“But until that happy day, we flawed mortals must get along as best we can,” said Artorius dryly. “How do you think the Empire itself was built, save through war? How do you think its peace was kept for so long, save through endless war?” He grinned. “And — Regina, if it is a game it is a marvelous game. The world is an arena for the ambitious, and the prize for victory is no petty favor from a stadium crowd. What else is life for?”
“Once you prized my strength of character,” she said. “My defiance.”
“But now you are starting to irritate me, my Morrigan.” He stepped closer to her, his face even. “Do not oppose me tomorrow.”
When he had gone she stood for a time, in the cool shade of the colonnade, thinking through her problems. Artorius was determined on this course, a course that must lead him to disaster. And then there was Brica with her moon-faced barbarian boy.
Both her problems had a single solution.
It is time, she told herself. She must not go back to the dunon. Perhaps she had anticipated this decision, for she had after all packed the matres, the heart of her home. The decision made, all that remained was to work out how to achieve her new goal.
And yet, standing here, she felt suddenly old, and weak, and tired. Must she do this? Must she uproot herself again, build yet another life? And would she have to fight even her own daughter to do it? But she knew there was no choice, not anymore.
As it happened, an opportunity to get what she wanted showed itself before the next council.
Ceawlin sought her out in her small chamber. Standing in the doorway, his bulk seemed to fill the room.
“I saw the tension between you and the riothamus,” he said evenly. “If I can help—”
She eyed him, calculating, wondering what motives had brought him here. “Perhaps you can. I need passage.”
“Passage? Where?”
She took a breath. “Rome.”
“Why do you want to go to Rome?”
“To find my mother.”
He gazed at her, his eyes invisible behind layers of fat. “You fear Artorius. You think he is leading us all to disaster. You, specifically.”
“My relationship with Artorius isn’t your concern. Can you get me a passage?”
He shrugged massively. “I am a negotiatore. I can provide anything — for a price.” He considered.
“Come with me.”
He walked with her out of the house and along the line of the wall beside the river, heading west toward the bridge.
After a short time they came to the docks. A massive series of timber quays and waterfronts had been constructed in the shadow of the bridge. Behind the quayside was a row of warehouses, and behind them, as Ceawlin pointed out to her, was a district of workshops. There was a handful of boats in the quays. Most of them were small, but one was larger, with bright green sails furled against its masts.
“Here is the heart of Londinium. Goods from the heart of the Empire flow into these wharfs and warehouses, and our goods flow out. The workshops house crafstmen — shipwrights, carpenters, metalworkers, leatherworkers — to service the ships, and to process the trade goods. Once British wheat fed half the western Empire, and our metal clad the mighty armies that held Gaul. Now the port is much declined, of course. But there is still a profit to be made,” he said, patting his belly complacently.
“Why have you brought me here, Ceawlin?”
He leaned close, so she could feel his breath on her ear; there was a stink of urine about him. “To see that green-sailed ship. It belongs to the Empire. It is bound for the coast of Spain — and from there, my note of credit will buy you passage to Rome itself. Once you are out of British waters, away from the raiding Germans, the sailing is safe.”
“How much?”
“More than you can pay,” he said lightly, as if it were a joke. “I know that you are a creature of Artorius, with no wealth of your own. There is nothing you own that I could want — your pathetic bits of jewelry are of little value …”
“Then why are we talking?”
“I do have other — ah, needs. Call it an appetite, perhaps.” He lifted his hand to her breast. He pinched her through the layers of her clothes, hard; his hands felt strong despite their pudginess.
She closed her eyes. “So that’s it. You disgust me.”
“That hardly concerns me,” he said.
“How do I know you won’t betray me? Take what you want and—”
“ — and leave you stranded here? Because I would be stranded, too. And you would no doubt go to Artorius, who would no doubt have me killed.” He winked at her. “Of course you could do that now. Oh, you see, you already have the upper hand in our negotiation. I am a poor businessman!”
She nodded. “What now?”
He eyed her with an intensity she hadn’t experienced since Amator. “Perhaps you could grant me a little on account.” He began to pull up his tunic.
So there, in the shadow of the river wall, she knelt before him. His crotch stank of stale urine. As he grew excited he began to thrust, threatening to choke her.
“But it is not you I want,” he said, gasping. “Not a fat old sow like you. Your daughter. That is the bargain, lady Regina. Send me Brica. If not I will risk the wrath of Artorius himself …” He grabbed her head and pushed her face into his crotch. “Aah.”
Artorius faced his council. He was naked, save only for an iron torc around his neck, made for him by Myrddin. He had shaved his body, and the hair on his head was thickened with limewash so it stood up in great spikes from his head. This was how his ancestors had met Julius Caesar, he believed, and how he would challenge the latest holder of the purple.
His council gazed at him, frozen in shock. In the stony expressions of men like Ceawlin, Regina saw veiled amusement, even contempt. Only young Ambrosius Aurelianus stared at this savage, antique figure with something like awe.
You fool, Artorius, she thought.
Artorius said, “Many centuries ago — so the bards say — a great host of those the Romans call barbarians, the Celtae, thrust across Europe and burned down Rome itself. There were British among them — so it is said. What can be done once will be done again …”
He was calling for a great rising of the Celtae — for their culture had been swept aside, he argued, first by the Caesars and now by the Christian popes. It would be a campaign to free Britain and Europe once and for all from the yoke of Rome. And he would do that by taking Rome for himself.
“Some accuse me of seeking the purple,” Artorius said now. “The mantle of the Emperor. But I seek the mantle, not of the Caesars, but of Brutus and Lear and Cymbeline, the forefathers of Britain. And the gods who will protect me are not the Christ and His father, but the older gods, the true gods, Lud and Coventina and Sulis and the triple mothers …”
Ceawlin maneuvered himself close to Regina. There was a faint stink of urine even now.
Regina closed her eyes. His stink made her gorge rise, as it had done that day by the river wall. And yet she must put that aside, and think with the clarity for which she prayed daily to the matres.
Brica would be harmed by her contact with this fat pig. But the family would be harmed more badly if she sat by while Artorius submitted himself to his suicidal venture, and all he had built was cast to the winds, all the protection she had carefully accrued dissipated. Brica was the most precious person in the world to her. But together they were family. And the family, its continuity into the future, was of more importance than any individual.