Legate? I stared at Amadou Barry, but he was not looking at me. Only the Romans in their much shrunken imperial republic used the term legate for highly placed commanders and ambassadors.
"There's a… naked… man at the ramparts. He baldly requests permission to-"
I stood so fast I banged a knee against the table and had to catch its edge to prevent it from toppling over. My heart had galloped ahead. I could barely string coherent words together. "Let him in. Quickly! Can clothing be found?"
Lord Marius set to laughing in earnest. When he had controlled himself, and wiped his eyes, he managed to speak. "A naked man, come to my camp? Is it your abandoned husband, Catherine Hassi Barahal? Come to display himself for your benefit?"
My flush must have reached my ears as his words forced me to consider the prospect of facing Andevai Diarisso Haranwy in very different circumstances than any we'd previously shared. The two troopers and Lord Marius kept laughing while Legate Amadou Barry, whatever else he might be, had compassion enough to take pity on me.
"If you vouch for him, then certainly we can allow him to join our company. Sergeant, let him enter the camp."
The second trooper hurried out.
"By all means!" cried Lord Marius, placing the harp carefully back in its case and securing it. "Let me go view this prodigy for myself. Dare I hope-" He broke off and looked at me. Amadou put a hand on his forearm, in the way a man might quell a dog's yap. Marius chuckled and strode from the tent, leaving Amadou to give the order to fetch clothing.
I grabbed a cloak off the hook and hurried out in Lord Marius's wake, with Amadou following. The news had spread
through camp. The soldiers were calling out jokes, although in no way did they relax their vigilance.
"Best you stay back, maestressa," called Lord Marius over his shoulder. "The House company has camped beyond the ramparts. They have crossbows."
So I stood, shifting my weight from one foot to the other, as the officer and five men strode ahead. Amadou remained beside me.
"Who is it?" he asked.
"I think it likely it is my brother."
He raised an eyebrolv. "I did not know you had a brother, maestressa."
"No. I expect you did not."
A trooper ran past, carrying a bundle of clothes. He, too, vanished past the angle where the ramparts opened.
"He saved my life just today," I added. "I wasn't sure he was still alive-"
I pressed a fist to my mouth, unable to speak. My companion wisely held his tongue. Had he said one cursed sympathetic thing right then, I think I would have clawed out his eyes.
I heard men talking and talking, laughing and joking. It took forever and a day exactly as if they were conducting a party and had forgotten me entirely. I would have run to find out what was taking so long, but I thought of crossbow bolts and did not. At long last strode a half dozen men into view with Rory among them, limping a little-his feet were still bare but he was otherwise decently clothed-and his head thrown back as he laughed at some soldierly quip.
I might have moaned first, as despair fled my heart, entirely routed. Then I shrieked. "Rory!" I ran, and I flung myself at him so hard he staggered back at the impact and got an arm around me as I pressed my face into the coat he was wearing.
"You're safe," I cried like a player in the theater. "I thought you were dead."
"They were too startled to manage an effective counterattack. And the remaining horses went wild. All but one bolted."
I glanced up just as he licked his lips, looking suspiciously pleased with himself.
"I didn't know you could do that," I said with a glance at the soldiers now watching us with the sentimental expressions of men who pretend to be big and tough but in truth dandle babies on their knee with the greatest tenderness and affection.
"Neither did I!" he replied with a grin. "It just…came over me."
We both started laughing, and I broke away and wiped my eyes. "Are you hurt?"
"A shard of bone cut one paw. Nothing important. Now who are these fine fellows who have given me these fine clothes? And is that beef I smell?"
I introduced him as my brother Roderic without offering a single detail more, and our hosts graciously had another platter of food brought as well as a fourth camp stool. Rory chatted and laughed with Marius and Amadou, ever so charming, pausing at intervals to try on boots that soldiers brought in, none of which fit.
I stared at him, scarcely able to believe he had survived. His features, his gestures, his long black braid: All these had become as familiar to me as if I had known them my entire life long, yet I had first encountered him only a few days ago. I did not understand it. Was this what kinship meant? A sense, deep in your bones, that the person next to you is part of you? Inextricable from what you are? That you could not be who you are without their existence as part of the architecture of your very self?
We are none of us one thing alone and unchanging. We are not static, or at rest. Just as a city or a prince's court or a lineage
is many people in one, so is a person many people within one, always unfinished and always like a river's current flowing onward ever changing toward the ocean that is greater than all things combined. You cannot step into the same river twice.
"Philosophizing over there?" asked Rory, as if he could hear my thoughts. "You don't usually stay silent for this long, Cat. Unless you're deliberately ignoring me, I mean."
I shook off my reverie. "Just worrying," I said.
Lord Marius rose. "It will be a long night. I suppose the company pursuing you may take it into their heads to attempt a night raid, so I'll keep half my men awake and half asleep in their boots."
"I'll take the second watch," said Amadou.
"My thanks, Legate" I said with what I hoped was a biting smile.
He had the grace to look shamefaced. He and Lord Marius left the tent to us.
"What is a legate?" Rory asked.
"A very important man in Rome. I cannot figure it. It seems true that he and his sisters and aunt fled from Eko-"
"Eko?"
"You don't know anything, do you?"
"No," he agreed cheerfully. "Not a thing! That horse meat was tasty, though."
I laughed, and then grimaced, realizing he was not speaking of our supper. "You stopped to eat not knowing if I was alive or dead?"
"I discovered, dearest sister, that I am not entirely myself when I am in my natural shape here in the Deathlands. It took me a while to come to myself. Once I had, I followed your trail immediately. And am very glad to have discovered you alive and unharmed. What is Eko?"
"It's a place very far away from here on the coast of a land
where once rose a rich empire. A terrible plague devastated the country. Those who could, fled and made homes elsewhere, but of course their descendants never forgot where they had come from. In recent years, some intrepid settlers rebuilt the old port of Eko, thinking to return to their lost homeland. But they were attacked and overrun. The survivors returned here to Europa to the families and clans from which they had come. I thought Amadou Barry was just a young man from a well-to-do Fula banking family, who happened to be among those who attempted the resettlement and ended up making a new life in Adurnam after the disaster. Now I hear him addressed as a legate, which means he is connected to Rome! In what capacity he could possibly carry the title of legate I cannot be sure, nor why he was masquerading as a student…"
Rory yawned. "He smells clean. He and the other one mean us no harm, not like those hyenas waiting out beyond the old earth walls."
"Hyenas? What is that?"
"Never mind. Foul creatures. I hate them. Hyenas, I mean, not our rescuers. I'm tired. I need a nap."
He took possession of one of the cots and pulled the blankets up over his head. His breathing slowed immediately. Could anyone fall asleep that fast?
A cough startled me; a soldier poked his head in and gestured. "If you would like me to turn down the lamps, mae-stressa? Stoke the braziers?"