The Dog and the Wolf (35 page)

Gratillonius recalled vaguely that Martinus had founded such a thing, corresponding to the monastery.

“And I shall be with civilized persons.”

Aye, the tale was that Martinus’s successor Bricius held that total austerity was outmoded; it became a master of the Church to live somewhat like the masters of the world with whom he dealt. Runa should do well enough—she wasn’t addicted to luxury—and find congenial company in the magnates, especially as she rose to a commanding position among her women. She’d do that, he felt sure.

“The celibacy oughtn’t to be any hardship,” he said. That might be unfair, though in fact she had responded less and less to his attentions as time went on, and found more and more occasions to avoid them.

Color tinged those sharp cheekbones. “It is a sacrifice I pray will be acceptable to God. I have so much to atone for. Satan was everywhere. Heathendom—fornication, outright
incest, with you—lending your daughter my agreement to her running off with everything that that led to—seeking the death of her unborn child for her—and doing away with yours, Gratillonius!”

Her look challenged him. She strained arms back and breasts forward, like a Trojan woman before an Achaean sword.

Maybe later he’d be appalled. In this hour he felt nothing beyond … a vague sense of release? “I suspected,” he said tonelessly. “But I never pursued the thought, I let it skulk aside, because you were my mate and Id cause to be thankful to you, most of all that you freed me from the ghosts of the Nine, but for other things as well.”

“And you didn’t care,” she said after a minute. “You wouldn’t. You can’t. I wonder if you haven’t been a penance God set me.”

Derision: Is that sound Christian doctrine? Doesn’t baptism wash every past sin away? It’s the ones afterward that count.

“I will try hard to forgive what you’ve done to me,” she said. “1 will pray for your salvation. But I’ll pray more that God not allow you to lead others astray.”

“Goodbye.” He turned and walked out.

He heard her follow. “What?” she yelled. “You depart like that? You haven’t the simple courtesy to listen?”

“The law doesn’t require it,” he replied over his shoulder.

“You haven’t the courage, that’s what! You don’t dare hear about the harm you’ve done me.”

I am afraid, he refrained from saying. If I stayed longer I might well strike you, and that could break your neck.

The first breath of regret touched him. “I wish things had ended differently,” he confessed.

Still he didn’t look behind. In the entry he retrieved his drenched paenula and pulled it over his head. The wind caught at the door as he opened it. He pushed it back shut and went off through the storm toward Confluentes.

1

Winter heaven hung featureless gray. Trees could well-nigh snag it in their twigs. Mists drifted through raw air. The drip off boughs was the only sound there was, save when dead leaves stirred soddenly underfoot.

Then Bannon said, “Here it is.’

He did not call Gratillonius “lord” as aforetime, but it was Gratillonius whom he had sought. “I came to you myself, ’stead of sending the hunter who found the thing, because ’tis a matter for chiefs,” he had related in the house. “You know about the outside world, what the Romans might make of this if they hear, maybe even who could have done it—for surely no Osismiic man would, unless he be mad.” The pair of them had gone off into the forest without telling anyone else.

Folk shunned the spot they came to, believing it a haunt of vengeful wraiths and what was worse yet. The man from Dochaldun had only dared them, by daylight, when helping to search the woods for two children missing from the village. What he saw sent him running home while he clutched his lucky piece and babbled charms against horror.

Amidst osier and sedge crowding a pool, a boulder that looked like an altar for trolls heaved up its mass. Nearby stood a great beech. Lightning had blasted it long ago, and fire gouged out a hollow. Gratillonius squatted to peer inside. He spent a few heartbeats finding what Bannon pointed at, for it was very small, discolored nearly as dark as the char, and begrown with some of the fungus that clustered on the bark outside. In a few more years it would molder quite to nothing.

He stared into the eye sockets. “This is naught of the little ones you’ve lost,” he said low. “They were old enough
to walk. This is the skull of a suckling babe, maybe a newborn. And ’tis been here a while.”

“It has that,” Bannon answered grimly, “for ’tis pegged in place. No wolf does such a thing.”

Gratillonius saw and felt for himself, nodded, and rose. “A human sacrifice.”

“Not by any of us, I tell you!”

“Of course.” Stories of bloody rites in olden times might or might not be true, but the Romans had certainly exterminated the druids in Gallia. The pagan Gods whom most rustic Armoricans still worshipped were content with fruits of the earth, the mightiest of Them with an animal on Their high holy days.

“Some madman in the past, or a stray barbarian, or who knows what?” Gratillonius said. “I’ll see to the burial of this poor shard if you wish. Why should you care?”

“The children we’ve lost—”

“Children are forever wandering off, and not always found again. I’m sorry, but so ’tis. It has naught to do with this.”

Bannon seized Gratillonius by the wrist.
“Does
it? Can you swear no black wizard goes abroad, stealing our young for his cauldron? My thorp will be wanting more than words.”

Gratillonius understood. The knowledge was heavy as the sky. “You’d fain talk to Nemeta,” he said.

Bannon nodded. “I’d not be recklessly accusing of her. She’s done well by us in the woods.” His features tightened. “But we must make sure.”

“And I—”

“If she’s guiltless, maybe she can find out the truth. We’ve hardly anything to pay her with at this season, though. I asked you along also for coming with me to her. It may help. You are a just man. We have few just men any more.”

Unspoken was the likelihood that, if the tribesmen thought she was a murderess after all and her father was trying to shield her, they would kill both.

—Flames flickered in lamps. Brightest burned a Roman one. The bronze and oil were witch-wage lately earned. Darkness had fallen as the two men reached the oak by
the Stegir which Gratillonius remembered so well. Nemeta bade them come inside her cabin and spend the night before starting back.

Seated on stools, wooden cups of mead in their hands, they looked up at her where she stood. Barefoot despite the chill, she nonetheless wore a gown of finely woven wool, close-fitted to her litheness. The red hair smoldered, the green eyes gleamed through shifting shadow. It came to Gratillonius that his scrawny girl had become a woman to kindle desire; but the beauty was somehow more hawk or vixen than it was human.

“Epona hunt me through hell if I lie.” Her voice moved cat-soft around the things that hung on the walls. “Never have I harmed child of yours or of any living man.”

Bannon looked toward Gratillonius. Someone must say it. Gratillonius lifted the load, he felt as if it were about to break his bones, and answered, “Your own was lost, a year and a half agone.”

Her gaze scorned him. “It was. Would you make trial of me? I will meet the hounds, or whatever ordeal you name, and the Gods will uphold me.”

“Nay, I meant not that!” he croaked in Ysan.

“You are a witch—” Bannon stopped short. Nemeta played her glance over him and fleetingly grinned. Unless a Power intervened, she would be safe in any test that called on the World Beyond.

The chief cleared his throat. “None of us want to blame you,” he said. “’Twould be ill for us too.” Again she grinned. If the Romans heard of manslayings to pagan Gods, they might well send soldiers to strike down men and burn down homes. “But must we go in dread this’ll happen afresh, or has happened? Can you find our little ones for us, wisewoman?”

Nemeta shook her head. In the uneasy light, Gratillonius could not make out whether compassion crossed her face. “I’ve been asked the same erenow,” she said. “Maybe in later years; but as yet my arts are slight, and—the forest Gods keep the secrets of Their beasts.”

“The killer, then. Can you track him for us, that we may make an end of him?”

She stood still a while. Through the shutters they heard an owl hoot, once, twice, thrice.

“He’s a dangerous one to deal with,” she said slowly, “for an offering like that, if made aright, feeds strange strengths. I’ve doubt I can cast a net over such a man. Yet surely we should rid the land of him. And soon, ere his might grows more.”

Gratillonius read meaning in her tone. Fear stabbed. Bannon understood too, in fierce joy, and exclaimed, “You know who he is?”

“I do not,” Nemeta answered. “I only know who he might be, and I could be mistaken.”

“Who?”

“Cadoc Himilco, the trailmaker from Confluentes.”

Gratillonius dropped his cup and leaped to his feet. “Nay, this is moonstruck:” he roared in Ysan. “Have done!”

Bannon rose beside him, to say with hand on knife, “Let her speak.”

“But he—I know him, you do yourself, Nemeta, your own sister’s husband,” Gratillonius stammered. “And a Christian.”

“He has indeed plagued us with his Christ, has he not?” Nemeta said to Bannon.

The Gaul nodded. “He has. A pest. A threat, maybe; he talks of overthrowing the shrines. But—”

“Men have lied about their faith often enough,” Nemeta said. “Some did out of fear, others—well, Cadoc does range the wilderness wherever he likes. Who knows what he does there, or why? I’ve had feelings about him that crawled within me.”

“Why, you need only talk with him to know him sinless,” Gratillonius protested.

“Unless you are Nemeta and have witch-sight?” Bannon growled.

She lifted a hand as if to ward her father off. “I say naught for certain,” she reminded. “He may be harmless. You should hear him out.”

“He’s away.” Sickness caught Gratillonius by the throat. “We run the survey in all seasons.”

“When he returns, we will ask of him,” vowed Bannon.

Nemeta smiled. “Meanwhile, best keep silence about this,” she proposed.

Gratillonius knew that would be impossible, once Bannon brought home the tidings.

2

Daily the rumor grew. Gratillonius became fully aware of it when Julia came to him weeping, half crazed. “They mutter those things about Cadoc—one loyal maid warned me, one—I listened when they knew not I was nigh—What will become of him? Of our Johannes? Oh, father—”

He held her close, consoled her to the pitiful degree he was able, at least got her quieted by his promises, then went to Corentinus.

“I’ve heard,” the bishop said. He had ears in many places. “Of course it’s baseless. Those children simply fell prey to misfortune, and as for the babe that was sacrificed, Christ Himself would testify to Cadoc’s innocence. But pagans live without His comfort, you know. They’re all too apt to see magic and malice at work when anything goes wrong. These endless winter nights drive everybody a bit crazy, too. Hatred is easier to live with than fear; it gives you someone to attack. And … I’m afraid Cadoc has made himself disliked among the backwoodsmen. He’s been too zealous. Evangelism isn’t his proper calling. I’ll speak to him about that.”

“If you get the chance,” Gratillonius replied. “How can we even protect him, let alone clear his name?”

Corentinus sighed. “I myself have hardly any voice among the pagans. What you could do—” The eyes beneath the tufted brows pierced. “You could search out the true guilty party, hiding nothing. If you will.”

Gratillonius left as soon after that as possible, and turned to Apuleius. The senator received him kindly enough, though somewhat abstractedly. The latest news received was of still another setback in his effort to have the taxes on the Confluentians lowered. The Germanic menace smothered it. Official alarm had redoubled since Emperor
Honorius, after the Visigothic invasion of Italy, moved his capital from Mediolanum to Ravenna, where landward marshes gave added security and the sea offered ready escape to Constantinople. Not but what the danger wasn’t real. With the defenses of the Rhenic frontier weakened and the tribes beyond it ever more restless, the praetorian prefect had grown impatient with lesser claims on his attention.

“My heart goes out to your daughter,” Apuleius said. “And her husband, when he returns to this grisly business. But what can I do? Keep him under guard, day and night? We haven’t the guards to spare, you know. Best we send him, them, to live elsewhere. I can try to arrange that.”

“If he isn’t murdered in the woods on his way back,” Gratillonius said.

“God forbid. I’ll pray. If you would also—”

Again Gratillonius made an early farewell. Since Runa departed, constraint had diminished between him and the other two men, but the old cordiality had not risen from its grave. It would be hard having Julia move away. Hard on her too. What roots she had left were in Confluentes. And what kind of living could Cadoc make, out among the Romans? Lacking status, money, or skills that anybody wanted to hire, he might well end by selling himself and his family into slavery.

If only Rufinus were here. How sharply Gratillonius missed the rascal. There was a barrier there too. Somehow, in spite of all they had been through together, they were never really near each other in the way that Gratillonius and Parnesius had been. It was as if Rufinus somehow feared complete openness. Because he felt guilt about the catastrophe of Ys? Gratillonius had told him over and over to forget that. Maybe he couldn’t. Or maybe what happened to him in his early youth had forever scarred his heart.

He was always ready with counsel, though. He’d find some fox-trail out of this trap, if anybody could. But what?

My mind is so slow, Gratillonius thought. Well, if it keeps plodding along, it may finally get somewhere. Up on your feet, soldier.

That night he lay awake till the east whitened, and this was around midwinter. Back and forth he trudged through the blindness, about and about, to and fro, from thing to thing, and found no answer. A couple of times he wished Runa were at his side, or any woman, that he might lose himself in her and afterward sleep. Otherwise he had decided he didn’t miss her. And he had no right to go rutting indiscriminately like a common roadpounder on furlough. He was on duty, he the centurion. …