Sailing to Sarantium (17 page)

And if Gisel, the young queen of the Antae, was correct, Valerius II
wanted to restore the western empire, one way or another.

As far as the Rhodian mosaicist Caius Crispus of Varena was
concerned, unhappy and cold in autumn rain, any and all measures that
increased the degree of civilized order in places like this were to
be vigorously encouraged.

He really didn't like the forest, at all.

It was interesting, the degree of uneasiness he'd felt as the days
passed and they walked the road within constant sight of it. He was
forced to acknowledge, with some chagrin, that he was even more a man
of the city than he'd known himself to be. Cities, for all their
dangers, had walls. Wild things-whether animals or men without
laws-could generally be assumed to be outside those walls. And so
long as one took care not to be abroad alone after dark or enter the
wrong alleyway, a purse-snatcher in the market or an overly
impassioned holy man strewing spittle and imprecations was the
greatest danger one was likely to encounter.

And in cities were buildings, public and private. Palaces,
bathhouses, theatres, merchants' homes, apartments, chapels and
sanctuaries-with walls and floors and sometimes even domes whereon
people with sufficient means sometimes desired mosaics to be designed
and set.

A living, for a man of experience and certain skills. There was
extremely little call for Crispin's particular gifts in this forest,
or the wild lands south of it here. The feuding Sauradian tribes had
been a byword for barbaric ferocity since the early days of the
Rhodian Empire. Indeed, the worst single defeat a Rhodian army had
ever suffered before the slow decline and final overthrow had been
not far north of here, when a full legion sent to quell one tribal
rising had been trapped between swampland and wood and cut to pieces.

The legions of reprisal had waged war for seven years, according to
the histories. They had succeeded. Eventually. Sauradia was not an
easy place to fight in phalanx and column. And enemies that melted
like spirits into the trees and then dismembered and ate their
captives in blood-soaked ceremonies in the drumming, shrouded forests
could inspire a certain apprehension in even the most disciplined
soldiery.

But the Rhodians had not taken most of the known world under their
aegis by being reluctant to employ harsh measures themselves, and
they had the resources of an Empire. The trees of the Sauradian woods
had ultimately borne the dead bodies of tribal warriors-and their
women and small children-with limbs and privates hacked off, hanging
from sacred branches by their greased yellow hair.

It was not a history, thought Crispin one morning, calculated to
elicit tranquil reflection, however long ago it had taken place. Even
Linon had fallen silent today. The dark woods marched beside the
road, very near at this point, seemingly endless ahead to the east
and when he looked back west. Oak, ash, rowan, beech, other trees he
didn't know, leaves fallen or falling. Smudged black smoke rose at
intervals: charcoal-burners, working the edgings of the forest. To
the south the land swept upwards in a series of ascents towards the
barrier of mountains that hid the coastline and the sea. He saw sheep
and goats, dogs, smoke from a shepherd's hut. No other sign of human
life. It was a grey day, a fine, cold rain falling, the mountain
peaks lost under clouds.

Beneath the hood of his travelling cloak, Crispin tried-with only
marginal success-to remember why he was doing this.

He attempted to conjure forth bright, multihued images of
Sarantium-the fabled glories of the Imperial City, centre of Jad's
creation, eye and ornament of the world, as the well-known phrase had
it. He couldn't.

It was too far away. Too unknown to him. The black forest and the
mist and the cold rain were too oppressively, demandingly present.
And the lack of walls, warmth, people, shops, markets, taverns,
baths, any man-made images of comfort, let alone beauty.

He was a town person, it was simply the truth. This journey was
forcing him to accept, however ruefully, all the associations that
carried ... of decadence, softness, corruption, overbred luxury.
Those last sardonic caricatures of Rhodias before it fell: effete,
posturing aristocrats who hired barbarians to fight for them and were
helpless when their own mercenaries turned. He and the lady Massina
Baladia with her cushioned litter, her exquisite travel garb, her
scent, and her painted toenails were more akin than unlike, after
all, whatever he might wish to say. Town walls defined the boundaries
of Crispin's world as much as hers. What he most wanted right now-if
he was honest with himself-was a bath, oiling, a professional
massage, then a glass of hot, spiced wine on a couch in a warm room
with civilized talk washing over him. He felt anxious and
disoriented, exposed out here in this wilderness. And he had a long
way to go.

Not so far to the next bed, however. A steady pace through the steady
rain, with only a brief halt for a midday piece of cheese and bread
and a flask of sour wine at a smoky, mitten-smelling tavern in a
hamlet, brought them by late afternoon near to the next Imperial Inn.
The rain had even stopped by then, the clouds breaking up to south
and west, though not over the woods. He saw the tops of some of the
mountains. The sea would be beyond. He might have sailed, had the
courier come in time. A wasted thought.

He might still have a family, had the plague bypassed their house.

Behind them, as he and Vargos and the mule went through another
cluster of houses, the sun appeared for the first time that day, pale
and low, lighting the mountain slopes, underlighting the heavy clouds
above the peaks, glinting coldly in pools of rainwater in the ditch
by the road. They passed a smithy and bakehouse and two evil-looking
hostelries in the village, ignoring the scrutiny of the handful of
people gathered and a coarse invitation from a gaunt whore in the
laneway by the second inn.

Not for the first time Crispin offered thanks for the Permit folded
in the leather purse at his belt.

The Posting Inn was east of the village, exactly as indicated on his
map. Crispin liked his map. He took great comfort in the fact that as
he walked places appeared each day when and where the map said they
should. It was reassuring.

The inn was large, had the usual stable, smithy, inner courtyard, and
no piles of rotting refuse in the doorway. He glimpsed a well-tended
vegetable and herb garden beyond a gate towards the back, sheep in
the meadow beyond and a sturdy shepherd's hut. Long live the
Sarantine Empire, Crispin thought wryly, and the glorious Imperial
Post. Smoke rising from broad chimneys offered the promise of warmth
within.

'We'll
stay two nights,'
Linon said.

The bird was on the thong around his neck again. She hadn't spoken
since morning. The blunt, sudden words startled Crispin.

'Indeed? Why? Your little feet are tired?'

'Mice and blood. You are too stupid to be allowed out of doors
without a nursemaid. Remember the calendar and what Zoticus told you.
You're in Sauradia, imbecile. And tomorrow is the Day of the Dead.'

Crispin had, in fact, forgotten, and cursed himself for it. It
irritated him, however unreasonably, when the bird was right.

'So
what happens?'
he demanded sourly.
'They boil me into soup if I'm found
abroad? Bury my bones at a crossroad?'

Linon didn't bother to reply.

Feeling obscurely at a disadvantage, Crispin left Vargos to see to
the mule and his goods while he strode past two barking dogs and a
scatter of chickens in the sodden courtyard. He walked through the
doorway into the front room of the inn to show his Permit and see if
a hot bath could be had immediately for coinage of the Empire.

The entranceway was encouragingly clean, large, high-ceilinged.
Beyond it, through a door to the left, the common room had two fires
going. A cheerful buzz of speech in many accents drifted out to him.
After the wet, cold road all day it was undeniably alluring. He
wondered if someone in this kitchen knew how to cook. There had to be
deer and boar perhaps even the elusive Sauradian bison in these
woods; a well-seasoned platter of game and a halfway adequate flask
or two of wine would go some way to easing him.

It occurred to Crispin, looking around, noting the swept, dry tiling
on the floor, that this inn might indeed be a perfectly decent place
to rest his feet for two days and nights. Zoticus had been
unambiguous in advising him to stay in one place and indoors on the
Day of the Dead. For all his sardonic attitude to such things, it
wouldn't do to be foolish merely to win a battle with an artificial
bird. If nothing else, he thought suddenly, Linon was proof that the
half-world was real.

Not an entirely comforting reflection.

He waited for the innkeeper, blessed Permit in hand, letting himself
relax already into the sensation of being dry with the near prospect
of warmth and wine. He heard a sound from the back of the inn, behind
the stairs, and turned, a civil expression ready. He was aware that
he was hardly distinguished-looking at the moment, nor did travelling
on foot with one temporarily hired servant commend him as affluent,
but a Permit with his name elegantly written upon it-or Martinian's
name-and the privy Seal and signature of no less a figure than the
Imperial Chancellor could make him instantly formidable, he'd
discovered.

It wasn't the innkeeper who came from backstairs. Only a thin serving
girl in a stained, knee-length brown tunic, barefoot, yellow-haired,
carrying a stoppered jug of wine too heavy for her. She stopped dead
when she saw him, staring openly, wide-eyed.

Crispin smiled briefly, ignoring the presumption of her gaze. 'What
do they call you, girl?'

She swallowed, looked down, mumbled, 'Kitten.'

He felt himself grinning crookedly. 'Why that?'

She swallowed again, seemed to be having trouble speaking. 'Don't
know,' she managed finally. 'Someone thought I looked like one.'

Her eyes never left the floor, after that first naked stare. He
realized he hadn't spoken to anyone, other than some instructions to
Vargos, all day. Was odd, he didn't know how he felt about that. He
did know he I wanted a bath, not to be making talk with a serving
girl.

'You don't. What's your proper name, then?'

She looked up at that, and then down again. 'Kasia.'

'Well, Kasia, run find the 'keeper for me. I'm wet outside and dry
within. And never dream of telling me there are no rooms to be had.'

She didn't move. Continued to stare at the floor, clutching at the
heavy wine jug with both hands beneath it. She was quite young, very
thin, wide-set blue eyes. From a northern tribe, obviously. Inicii,
or one of the others. He wondered if she'd understood him, his jest;
they'd been speaking Rhodian. He was about to repeat his request in
Sarantine, without the witticism, when he saw her draw a breath.

'They are going to kill me tomorrow,' was what she said, quite
clearly this time. She looked up at him. Her eyes were enormous, deep
as a forest. 'Will you take me away?'

Zagnes of Sarnica had not been willing, at all.

'Are you simple?' the man had cried the night before. In his
agitation he had pushed Kasia right out of the bed to land sprawling
on the floor. It was cold, even with the kitchen fires directly
below. 'What in Jad's holy name would I do with a bought girl from
Sauradia?'

'I would do anything you like,' she'd said, kneeling beside the bed,
fighting back tears.

'Of course you would. What else would you do? That is not the point.'
Zagnes was quite exercised.

It wasn't the request to buy her and take her away. Imperial Couriers
were used to such pleas. It must have been her reason. The very
immediate, particular reason. But she'd had to tell him ... otherwise
there was no cause at all for him to even consider it, among all the
usual requests. He was said to be a kindly man . . .

Not enough so, it seemed. Or not foolish enough. The courier was
white-faced; she had given him a genuine fright. A balding, paunchy
man, no longer young. Not cruel at all, merely refusing prudently to
involve himself in the under-the-surface life of a Sauradian village,
even if it involved the forbidden sacrifice of a girl to a pagan god.
Perhaps especially so. What would happen if he reported this story to
the clerics, or at the army camp east of them? An investigation,
questions asked, probably painful questions-even fatal ones-for these
were matters of holy faith. Stringent measures to follow against
resurgent paganism? Fulminating clerics, soldiers quartered in the
village, punitive taxes imposed? Morax and others might be punished;
the innkeeper could be relieved of his position, his nose slit, hands
cut off.

And no more of the best treatment, the warmest rooms at this inn or
any of the others in Sauradia for Zagnes of Sarnica. Word travelled
swiftly along the main roads, and no one, anywhere, liked an
informer. He was an Imperial Officer, but he spent most of his
days-and nights-far from Sarantium.

And all this for a serving girl? How could she possibly have expected
him to help?

She hadn't. But she didn't want to die, and her options were
narrowing by the moment.

'Get back in bed,' Zagnes had said brusquely. 'You'll freeze on the
floor and then you're no good to me at all. I'm always cold, these
days,' he'd added, with a contrived laugh. 'Too many years on the
road. Rain and wind get right inside my bones. Time to retire. I
would, if my wife wasn't at home.' Another false, unconvincing laugh.
'Girl, I'm sure you are frightened by nothing. I've known Morax for
years. You girls are always afraid of shadows when this silly . . .
when this day comes round.'