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Eboracum—A. D. 208

The slapping of cupped hands on oiled skin echoed off the stone walls of the gymnasium like lukewarm applause. It was interrupted, however, by a bad-tempered grunt. ‘Steady, man! That’s still sore.’

Fingertips explored a pink scar streaking diagonally like a ribbon across the muscled shoulder. It was healing well. ‘Where, sir? Just there?’ The fingers fondled.

‘Ouch! Yes, you imbecile!’

The slave grinned and continued his kneading.

‘If you were not such a good masseur, I’d have you flogged,’ the deep voice grumbled into the towelled pillow.

‘Yes, sir,’ the slave replied, hearing a smile in the empty threat. Quintus Tiberius Martial was not a soft touch in any sense, but nor was he given to floggings and beatings. Florian had been in the Tribune’s service since he was twelve years old and so far had only suffered tongue-lashings for his misdemeanours.

The Tribune’s back was long, tapering and sculpted, divided by a valley with hills and mounds of hard muscle rising on each side, the Titanic shoulders extending to arms as strong as tree branches.

His dice-playing towel-wrapped companions looked up from their game to smile at the tetchiness. ‘Time you had some exercise,’ one of them volunteered, softly.

From the slab, Quintus opened one dark eye to glare at his friend. ‘I’ve been exercising all morning, if you recall. Where were you?’

‘Not that kind,’ the friend said, winking at his partner.

The partner moved one of the pieces on the board and shuffled himself deeper into his towel. ‘Horizontal, he means,’ he said, helpfully.

‘Yes … well … this is probably as horizontal as I’m going to get until I’m properly mended,’ Quintus mumbled, crossly.

‘Rubbish!’ said the friend, wiping the sweat from his face with one forearm. ‘You are mended. Isn’t he, Florian?’

‘Indeed, sir. I believe our forthcoming trip to the hot springs in the south will complete the cure, but I see no reason why the Tribune should not take—’

‘Oh, spare me the lecture and get on with your pummelling, lad,’ Quintus returned sharply. ‘One punishment at a time, for pity’s sake.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Florian, lifting the towel from his master’s brawny thighs. ‘Will you turn, sir, if you please?’

Quintus obliged, staring up at the thick cloud of steam that hung in the curve of the vaulted ceiling. There were sounds of splashing and the deep bellow of men’s voices, the grunts of effort as heavy weights hit the floor, a distant laugh, the patter of bare feet on stone and the accompanying pants as two men wrestled over on the other side of the steaming pool. He caught the whiff of almond and lavender oil as Florian set to work on his chest. He closed his eyes, knowing that his two companions, Tullus and Lucan, would not let the matter rest there. His shoulder had responded well to treatment, but the damage to his knee was more serious, and it was that which had concluded his brilliant career as a military tribune and steered him instead towards administration. His abilities as an expert in the imperial system of record-keeping, accounting and taxes had been recognised even before he was fully recovered, and in record time the Emperor Severus had placed him in his personal service as Provincial Procurator directly responsible to him, not to the Governor of the northern provinces whose hospitality they were at present both using and abusing.

As a respected and successful cavalry officer, Quintus had wanted nothing more than a soldier’s life, and although his new position was both challenging and demanding, and lucrative, it could never compare to the heady excitement of command, continuous movement and brotherhood.

‘We have your best interests at heart, Quintus my friend,’ said Lucan. ‘This expedition down to Aquae Sulis will take quite a few days, and you know what will happen every time we’re offered a night’s hospitality.’

‘I’ve never known you to protest at an excess of hospitality,’ Quintus said, gruffly. ‘The girls you’re offered are never refused, if my memory serves me. What’s the problem?’

‘You are,’ Lucan said. ‘How many ways do you know of refusing? No, thank you. Not tonight. Too tired. My leg hurts. My shoulder is sore.’

‘You’re bound to give some offence,’ said Tullus, nodding.

The two friends were Assistant Procurators, junior administrators in Quintus’s office of scribes, secretaries and accountants. Younger by a few years than his thirty, they had no plans for marriage, mainly due to the roving nature of the job, but their experience of women from the countries through which they had passed in the Emperor’s service was, to say the least, extensive. No one understood better than they how hospitality worked on long journeys, how it was always assumed that a single male guest would need a companion for the night. Slaves were an ever-present commodity to be used at the master’s discretion, and for Quintus to be continually plied with this amenity while he was away could become something of a nuisance.

In his army days, he would have thought nothing of it, but these last few months had been physically hampered by pain and some anger at the turn of events, and though his recuperation had involved a punishing regime of exercises to tone his body, he had allowed himself no rewards. Not even the trip to Aquae Sulis was solely for his health; there was some investigating to be done, too.

‘Giving offence,’ he responded, ‘has never kept me awake at night.’ Flinging aside the hip-covering towel, he sat up and swung his legs over the side of the slab, causing Florian to skip to one side. He ran a hand through his damp dark hair and scowled at his feet. ‘I’ll take a woman when I’m ready,’ he said. ‘I shall not be stuck for excuses.’

Lucan was tall and as lithe as a panther, his nose handsomely hooked, his mouth wide and often smiling, his Greek ancestry enchantingly obvious. Unwinding himself from his towel, he stood up to face his friend, giving the towel a kick, his eyes laughing with a distinct lack of sympathy. ‘You won’t need any excuses if you take a woman with you,’ he said. ‘She doesn’t have to be anyone in particular. Just for show. A slave will do, as long as she’s well bred. One you can pass off as your woman. A companion. She needn’t sleep with you if you don’t wish it. You just let it be known that you’re provided for, thank you very much. No more offers. No refusals. No offence. Everyone happy.’

Ready to dismiss the suggestion out of hand, Quintus held his tongue, recognising an element of good advice. Apart from a few romantic encounters, the hospitality to which Lucan referred had never been an issue in the army where women were taken, paid for and left on a more business-like basis than in civilian life. Outside the barracks, any single, wealthy, good-looking man of equestrian rank with the personal friendship of the Emperor, injured or not, was quickly regarded as husband material for the daughters, nieces and widows of good family. Already Quintus Tiberius Martial had attracted some attention from the women of the royal court surrounding Julia Domna, wife of the Emperor Severus. Clearly his two friends were beginning to think he was using his injuries as an excuse, though the fact was that his knee gave him more trouble than he would admit, and when the prestigious office had been offered, he had taken it immediately rather than see it given to someone else. The demands of such a high position were of a different order from the demands of making love, and Quintus had no wish to start making a fool of himself in a department at which he had always excelled.

Tullus pushed the game-board aside in disgust and stood up, vigorously tousling his nut-brown hair with the towel, emerging red-faced and serious. ‘He’s right,’ he said, eyeing his superior’s long limbs, noting how he sidled off the slab, gingerly testing the knee with the swollen joint. This man, Tullus thought, was a prime specimen, almost in the peak of fitness, with an intellect as bright as any he’d ever worked with, darkly good looking with a heavy-lidded insolence and steady eyes that made women blush and stammer. He would not be chaste for much longer, thought Tullus. ‘The Empress has some high-class slaves in her service,’ he said. ‘You have only to ask her. Just for the trip to Aquae Sulis and back. We shall be off tomorrow.’

‘I shan’t have time,’ Quintus said, dismissing Florian with a nod. ‘The Emperor wants to see me this afternoon. More instructions.’

‘More? I thought everything was arranged,’ said Tullus over his shoulder. He was poised on the edge of the pool, studying the ripples and reflections.

‘So did I,’ said Quintus, joining him. ‘He was pleased to be mysterious, but I believe he wants someone else to join the party.’

Standing between them, Lucan groaned. ‘Oh, Jupiter! Not another aged cripple with wobbly knees who needs spa treatment. We’ll never get there if we’re on escort duty to—’ His protest was cut short by a bellow as he was shoved unceremoniously into the water, hitting it with a loud smack and having no time to surface before two hefty male bodies landed on top of him, sending a tidal wave over the floor to wash Florian’s toes. Steam swirled around flailing limbs, engulfing them.

‘The Tribune Quintus Tiberius Martial,’ snapped the guard, opening the door of the Emperor’s newly whitewashed office.

Quintus stepped forward, his nose wrinkling at the pungent smell of medication that clung to the soldierly white-haired man who, despite the warmth of the April day, wore a fur-lined cloak and a pair of white-and-brown striped socks. ‘Your Excellency,’ Quintus said, bowing and waiting for the Emperor’s attention to lift from the scroll he was reading.

The tube of papyrus sprang upwards with a rattle. ‘Ah, Quintus! All prepared? Right,’ he went on, not waiting for any denial, ‘so I’ve had funds set aside for you in that box over there …’ he pointed with the scroll to a wooden brass-bound chest ‘… and there’ll be a two-man guard on it while you’re in transit. That’s for expenses. And here’s the final list of names and residences for the journey. They’re expecting you all the way from here to Lindum, Corinium, Aquae Sulis and all points in between, but it’s for you to decide the pace and where to pitch camp for the night.’

‘Thank you, my lord.’

Quintus had been in the Emperor’s inner sanctum many times since their arrival at Eboracum earlier in the year and was used to the sparse functional surroundings favoured by him and his two sons. As a Lybian, Severus found the harsh British climate not at all to his liking, but since his recent visit to Hadrian’s Wall, even further north, his chest complaint had been responding to treatment. Something, thought Quintus, must have agreed with him, apart from victory.

‘How’s the knee today?’

‘Bearable, sir, I thank you.’

‘Good. So you won’t mind taking along an extra passenger tomorrow, I take it.’

As if the entourage was not big enough already with attendants and aides, servants and slaves, bodyguards and bald Greek lawyers. ‘Just the one, sir?’

‘Ah … no. She’ll probably want to take her maid along with her, too.’

Inwardly, Quintus groaned. ‘A woman, sir? Not the Lady Julia Domna, surely?’

Severus sighed and rested his behind on a white marble table with gilded lions’ legs, his dark eyes straying briefly to the door and back to his sandals. ‘No, not my wife.’ His voice was subdued. The Empress would not have approved of his plan.

Quintus wondered whether there would be any point in objecting, but suspected not. Women always slowed a journey down, one reason why he’d been disinclined to accept his friends’ suggestion.

The Emperor wriggled his toes. ‘That battle last week,’ he said. ‘Remember?’

‘Indeed I do, sir. You killed the chieftain. It was well done.’

‘And if he’d been the only chieftain, Quintus, it would have been even better. But as you know, the Brigantes are the biggest and most powerful collection of tribes in Britain, even scrapping amongst themselves for dominance, and as soon as we remove one chieftain, another springs up in his place like bloody mushrooms. This time we have two of them. Sons of the last one. But we took the daughter captive.’

‘I didn’t know that, sir.’

The Governor of the northern province where the massive Brigantian tribes made such a nuisance of themselves had sent to the Emperor of Rome for help to put them in their place, once and for all. Severus, his sons, wife and a huge army had come post-haste from victories in Gaul and had already achieved some success.

‘I kept it quiet,’ Severus replied. ‘On the night the chieftain was killed, a party of our men sneaked up to their hill-fort to torch it while their backs were turned. They came back with the daughter and her maid. But I can’t keep them here indefinitely, Quintus. My eldest son is eager to bait them in the arena, but that would be asking for more trouble than they’re worth. I’d have the whole of the Brigantes united against us like a pack of ravening wolves. Subduing them one at a time is enough without provoking them still further. I wish he’d understand that.’

Imprisonment, Quintus knew only too well, was not an alternative form of punishment generally favoured by the Romans. Captives were either sold as slaves or killed. To keep them was an unnecessary burden on the state. High-status captives were sometimes taken in chains to Rome, displayed as trophies, but there was rarely a role for women in all this.

‘Would the two brothers not search for her, sir?’

‘Perhaps. But they’ll have a good idea of where she is, and anyway they’ll have their hands full sorting things out after their father’s death. I have reliable spies in Eboracum. Nothing has been seen of them after the battle. But I have to get rid of her, now, immediately.’ He leaned back, taking a deep breath. ‘Besides, there’s another reason.’

‘Sir?’

‘This woman’s tribe recently received a deputation from the Dobunni tribe down in the south. The spa Aquae Sulis is in their territory.’

Quintus was already beginning to understand. ‘Ah,’ he said.

‘A chieftain’s son, apparently. I’m told that it’s his father who favours an alliance with the local Brigantes, sending his son up here to make an offer for the daughter. I’m told she’s been promised.’

‘To the Dobunnii.’

‘Yes. It’s the kind of alliance that would give him some clout in the south.’

‘So he needs the Brigantes’s help. Is this the same troublemaker who’s building up a resistance army down there, sir?’

‘I believe it is. These impetuous young things take on all the advantages we’ve offered over the best part of two hundred years, all the trappings of Roman citizenship, but the one thing they can’t accept is that they’re expected to pay for our protection. One of these days they’re going to get a shock when we all go back to Rome and leave them to it, Quintus. But it always boils down to the tax problem. And this young renegade, so I’m told, has been recruiting young rebels to be trained for his resistance army.’

‘Jupiter!’

‘Quite. If he’s not stopped very soon, we’ll have more to do here in Britain than we thought. I don’t want to be stuck up here for years and have no wish to die here, either. We have to find this ringleader and put him out of action.’

‘So he’s disappeared, sir?’

‘Yes. We believe he was up here a week ago to make his offer, but now he’s fled, leaving the intended bride to eat her heart out in captivity. Not a very committed type. He obviously saw no reason to stay after the father was lost and the village destroyed. Perhaps the two sons are not so keen on an alliance. I don’t know.’

‘We’re sure he’s gone, then? Not in hiding? Waiting for a chance?’

‘Can’t be sure. But what I believe is that, if the woman is taken down to his neck of the woods, she’ll surely try to make contact with him. My hope is that she’ll lead you to him.’

‘Or he’ll learn of her whereabouts and try for a rescue.’

‘Then it’s up to you to watch and take him. Bring him back here with you or, if you have to, kill him. We’d have taken him earlier if we’d thought he’d abandon the mission. We thought he’d stay and fight with them, but he didn’t.’

‘And the woman?’

‘Oh, do whatever you like with her, lad. Just keep her from under my feet.’

‘Willing or not,’ murmured Quintus.

But Severus heard and threw back his head in a bark of laughter that was not wholly solicitous. ‘Hah! She’ll not be willing, I can promise you that. She’s the most unwilling wench I’ve ever … no … I should not say any more. I can see the idea of carting her off down to Aquae Sulis doesn’t exactly thrill you to the core, does it?’

‘I would rather convey a raging bullock, sir, if you wouldn’t mind.’

‘Unfortunately, that would not be quite so effective, Quintus. You going down there tomorrow happens to fill the bill perfectly. Besides, between you and me, I would rather my son was denied access to her. His manner of dispatching captives lacks finesse, I find.’

Quintus nodded, being too diplomatic to speak out loud on the sensitive issue of Caracalla’s disgraceful behaviour, even towards his own brother. ‘And the other business, sir? The tax fraud?’

‘That must be investigated thoroughly, once you reach the spa,’ said Severus. ‘The tax officials are expecting you, and they’ll give you all the assistance you need. You’ll have plenty of time for the healing and rest. No hurry. I want you to come back refreshed and ready for duty.’

Privately, Quintus saw his recuperation being gnawed away by a package of extra duties he’d hoped to be spared, the notion of being refreshed growing dimmer by the hour. ‘Thank you, sir,’ he said. ‘Any instructions about the woman?’

‘Oh, her! Well, she’s apparently known as a princess, according to the maid, so she’ll certainly regard you as an inferior, Quintus. Very high status.’

‘Hmm! Does she understand our tongue, sir?’

‘So far, we haven’t had a word from her in any tongue, but I think she has a fair understanding of what’s being said. You can take her along as your slave, if you wish, or you may prefer to sell her to a merchant when she’s fulfilled her purpose. It’s up to you. You’d get a good price. She’ll have knowledge of cures and such. These tribal women often do, you know. She might even be quite useful to you, but just get her away from here. Far away.’

Quintus was puzzled. Where was the catch? There had to be one. ‘Would she be of no use to the Lady Julia Domna?’ he said, grasping at straws.

‘No,’ said Severus, irritably. ‘None at all.’

‘Does she ride, sir?’

The frown disappeared as the Emperor passed the scroll to Quintus and scratched into his curling beard. His white bushy brows, stark against the dark skin, lifted and lowered in time to the opening and closing of his mouth; Quintus saw that he’d been about to say something else about the captive before thinking better of it. He began to shuffle through a pile of scrolls, quickly losing interest. ‘On that score I have no suggestions to offer,’ he said, callously. ‘You may have to drag her there by the hair. Have you ever had the pleasure of trying to make one of these tribal women do something they don’t want to?’

‘No, sir. Not yet.’

‘Well, then, I have high hopes of you, lad. If a Tribune of equestrian rank can’t do it, I shall eat one of my socks.’

‘Only one, sir?’

Severus kept on shuffling. ‘Only one.’ He smiled. ‘Get somebody to take you down there. And don’t let me hear the rumpus.’

Quintus bowed. ‘Do we know her name, sir?’

The Emperor looked up with an unusually blank stare. ‘Damned if I know,’ he said. ‘See if the maid will tell you.’

No matter what standard of accommodation the captive had been given, it would not have found favour with her, for the heavy door was locked, confining her to four walls and depriving her of every Brigantian woman’s right: freedom. The room was, in fact, generous as prisons go, plastered walls, red-tiled floor, a barred window above head height, a low wooden sleeping-bench with a few blankets. That was all, apart from heaps of broken earthenware in the corners and one whole pottery beaker towards which one skinny arm was waving in the hope of attracting attention.

‘Please,’ a faint voice whispered. ‘Please?’

The bench had been pulled up below the window with the curled-up body of a young maid lying motionless at one end, covered with a rich cloak. Trying not to stand on her, her regal mistress of the Briganti tribe balanced on the tips of her toes to see out of the window where the spring sun beamed between scudding clouds, showing her that she was facing home, miles away to the north of Eboracum. The princess, a tall slender woman of twenty-two summers, swayed dangerously as she let go of the bar with one hand to look down at the poor waif. ‘Wait,’ she whispered.

The movement made her dizzy and faint, her legs trembling with the effort of reaching up, her usual robust energy sapped by hunger. Warily, she began her descent, clenching her teeth, commanding her feet to tread where they would do no further damage. In mid-step, she let go of the window-bar as the echoing rattle of a key in the door held her, poised and swaying like a reed, narrowing her eyes in anger at the intrusion. Every time the guard brought food, she was aware of the room’s appalling smell of unwashed bodies, rats, sickness and despair, the very idea of eating almost turning her stomach.

But this time, the armour-plated guard stood back to allow a stranger to enter, a tall white-clad man, obviously an official, who frowned at the sight of the young woman in the belted green tunic with a head of bright copper-coloured hair some way above his, glowing like a halo with the sun behind it. Her lips parted, then closed again quickly. The angry expression remained.

Years of discipline held Quintus’s initial reaction where it would not show, yet his eyes faced the sun and the captive Brigantian caught that first fleeting glimpse of shock before the haughty lids came down like shutters. Clearly, he would have preferred it if she’d been on his level, or even lower, but he took the opportunity her position afforded him to take in the intricately woven green-and-heather plaid, the borders of gold-thread embroidery, the tooled leather shoes and patterned girdle. There was heavy gold on her wrists and neck, a wink of red garnets through the hair, and the cords that wrapped her thick plait were twisted with glass beads from the Norse countries, cornelians and lapis from the other side of the world.

Pretending to ignore her perilous position, Quintus glanced round the room. ‘What’s been happening here?’ he said to the guard, indicating the broken pottery.

‘Her food, sir,’ said the man, expressionless. ‘Everything I bring in gets thrown against the wall. The rats like it well enough.’

‘How long?’

‘Since she set foot in the place, sir. The maid’s ready to pack it in, by the look of things. All she gets is water. Tyrannical, I call it, sir.’

‘Seven … eight days?’

‘Aye, sir. Look ‘ere.’ The guard pointed to his bruised cheek. ‘She threw a bowl at me. They can starve for all I care.’

‘That’s what you get if you don’t wear your helmet,’ Quintus said, dismissively. No wonder the Emperor wants rid of her, he thought. He’d not want her death here in Eboracum. Miles away, perhaps, but not here under his roof. Another glance up at the captive’s face, however, alerted him to the probability of that fate if something was not done immediately to reverse it. She was swaying dangerously, her eyes half-closed in pain.

‘Come down,’ he said, sternly. ‘Take my arm. Come on.’

The guard looked dubious. ‘She’ll not let you touch her, sir.’

But the stern command had reached through a cold haze as if from a long way away, and the hand she put out to steady herself touched something firm and warm that supported her, keeping her from falling. Not for the world would she willingly have allowed any Roman to touch her, nor would she have touched one, but now she found herself being placed carefully upon the floor and helped to sit unsteadily beside her maid’s feet that stuck out from beneath the gold fringe of a cloak. Seated on the edge of the bed, she felt her head being pushed slowly down between her knees in a most undignified manner.

‘Let me up!’ she gasped. ‘I’m all right.’

The guard let out a yelp. ‘Ye gods! That’s the first time she’s said a word, sir. Honest. We all thought she was word-struck!’

‘There’s something to be said for it, in a woman,’ Quintus remarked, removing his hand from her head, ‘but I have a suspicion we shall hear a lot more of it before we’re much older.’ Bending, he picked up the beaker of water from the floor and placed it in the woman’s hand. ‘Take a sip of that,’ he said. ‘Then you’d better listen to me.’

She refused his command, preferring instead to place a hand under her maid’s head and offer the water to her parched lips. With closed eyes sunk deep into brown sockets, the girl could take only a sip before bubbling the rest of it away down her chin, coughing weakly.

‘Are you going to let her die, then?’ said Quintus. ‘Can you not see she has no strength? You may be able to last out a few more weeks, but she won’t. Do you want her death on your hands? No one regards your protest, woman. You’re wasting life for no good reason.’

The captive pulled herself up straight, her back like a ramrod, a token of inflexibility. Her hands trembled around the beaker of water, her mouth panting.

‘Listen to me,’ Quintus said. ‘I’ve come to offer you a choice. Either you come with me and give your maid a chance to recover, or you allow her to die through your own neglect. No good mistress would do that to her maid.’

‘It is not how you think, Roman,’ the captive whispered. ‘That fool knows nothing. My maid is not neglected. She is mine.’ Her hand rested tenderly on the maid’s hip, then slid down to take the claw-like fingers in her own. She was close to desperation, knowing that although her voice was weak, the hard edge of physical effort had been mistaken for a mistress’s authority and ownership. Already she had decided that the death of her maid would coincide with her own, using the window-bars and her tablet-woven girdle to speed her into the next world. Tears in her proud eyes sparkled in the sunlight, tears that had been suppressed during days and nights of isolation, unwelcome, shaming tears to be brushed away impatiently with one flick of the wrist.

Quintus kept up the pressure. ‘Correction!’ he snapped. ‘She is not yours. She is mine, as you both are. You belong to me now. Yes, you, too.’

The woman’s gasp was audible as she jerked her head up to look him full in the face, her eyes blazing with furious tears like watery blue-green gems. The very notion of being owned by a Roman was impossible for her even to contemplate. ‘Never! Never!’ she growled, her voice raw with fury. ‘I belong to no one except my father, the chieftain of our tribe. Leave me, Roman. Get out!‘ With an astonishing resurgence of energy, she glared at Quintus with all the contempt she could summon, not having the slightest notion, in her trembling rage, what a picture of sheer animal loveliness she presented as the sun caught the edges of the blazing red hair surrounding her face. Like the sheen on water, her skin was almost translucent, her mouth wide and pale, her eyes dark-lashed. Too large, and too full of rage.

A frail hand caught at her sleeve, tugging gently. ‘Please, mistress,’ the maid whispered, her voice almost too low to hear. ‘We should go, for your father’s sake.’

‘Don’t shame me,’ the woman whispered back, angrily. ‘Where is your pride? You think my father would want us to belong to a Roman? Rather we should die first.’

The little hand fell away. ‘It could not be worse than this,’ the girl said on a sigh of resignation. ‘Accept his offer.’

‘Well?’ said Quintus. ‘I’m not going to carry you out of here kicking and screaming. If you’re determined to stay …’ He turned towards the door, signalling the guard to go.

‘No. wait!’ The woman held out a hand to him. ‘Save her. Take her with you. She can go. There’s just a chance.?’

‘It’s both of you, or neither. Make up your mind.’

‘You don’t understand,’ she replied, trying not to plead. ‘I cannot be owned. I cannot be so shamed. I am a chieftain’s only daughter.’

‘And I’m not ecstatic about having to take you where I’m going either, if you must know. I have neither the time nor the inclination to act as nursemaid to two women intent on self-harm when there are thousands out there trying to find cures and enough food to keep themselves alive. I suppose you think your deaths would be an heroic gesture, do you? Well, I think it’d be a bit of a waste when you could help others to stay alive, but the decision is yours. Either you accompany me down to the south, or you stay here and—’

‘What? South, did you say?’

‘That’s what I said. Tomorrow I’m off down to the healing spa at Aquae Sulis. Not exactly in your direction, is it?’

The captive princess stood up. Too quickly. Unfocused, her eyes swam, fighting the sudden pain in her head. ‘I’ll come,’ she whispered, swaying.

‘Then you’d better tell me your name. I cannot keep on calling you Woman.’

Her knees melted and the growing roar in her ears brought with it a cold blackness to envelop her in a drowning tide. ‘Brighid,’ she said.

Quickly, he caught up the sinking body in his arms, wincing at the twinge in his knee. ‘What in the name of Hades have I let myself in for?’ he asked of no one in particular. ‘Go on,’ he said to the guard. ‘You carry the maid and I’ll take this one.’ Still frowning, he looked down at the limp figure in his arms, at the mass of red hair on his shoulder and the angelic face deep into her swoon, and briefly he wondered why they could not have captured some worn-out old crone who would not last out the journey instead of this high-flown goddess.