s eyes closed for a moment and then he frowned deeply before opening them once more.
“Would you just care to run that by me again, Scortius?”
The doctor sighed and, reaching out, pulled a basic wooden chair across to the table and took a seat.
“It’s not the wound. The wound is alright. It’s nasty, but it’d heal, as would the new furniture wound in your back.”
“So…” Varro’s frown deepened, “what are we talking about then?”
Scortius rested his elbows on his knees, clasped his hands together and raised his sad eyes to Varro.
“Have you ever heard of Ironroot?”
Varro shook his head, pensively.
The doctor pinched the bridge of his nose.
“I can’t say I’m really surprised. Ironroot is the Imperial name for a substance the Pelasians know as Sher-Thais. It’s harvested from the seeds of a plant the locals call the ‘suicide tree’. I’ve seen it used in the eastern provinces as both a poison and a pesticide, but never this far north or west.”
Varro stared at the doctor, confusion and panic fighting for control of his expression.
“I’m sorry,” Scortius shook his head. ”There’s no cure.” He sat back with a flat look on his face.
Varro tried once more to raise his head, growling.
“How can this happen?”
Scortius pinched his nose again and frowned.
“There appears to be some discoloration of the organs and flesh around your wound. At this point, I’d say that the blade that cut you was coated with the stuff. Very nasty. And curious…”
“Curious?”
Varro’s growl deepened.
“Curious? That’s all you have to say?”
The doctor sat back slightly. “Curious that a hairy, unwashed barbarian from the northern mountains would have a sword coated with an exotic and expensive poison from the other side of the world? I’m sorry this has happened Varro, and if I could stop it, I would, but I can’t help being curious as to how he got it.”
“How long have I got?”
Scortius shrugged slightly. “He’s obviously used a strong dose. And straight into your body. Normally I’d expect a few days at most, but I think I can give you things that’ll keep you going longer than that. A week? Maybe two? I’d have liked to see that sword. Perhaps we could have learned more.”
Varro collapsed back, exhausted and stunned, as the doctor gave a weak and sympathetic half-smile.
“I’ll go see what I can mix up for you.” The doctor shuffled off among his bottles and bags in the corner, muttering “for pain, stimulation, retardation and blood. Hmm…”
Varro blinked and turned his head to look at Corda, clearly stunned, his face bleak, but showing the first signs of anger. The sergeant leaned down toward his officer and growled.
“I take it the bastard’s dead? We’ll not be able to find out.”
Varro’s eyes narrowed.
“The barbarian’s dead alright, but I don’t think he was the problem.”
“What?” Corda frowned and leaned closer. The captain closed his eyes and the veins on his temple pulsed as he tracked back over the last two days.
“The sword.“ Varro’s hand reached up and grasped his sergeant by the shoulder. “The bastard that stuck me had an Imperial sword; a nice one too. A proper officer’s sword. That hairy piece of shit didn’t get the poison at all. This is someone else’s doing! One of our own, for Gods’ sake, Corda… one of our own!”
Corda’s expression hardened.
“I’m going to go see the quartermaster and go through the loot; see if I can find an Imperial sword.” He looked up at Scortius as the captain sank wearily back to the table. “You get him up and about. I don’t care how you have to do it. Just get him moving.”
Corda gave his captain a last determined glance, grasped his shoulder, and then strode out of the tent as though he’d do battle with the Gods.
Varro watched Scortius approaching the table once more, his soul hardening like baked clay as he lay there. There was more to this than simple chance. Someone had engineered Varro’s death, and that made him angry. Hopefully angry enough to stay alive long enough to settle this. Someone was going to pay for this. Someone would pay.
And cleft in two does history lie…
I opened my eyes. It took a few moments for me to place myself and my surroundings, but after a minute or so I remembered being helped back to my house by two medical orderlies. Scortius had given me some compound that quickly begun to clear my head and return the strength to my body. I know I was still feeling a little strange and confused as I woke, but some of that could well have been natural grogginess on waking from deep sleep.
I wasn’t prepared for what happened.
Clearly I was still hallucinating. Of course, a few hours later I began to doubt that, and in retrospect I’m now totally convinced of the reality of the situation; or at least the reality of it to me. But nothing prepares you to wake from fuddled sleep and find yourself staring deep into the eyes of a stag.
Needless to say, my first reaction was to turn my head this way and that, convinced that this was some trick of the light or reaction to Scortius’ medicine in my brain. Evidently the early morning sunlight streaming in through the glass panes of my room, squeezed to a sliver by the heavy drapes, was colliding with the many dust motes and creating a vision my battered subconscious had forced into the shape of a stag.
Yet as I turned my head and squinted, the creature was still there. I think I chuckled to myself as I struggled off the couch and my feet touched the tiled floor, sending a cold throb through them. I pulled myself upright with little pain and stood, swaying slightly. I remember the smell. I didn’t notice it at the time, but later conversations brought it flooding back to me. The scent of a forest. The mulched leaves and pine needles.
I reached forward, fully expecting either for my hand to pass through the beast like a fog, or to wake with a start and realise that I’d still been asleep. I felt a shudder pass through me as my fingers brushed the fine white hair of the creature’s nose. I had read stories of unwary hunters being gored by the antlers of even small stags, and yet this was no ordinary stag and no ordinary circumstance. In fact, this was impossible, I told myself again.
And yet for some reason it felt right. And more important than that, whereas the previous day I’d felt panic and horror, fear and anger, at that moment I felt none of those. On the first morning of my remaining days as a condemned man, what I actually felt was peace. And not just peace; peculiarly, peace and hope. Peace was a feeling I hadn’t felt in so long it almost floored me with its intensity. An absence of fear and anger.
Cernus had bestowed something indefinable upon me; or possibly removed it from me.
All I can truly tell you is that the stag snorted very gently and as I felt the warm breath brush my face, all I felt was happiness. Without really understanding why, I returned to the couch and lay down, drifting into a pleasant sleep with a smile on my face.
I dreamt of white stags, of glittering swords and, finally, of Catilina.