Wagers of Sin: Time Scout II (13 page)

He took a long pull from his beer and made the wish anyway.

From his viewpoint, Skeeter figured the gods owed him a break or two. For once, maybe they'd listen?

Lupus Mortiferus stood panting in the middle of an empty corridor, hand on the pommel of his gladius, eyes narrowed in a rage that filled his veins until his ears roared with it. Where had that little bastard slipped away to? So close ... and the rat had vanished into thin air.

Again.

"I will find you, odds maker,- Lupus swore under his breath. "And when I do.. ."

Meanwhile, he had to find someone to communicate with. That dark-skinned man had answers Lupus needed. It took him nearly an hour of confused wandering through the mad place before he found it again, but find it he did. And the man was still there, perched comfortably behind a wooden counter. Girding on courage as though it were armor, Lupus strode up to the counter and greeted him in Latin.

The man glanced up, surprise showing in deep brown eyes. "Hello. Guide? Or scout? Don't think I've seen you before. Just in from another station? Brian Hendrickson, Station Librarian."

The man stuck out a hand.

Lupus stared at it, wondering what in the world the man was babbling about. The words were Latin, but their meaning ... He might as well have been speaking some obscure desert tongue like Palmyrene or the incomprehensible babble of a Scythian horseman.

"Well," the man was saying, staring at him with rising curiosity, "the computers are at your full access, of course. With that getup, I'd thought you were headed down the Wild West Gate. Planning on a freelance trip to Rome? It's a lucrative gate, certainly, and thanks to Kit's leaning a little on Bax, Time Tours is giving freelancers a freer hand with the customers. You shouldn't have any problem at all making a good living if you decide to stay."

The man made no sense at all. With a rising sense of panic he couldn't control, Lupus tried to marshall a single question, but found his tongue glued to the roof of a mouth gone dry with fear. The gods make sport of me for fun ... .

Whatever the man said next, it wasn't in Latin. His brow furrowed in open puzzlement. That was more than Lupus could take. He couldn't afford to be found out as an imposter in this place of divine madness. He bolted for the door. Mithras, help me, he prayed in growing misery. I don't know where to go or what to do. Lupus didn't quite run down the bewildering confusion of staircases, ramps, shops, ponds, and imitation streets that made up the main room of this world, but he moved fast enough to put distance between himself and the man who was most certainly coming to the conclusion that Lupus did not belong here.

He was halfway down the long, long stretch of room when he realized he was being followed. The man was younger than he, brown-haired and slender enough that Lupus could easily break him in half with bare hands. Lupus knew a jolt of fear that stabbed from heart to groin, anyway. The gods who ran this mad playground had found him out.

Then anger, pure and simple, scalded him to his bones.

I have been swindled, cheated, and dragged out of my very world. I will not submit meekly to this!

He took a side corridor that led into a quiet, private part of this world and hid in a shadowed niche. Sure enough, the young man following him took the same turn. Lupus gripped his sword and slid it sweetly out of its scabbard. Someone would give him answers or pay the consequences of their refusal.

He waited patiently for the quarry to come close enough to strike.

One moment, Marcus was completely alone in the Residential corridor, having lost sight of his quarry. The next, he was crushed painfully against the wall, sword at his throat. He gasped. Lupus Mortiferus ...

Shock detonated in the other man's eyes. Marcus only realized he'd gasped the man's name aloud when the gladiator demanded, "You know who I am?"

"I-" Marcus thought he might well faint from terror. How many men had the Wolf of Death killed during his bloody career? The thought of leaving Ianira and little Artemisia and Gelasia alone, trying to survive without him, drove him nearly to gibber. "I know-I know you, yes. I saw you, once. Many years ago. Before a fight. At-at one of the gladiator feasts-"

The sword blade stayed pressed against his throat. "Where am I? What place is this? And why have the masters of it sent you trailing my steps?"

Marcus blinked in surprise. ",`Nobody sent me. I saw you earlier and thought I recognized you. I-I just wanted to ask what you were doing here. You shouldn't be here at all. Please, I beg of you, Lupus Mortiferus, don't kill me, I have children, a family-"

The blade remained at his throat, but the pressure eased up just a bit. "Kill you?" the gladiator snorted. "The only man in this mad place who speaks Latin that makes sense? Do you think the Wolf of Death a complete fool?"

Marcus began to hope he might survive. "How did you come here? The Roman gate is very well guarded-" His eyes widened. "Those boys who got sick, when the gate cycled. You must have come through during the confusion."

Lupus Mortiferus narrowed dark eyes. "Gates? Talk sense. And answer my question! Where am I?"

Marcus knew he'd once been a slave, but it had been years since anyone had used that tone with him. `The last time I saw you," he dared flare back, "you were still a slave. Where is your collar? Or have you run from the school?"

Lupus' dark eyes widened. For an instant, Marcus saw his own death reflected there. Then-shocking him beyond all reason-the Wolf of Death lowered his sword. "I bought my freedom," he said quietly. "Then the money I earned with this sword, the money I was saving to start a new life, was stolen by a blackhearted street-rat of a foreigner. I followed him here." The threat returned to his eyes. "Now tell me, where is `here'??"

Marcus blinked several times, struggling with emotions that ran the gamut from pity to terror and back again. "If you will put away the gladius, I will tell you. In fact, if you put away the gladius, I will take you to my own rooms and try to help you as best I can. What I have to say will not be easy for you to understand. I know you are a proud man, Lupus Mortiferus-you have a right to be-but you will need help to survive here." Some glint in Lupus' dark eyes toll Marcus he'd hit a raw nerve. "I have a woman and daughters to support, but I will do my best to help. From what I remember, you didn't begin your life in Rome either. In that, we have something in common. You have asked for answers. I offer them and more. Will you come with me?"

The gladiator paused for several heart-shattering moments, then sheathed his sword under the ridiculous cowboy chaps. The gladius snicked softly into place under the concealing leather. "I will come. I think," he said softly, "the gods have left me no choice."

The admission shocked Marcus speechless.

But he recalled all too vividly his own first days in La-La Land, with their wrenching, sick dislocation and the terror every sight and sound brought. This man had been badly wronged by someone from TT-86. Marcus would do what he could to make amends.

The Wolf of Death followed silently behind as Marcus led the way toward his small apartment. He wondered with a sinking terror in his gut what Lupus Mortiferus would do when he saw Ianira's delicate beauty. He was strong enough-and ruthless enough to take her while Marcus watched helplessly from the floor, bloodied and dazed, perhaps even bound and gagged. Surely Lupus would adhere to guest/host laws? But Lupus was neither Roman nor predictable. Marcus had no idea what he would or wouldn't do.

But he had given his word and Lupus Mortiferus had been wronged.

And the laws here, he recalled with effort, were not those of Rome. If Lupus Mortiferus tried to hurt his beloved, he could call for help---or send her and his daughters to live with others who could and would protect them.

Afraid and torn between honor and multiple duties, Marcus led the gladiator to his little home deep in the recesses of Residential.

Ianira had just taken a cooling cheesecake out of the oven, placing it on a rack on the counter beside simmering pots and sizzling pans filled with their dinner, when the apartment door opened. She glanced up, a smile on her lips ... and let the smile die, unborn, at the look in Marcus'eyes. His face was ash pale.

He held the door for a stranger dressed for the Denver Wild West Gate. Eyes downcast, Marcus' posture screamed his feelings of fear and inferiority. The stranger's dark gaze darted about the room, paused briefly on her, then returned to a scrutiny of the room as though expecting it to contain lethal traps.

With her eyes alone, Ianira sought Marcus' gaze and begged the question: Is this the man.? Your former master? She realized she'd begun to tremble only after the slight movement of Marcus' head indicated, No, this is not the one.

The relief that flooded her whole being was short-lived. If this were not Marcus' mysterious uptime previous master, who, then, that he inspired such terror and deference in her beloved? When Marcus spoke, he spoke in Latin and kept his voice soft-the voice of a slave addressing a social superior from his own world.

"Please, you are welcome to my home. This is Ianira, the mother of my children. A high-born woman of Ephesus," he added with just a touch of defiant pride in his eyes and voice. The dark-eyed stranger gave Ianira a long, clear-eyed stare which left her trembling again, from anger, this time. She knew the look of a man hungry for a woman's body. That look was a ravening fire in this man's eyes when he stared at her.

"Ianira, Lupus Mortiferus has stumbled through the Porta Romae in pursuit of a man who stole his money. He needs shelter and our help."

Ianira relaxed marginally, but remained alert for trouble. Why was Marcus so visibly shaken, so subservient, if all he offered was asylum to a fellow downtimer in need? By rights, he should be playing the role of social superior, not struggling to hide obvious terror.

Taking the plunge, Ianira recalled her duties as hostess in Marcus' home. "You are welcome as our guest," she said in her careful Latin. Marcus spoke Greek better than she spoke Latin. Their common household tongue was English. Living as they did, it was a survival ritual they practiced as much for the sake of their children as for the practice speaking the dominant language of the time terminal. Most of the languages Ianira heard spoken on the station, particularly japanese-were utterly beyond her. But English she learned from necessity and Latin she learned from love. She could even understand a little of Marcus' native Gaulish, although he rarely used it except to swear at or by gods neither Athens nor Ephesus had ever known.

Marcus gazed worriedly at the man who continued to stare at Ianira as though the jeans and T-shirt she wore didn't exist. The look sent chills down her back and made her long to close her hands around a weapon to defend herself.

"Ianira," Marcus added with a touch more courage in his eyes, "is highly placed on the Council of Downtimers in this world. She owns her own business and is well respected even by those from uptime, who control the fate of all downtimers who stumble into the station. She is important in this world." The warning in his voice was unmistakable--and it had effect. Lupus Mortiferus' look changed from that of a man who is considering taking what he desires by force to that of speculative curiosity.

Marcus ended the introductions by saying quietly, "Ianira, Lupus Mortiferus is the most famous gladiator to fight in the Circus Maximus at Rome. He has won the Emperor's favor many times and has killed his way to victory in more than a hundred fights by now, I should guess. He will need our help adjusting to La-La Land and to find the thief he seeks. It is his desire to find that thief, recover his stolen money, and return home."

That was against the law. They both knew it.

But a man like Lupus Mortiferus, who had survived combat in the arena, wasn't likely to abide by any such rule. Clearly, Marcus wanted only to help him regain his money as quickly as possible so the man would leave again. Ianira found herself agreeing with that silent desire which burned so brightly in Marcus' frightened eyes. She did not want Lupus Mortiferus to stay on Time Terminal 86. The shorter his visit, the greater her peace of mind. But until he left, he was an invited guest in the home of the father of her children.

She gestured gracefully, playing the role she had learned so well under the lash in her husband's home. "Please, come in. Sit down. The evening meal is nearly ready. It is very simple fare, but nourishing, and there is Greek cheesecake for afterward."

Lupus Mortiferus' eyes came back to hers. "Greek? I thought you were from Ephesus?"

"I was born in Ephesus, yes, but came to live in Athens for a year before stumbling through the Philosophers' Gate, as it is called here. You came here by way of the Porta Romae."

Lupus treated them to a mirthless laugh. "Gate of Rome. How incredible. So you really did live in Athens? The cheesecake is genuine?"

She held back a proud, haughty smile by main force of will. Romans felt a humble respect for anything Greek, believing-as well they ought!-that Greek culture was culture.

"I have heard much of Greek cheesecakes from wealthy patrons."

Ianira forced a light laugh. "Indeed, my recipes are genuine. I knew them by heart-and I was born about six hundred years before you were."

Shock detonated in the man's dark eyes.

Ianira laughed again, knowing she played a deadly game, but knowing also that she could more easily risk it than a man. "Welcome, Lupus Mortiferus, to La-La Land, where men and women from many different places and times come together under one roof. You have much to learn. Please. Sit down and rest. I will bring refreshments for you and serve the dinner. Then we will talk of things you must know in order to survive here."

The piercing look he gave her was difficult to interpret, but he took a seat on their plain brown couch. The vinyl squeaked as the leather of his chaps rubbed it. Ianira noticed the sword half concealed beneath them, but said nothing. Guest laws notwithstanding, Lupus Mortiferus was a man lost in a world he could not possibly comprehend-one that Ianira herself, after three years, took mostly on faith, translating "technology" into "magic" for anything she didn't understand.