The Wolf King (44 page)

This wasn’t entirely consoling. The Saxon was a large and dangerous individual and hadn’t seemed to care too much for Franks.

“My lord Maeniel sends greeting,” the Saxon said. “And we have come to take you to Charles.”

“We?” Bernard asked, trying not to show he was filled with utter and complete relief.

The largest wolf Bernard had ever seen stepped out of the shadows near the Saxon. “We?” Bernard asked again.

“Yes, wake your men. It’s almost dawn. We will leave before first light.”

“I trust you will not lead us into an ambush?”

The Saxon’s eyes narrowed slightly. “I will ride knee to knee with you. If I do, you may kill me first.”

“Your trust in your lord’s servants is great indeed.”

“My trust,” the Saxon answered distinctly, “in my lord is great.” Then he turned away, leaving Bernard to make what he would of the statement.

Bernard didn’t care to think about its implications. There were stories about Maeniel… and his wife… and his friends…

A wooden bucket near his knee held well-watered wine. It was cold. Bernard took a long drink. Then, lifting the bucket by the handle, he went to wake his men. He decided to rouse his officers first.

Bernard was no fool. Charles was his nephew. The fortunes of the whole family stood or fell with Charles. As they had retired the long-haired Megrovian kings, one of the other magnates might retire them in their turn. His king needed him desperately. If the devil himself had appeared and promised to lead him to the king for the price of his soul, Bernard would not have turned him down. Bernard mounted every man he could and left his footmen to straggle. If the
scarae
couldn’t do it, it couldn’t be done. If they won, the infantry could mop up. If they lost, the men were on their own and would have to try to survive as well as they could.

When the world began to lighten around him, Bernard saw the fog had returned with a vengeance. The Saxon appeared before him riding a magnificent roan horse, but Bernard was uneasily aware that the horse had no bridle or saddle on his back. The Saxon rode with neither bit nor rein, and the horse was a stallion. But Bernard asked no more questions.

“The trail is narrow,” the Saxon said. “Tell each man to follow the one in front of him, keep up, and don’t get lost.”

“You heard that,” Bernard shouted.

Then at some sort of signal from the Saxon or possibly something else he couldn’t see, the roan turned and led them off into the fog. Bernard made the sign of the cross and followed.

“They are madmen or sorcerers,” one of his officers said.

Before anyone could blink, Bernard’s sword cleared the sheath and, in the same motion, beheaded the man.

“Anyone else care to comment?” Bernard bared his teeth at the rest. It was nothing like a smile.

Then he turned. The roan the Saxon was riding had pulled up and turned broadside and was studying him with one horse eye. The Saxon flicked a glance at the headless corpse still seated in the saddle. Bernard slammed the heel of his hand into the cadaver’s chest and it fell. The fog was so thick he couldn’t see it hit the ground. Even as he watched, the glowing vapor clouds almost obscured the Saxon from view.

“Let’s go,” Bernard said. “And in case you haven’t understood yet, I could teach the devil a thing or two. So don’t try me. Now move.”

They did.

Lucilla followed Adalgisus through the night. She hoped he knew where he was going; she didn’t. Toward dawn, she became aware that Stella had died. She knew this because Stella’s presence paid her a brief visit to thank her for taking away the two men who had accomplished her ruin, and to say that she lay easy in the arms of Ansgar, the man who, after all was said and done, was her only love.

To weep was futile. They were pushing their lathered horses to get the last few miles from the weary beasts. The trees beside the rutted trace were only shadows against the stars. Every time her mount so much as slowed, Adalgisus cursed Lucilla and struck her horse with his riding whip. She noticed he didn’t hit her. She’d managed to cripple and possibly kill Eberhardt, and dear Dagobert hadn’t survived long at all when she turned a cold and vengeful gaze on him, so she surmised that Adalgisus might be a bit afraid of her. Besides, the sadness she felt about Stella’s fate struck at a deeper place in her being, a place that was uninterested in tears, seeing them solely as a sign of weakness. No. She promised Stella’s presence that the pig riding ahead of her and his whole family would forever regret what they had done to Stella. Her fragile beauty would not fade into dust unavenged. Stella’s presence made no comment about Lucilla’s resolve, but only seemed to say,
Peace be upon you. I have found mine, Lucilla. May God bless you and keep you safe
. And then she was gone.

Lucilla rode on through the night. She had left her mantle at the monastery under Stella’s ruined body, but she was warmed by the cold hatred she felt in her heart. She and Adalgisus reached the villa Jovis near daybreak. They found the household up and stirring even at that hour. The superintendent of the villa immediately placed it at Adalgesis’s disposal.

Feeling her age, Lucilla was led to the baths. The water was warm. The bath attendants were two peasant girls who looked capable of bull wrestling. Lucilla didn’t even think about escape. Her clothing was taken away to be laundered, and she was given an embroidered linen shift and a dark woolen overgown. Both garments were ample and the overgown was embroidered with yellow silk in a pattern that made Lucilla squint in surprise. Acanthus? No, artichoke leaves. The two girls then conducted her to a room that faced the inner courtyard of the villa. It was lit by four clerestory windows high in the walls. The windows were barred on the outside, as was the door. But inside, Lucilla found a tray with bread, fresh cheese, wine, raisins, and a bowl of onion soup.

Lucilla felt no appetite, but as soon as she tasted the wine and a bit of bread she found herself absolutely ravenous. She couldn’t bring herself to stop until she’d consumed the last crumb. When she tried to stand, she found herself reeling. She staggered toward the bed and was asleep before her head touched the pillow.

She was awakened by a scream.

Lucilla got to her feet before she was folly awake. She reached the door and opened it without thinking. Why was it not locked?

Adalgisus was standing in the hall, struggling with a girl who had evidently brought his supper tray—it was resting on a table just outside the door to his room.

Oh, for heaven’s sake,
Lucilla thought.
Give it a rest
. Just then the girl screamed again, then crouched down, her back against the wall, sobbing. The light in the courtyard was blue, and Lucilla surmised she must have slept all day. Adalgisus was standing, examining his hand.

“Cunt,” he screamed. “Your nails are sharp. I’ll have you flogged, you little—” He bit off the word when he saw Lucilla standing there. “She scratched me. All
I
wanted was a little company.” He winced. “Whore!” he shouted again. “I’ll wager I’m not the first to have my hand up your skirt.”

The girl looked at him, frightened and angry, and answered with a flood of rapid speech in a dialect he obviously couldn’t understand. Lucilla understood her. The girl sounded as if she’d grown up near the mountain town where Lucilla had been born. She was babbling about being sore and bleeding.

“The little twit is so backward she can’t speak proper Latin,” Adalgisus snarled.

“Wait,” Lucilla said calmly. “I can understand her. I’ll ask what’s wrong. What is your name?”

The girl wiped her eyes with the back of one hand. “Lavinia.”

“What’s wrong?”

“He wants me to lie with him, but I can’t… I can’t… I’m bleeding… Two weeks ago my courses didn’t… I was late, so I was afraid. I took a potion. My period came down last night with bleeding and cramps. I’m so sore I feel like if he touches me, I’ll die. The cook just sent me to bring him his supper. I’m filthy and dirty. A dozen men had me last week. They use the house slaves here to keep the field hands content. I was in the stable all last week with the other women. I don’t know how many had me… when I took the potion… I think I was breeding… I don’t want to see its skull crushed. That’s what they do here: crush the skull and throw it in the old well.”

“Yes,” Lucilla said. “Now dry your tears and be quiet and go back to the kitchen. I’ll explain to the gentleman.”

The girl didn’t walk away, she crawled, one shoulder against the wall until she was out of reach of both Lucilla and Adalgisus, then got to her feet and ran off.

“What was she yapping about?” Adalgisus asked.

“Her woman’s courses have come down on her. She’s cramping and bleeding.”

It was almost dark. The last sun blush was fading from the sky. Fireflies danced over the garden beds in the courtyard. A wax light was glowing on the table next to Adalgisus’s tray. He was studying Lucilla intently in its light. The shift she was wearing under the woolen gown was semitransparent. Over it, the thick woolen gown was made for a man much larger than Lucilla, and the neck slit at the front extended down to her waist. On either side her breasts rose, pale cups covered only by the thin linen gauze. He was staring fixedly at them.

“They’re uneven,” he said.

“Yes,” Lucilla answered. “Part of one is gone.” She pushed the woolen gown aside and showed him her scarred breast. The nipple had been destroyed.

“That must have hurt.” He licked his lips.

“It did.”

A second later he was bending over, his lips suckling her scarred breast as his teeth nibbled the scar tissue. When he pulled away, his face was flushed, the veins in his neck and temples raised, standing out like ropes.

“What did they use?”

“Red-hot pincers at the nipple.”

He made a moaning sound.

Lucilla reached down and caught his erection, wrapping her hand around the spike.

“Ohhhh. Don’t.” But he didn’t sound distressed about her action. “You keep that up,” he whispered, “I’m going to come.”

“That would be a shame,” she said. “A tool like yours is to be used, savored, and enjoyed, before it is at last, alas, allowed its rest.”

She backed him into his room and barred the door. The shift and woolen gown landed on the floor a second later. Then she eased him to the bed.
Why didn’t he do this before Stella was assaulted by that fool Dagobert
? Lucilla thought furiously.
Why did this stupid piece of pig shit have to play the man among men
? But then, why should she expect him to do otherwise? He had nothing in his character that remotely resembled discretion or good judgment. That a fool should play the fool was hardly surprising.

She maneuvered him onto the bed. She got on top. “Let me control things,” she told him.

“All right, but you have to tell me everything they did to you. Everything. I want to hear it while we…”

“Fuck?” Lucilla whispered.

“Yes, yes, while we fuck—that beautiful word,
fuck
.” He laughed.

Lucilla tightened some very strategic muscles. He cried out, his body arched against hers.

“I’ve finished,” he said, sounding almost astonished.

“Oh, no, my dear, you’ve only just begun.”

He cried out again, sounding surprised as she tightened those well-practiced muscles and he felt his body respond.

“Oh, God,” he gasped. “When we reach Verona, I’ll have to find a place to hide you. If she finds out… she’ll kill you.”

Somewhere in her mind Lucilla heard a yell of sheer triumph so loud she was surprised Adalgisus couldn’t hear it, too. She knew. She knew. Now, now to get a message to Hadrian. And she set out to give Adalgisus the time of his life.

When she was finished with him, she rose and went back to her room. She left him sleeping like a corpse. She’d unabashedly plied him with food, drink, and enough sex to leave him limp as a cooked noodle. She didn’t think he would awaken before morning, if then, but she barred the door behind her and found three objects she’d managed to conceal on her person in spite of the observant eyes of the bath attendants.

Now, whom to bribe? She was considering this when there was a timid tap on the door. Lucilla swore under her breath but managed a smile, in case it should be Adalgisus. But it was the serving girl, Lavinia. She entered bringing in a tray of cold chicken, soup, bread, and some cheese.

“The hour is late,” Lucilla said, surprised. “Is the cook still up?”

“No, but I was grateful for what you did and asked if I could bring you something when you and… the lord were finished. The cook—she’s nice to me—made this, and when I saw you come from his room…”

The girl’s face was red and swollen in the lamplight. She looked as if she’d been crying for a long time.

“What’s the matter? Are you in so much pain?” The bath attendants hadn’t been able to get Lucilla’s small supply of medicines away from her. In fact, they had refused to touch them, thinking her a witch. She might be able to dose this poor child with something, a little laudanum perhaps, that would give her at least one night’s sleep in comfort.

A kind voice was too much for the child. She burst into tears again. “I hate it. I just hate it here. Last night I tried to hang myself but… I can’t bring myself to lean on the rope. I couldn’t. I couldn’t, but Mira says if I drink enough at the barn… Some of the girls make them pay so they have a lot of coppers and buy a big jug of wine. But I can’t drink enough to give me the courage to put the rope around my neck and then lean forward.”

Lucilla put her arms around the child, who broke down completely, crying in a way that seemed to rend her whole being. Lucilla knew what the child was talking about. It brought back her own past more vividly than she cared to imagine. She’d seen girls in the stews at Ravenna kill themselves the way that Lavinia was describing, tie a rope or even a length of cloth to something low, even the back of a chair, loop it around their neck and men lean forward. She’d spoken once to a girl who had done it and been revived. The first minute or so takes courage but after that the pressure cuts off the blood to the head and sleep follows. In a little time, death. And just to prove how easy it was, the girl killed herself a few days later in that particular way. This time she wasn’t found until much, much too late.