“Yes, but if I get to the market square now, I have a better chance of finding things before it’s picked clean,” Nicole answered. She wasn’t as bold as she sounded, but Julia didn’t call her on it. Julia was still shaking her head as Nicole went out the door.
There were Germans in the streets, swaggering about with a lordly air. In front of the shop where Nicole had bought her image of Liber and Libera, one of the conquerors picked up a votive plaque with an image of the naked Venus. He ran a hand over the limestone curves as if fondling a real woman.
“Gut!” he grunted, or close enough. The shopkeeper stood motionless. The German laughed, tucked the plaque under his arm, and sauntered off. The stonecarver stared after him, but knew better than to demand payment.
Something about the incident stopped Nicole cold. It wasn’t the theft — that was common enough these days. It wasn’t the shopkeeper’s powerlessness, not really. And yet…
I don’t have the right plaque, Nicole thought. The thought was very clear. She’d had it before, and more than once, but never so distinctly. The god and goddess aren’t listening, because the plaque I have — it’s not the one I bought in Petronell. It’s not just the image, or the intent. It’s the connection to me, to my past and future. I need that one, and no other.
She couldn’t prove it. Nor was there any way to do so, unless she found the actual plaque, the one that had brought her here. Did it even exist yet? Would she have to wait another twenty or thirty years before it was made?
No, she thought with a shiver. She had to believe, for her own sanity, that the plaque had brought her back to the time when it was carved. Otherwise, what would be the point of it at all?
She put the thought away for now; because she had an errand, and it was urgent. It wasn’t too terribly hard to distract herself: the city had changed since she last went out to market. Shops that had once been open were closed and shuttered, Germans came and went from houses that had belonged to solid Roman citizens, the few women who were out and about went warily as Nicole herself did, and probably with some kind of weapon concealed in their clothing. Nicole, whose chief weapon was her stink of ancient piss, was just as glad not to be armed. Her self-defense instructor had been blunt about it. “A knife or a gun may make you feel better when you carry it, but you’re just giving a mugger another weapon to use against you. Unless you can shoot or stab to kill or disable, and do it instantly, he’ll get hold of it and he’ll use it. And you’ll be worse off than you were before.”
Armed with a stink that kept even the locals from crowding in too close, Nicole passed the baths and came in sight of the open space of the market square. She stopped, and gasped.
The space was larger, much larger, than it had ever been before. It opened to the north and west, openness in shades of black, the charred ruins of the fire that she’d heard but not seen on the first day of the sack. Houses and shops and a handful of four- and five-story apartment buildings were flattened, burned to the ground.
Romans and Germans, their clothes and hides black with soot, sifted through the wreckage. Some of the Romans were probably trying to salvage what they could from the disaster. Many must have been thieves — as were all of the Germans.
When a Roman found something he was looking for, he slipped it into a pouch or hid it somewhere on his person, as quickly and unobtrusively as possible. When a German found a coin or a ring or anything of value, he held it up and crowed over it. He didn’t care who saw him, or worry that someone else might take his prize away from him.
Nicole shook her head at the fortunes of war, and ventured into the market. Most of the largest stalls were empty, their keepers dead or robbed or simply lying low. The Germans helped themselves to whatever struck their fancy. She watched a barbarian walk away from a sausage-seller gnawing on a length of garlicky stuff he hadn’t paid for. Like the stonecutter, the merchant could only look unhappy. There wouldn’t be a revolt here, not while the Germans were large and strong and trained to fight, and the locals were smaller, weaker, and inclined to leave the fighting to professionals.
Nicole bought a length of sausage for herself. She didn’t have to haggle much to get a good price, rather to her surprise. “You’re only the third person today with money to spend,” the sausage-seller told her. “I’m happy to see any brass at all.”
With the sausage stowed away in her bag, she bought a sack of beans and a sack of peas, and filled another sack with lettuce and onions and cucumbers. That was as much as she could carry. There wasn’t any wine, as she’d fully expected.
Loaded down with her purchases but still trusting to her rape repellent, she left the market with relief. While she’d been busy shopping, she hadn’t taken time to notice the way the Germans eyed the women who’d ventured out to market. Once she was done, as she turned toward home, she grew all too well aware of it: long raking glances, and looks that stripped a woman bare and had their will of her. They didn’t actually drag anybody down and line up for the fun, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t do it, or wouldn’t. The sooner she was out of their sight, the better. Her ears burned. She couldn’t move nearly fast enough, burdened as she was; she had to keep to a slower pace.
It felt like a crawl. To these bastards she was meat, nothing more, as free for the taking as a sausage or a sack of barley. If one of them decided to have fun with her, and never mind the stink that surrounded her, she couldn’t stop him. Not if she wanted to stay alive.
As it happened, no one touched her or accosted her. She made it home without undue trouble, and set down her burden of sacks and bags with a sigh of relief.
Julia wasn’t any less relieved than Nicole was. “Mistress!” she said. “You got away with it.”
That was pretty much how Nicole felt, but she wasn’t about to let Julia know it. “We have to eat,” she said. “We can go without a lot of things, but not food.” And if Julia knew exactly how much Nicole was going without, she’d never believe it.
“I just hope there’s food to be had,” Julia said. “The gods only know what the barbarians have done to the farmers outside the city — the ones who didn’t die of the pestilence, that is.”
“If they want money, they’ll have to bring crops into town,” Nicole said. Julia nodded, but she still looked worried. She wasn’t the only one. In all the hard times Nicole had back in the United States, she’d never missed a meal, or even come close. Going hungry because there was no food was something she’d seen on the news, flashed into her living room by satellite from somewhere else. That it could happen to her… With all the horrors she’d seen since she came to Carnuntum, she was a fool if she thought she’d be immune to any of them. She had to plan ahead. If she could lay in a supply, she’d better do it soon. And not just for herself, either. For Lucius — because if he starved to death, all his future died with him, and Nicole with it.
Later that afternoon, Brigomarus came by: his first visit since the city fell. Nicole couldn’t really fault him for taking this long to do his brotherly duty. She hadn’t exactly taken pains to make sure he was all right, either. When he was well past the door and within smelling distance of the bar, he sniffed and nearly gagged. “Phew! Smells like somebody dumped a pisspot in here.”
“That’s how it’s supposed to smell,” Nicole answered tartly. “It keeps the Germans away.”
“Keeps the customers away, too, I shouldn’t wonder,” Umma’s brother said.
“Customers are the least of my worries right now,” Nicole shot back.
“Really? ‘ Brigomarus raised an eyebrow. “I would have thought your family was the least of your worries. Didn’t you even stop to wonder if Tabica and I were alive?”